Offers Hands-On Counseling Training, More Pastoral Courses

Contact: Grant Van Leuven, Dir. of Development & Communications, 412-731-8690, 412-716-9051 cell, gvanleuven@rpts.edu

PITTSBURGH, May 13 /Christian Newswire/ -- The Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary (RPTS) in Pittsburgh announces the hire of Dr. George C. Scipione to establish and be the director of its Biblical Counseling Institute in a building the Seminary recently purchased at 7401 Penn Avenue, across the street from its Point Breeze campus. 

Scipione will also serve as adjunct professor of pastoral theology and expand the seminary's counseling course offerings.  He practices and teaches the nouthetic counseling method, which has developed over the last forty years with various applications and been popularized in the U.S. by well-known pastors and authors such as Jay Adams, John MacArthur, and Al Mohler.

"I am thrilled to have a man of Dr. Scipione's caliber in Pittsburgh," said RPTS President Dr. Jerry O'Neill. "His leadership in the start-up of our Biblical Counseling Institute will be invaluable.  He has the mind of a theologian, the humble spirit of a true servant of Christ, and the practical expertise to serve us well."

Just settling in at RPTS, Scipione will soon be traveling around the world throughout the summer to lend his nouthetic counseling expertise through teaching opportunities in California, Brazil, and the Czech Republic.  He looks forward to working at RPTS.

"I want this to be the best Biblical counseling program in the Reformed theological world training leaders for the future of the church," said Scipione. 

He says more training in Biblical counseling is a great need for pastors and their congregations:  "The Word of God needs to be publicly proclaimed from the pulpit, the street corners, and elsewhere; it also needs to be taught privately from house to house and personally one-on-one as Paul did for his three years in Ephesus.  Most pastors are weak in this area of ministry."

Dr. O'Neill describes the new institute as a milestone for the Seminary, which will turn two hundred years in 2010:  "The Biblical Counseling Institute may well prove to be the greatest single advancement in our training of pastors for gospel ministry that we have witnessed in our generation," said O'Neill. 

"Counseling needs in congregations throughout the world are enormous.  We will be able to better equip both future and current pastors who are responsible for the spiritual growth and discipleship needs of church members by expanding our courses and offering practical apprentice-like experience with Dr. Scipione."

An author of myriad articles for professional journals, Dr. Scipione also has written Timothy, Titus and You: a Workbook for Church Leaders and The Sword and the Shovel: The Battle for the Biblical Family.  He is a member of the National Association of Nouthetic Counselors, for which he also is a Supervising Fellow and a board member, and is the founder of the Institute for Biblical Counseling and Discipleship in San Diego, a ministry that trains church officers and laymen in the principles and practices of counseling based on the Word of God as a fully sufficient guide. 

Dr. Scipione has been a minister in the Orthodox Presbyterian Church for nearly 35 years. He and his wife, Eileen, will be relocating to Pittsburgh.  They have five children, two who are still living with them.