The Chicago Theological Seminary (CTS) will leave the University-owned building it has occupied for 14 years next month and will move to fully online operations in the upcoming academic year.
“The University of Chicago has been a gracious and generous institutional neighbor,” Brad Braxton, CTS’s president, wrote in a press release announcing the move last week. “This agreement allows both institutions to deploy their respective resources in ways that best serve their distinct missions. CTS is grateful, and the mission of CTS—its brave, justice-centered work—continues.”
According to the press release, the University will “resume full stewardship of the building,” located at 1407 East 60th Street, on September 1. A University spokesperson told the Maroon that plans for the space have not yet been finalized but that the University would share more information soon.
The decision to terminate CTS’s “long-term lease arrangement” with the University was mutual, according to a frequently asked questions page released by CTS. Neither CTS nor the University responded to questions about what prompted the move.
The University agreed to build the 60th Street facility as part of a 2008 deal to purchase the seminary’s former home, now the Saieh Hall for Economics. The University had given CTS a 100-year lease for $1 per year to use the new space, according to CTS financial statements. CTS moved into the building in 2012.
CTS, founded in 1855 and located in Hyde Park since the 1920s, has faced serious financial problems in recent years. The seminary stopped admitting new students to its degree programs amid annual operating deficits exceeding $1 million, the Chicago Tribune reported in April, and its press release about the 60th Street building said it would welcome back only “continuing students” this fall.
Braxton told the Tribune at the time, and the school reiterated last week, that all currently enrolled students would have a path to completing their degrees. 215 students attended CTS as of fall 2024.
Chad Schwickerath, CTS’s vice president for advancement, wrote in an email to the Maroon that the school is “moving to a fully remote operating model.” Many of the school’s programs have been held online for more than a decade, according to the press release, and 78 percent of students were fully remote in fall 2024.
CTS did not respond to questions about whether its financial issues or admissions pause were related to its departure from the building.
In 2023, UChicago purchased another building—at 55th Street and University Avenue—that housed two other seminaries, the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago and the McCormick Theological Seminary. Both schools now share a campus with the Catholic Theological Union, another seminary, in East Hyde Park.
