General Ordination Exam

The General Ordination Examination is an examination given annually by the Episcopal church to all candidates for ordination. The purpose of the GOE is evaluative and advisory. It offers assistance to diocesan authorities in determining a candidate's readiness for ordination and, at the same time, provides to the candidate and his or her mentors valuable guidance in planning further, continuing education.

Before 1972, each diocese conducted its own process of examination, with the result that canonical examinations varied widely from place to place. The content of the exams was influenced by the interests and concerns of individual dioceses. In 1970, the General Convention of the Episcopal Church created the General Board of Examining Chaplains to standardize the process of canonical examination for ordination. The first examination was administered in 1972.

The canons of the church (Title III, Canon 8, Section 5g) require that before ordination a candidate must be examined and show proficiency in:

• The Holy Scriptures
• Church History, including the Ecumenical Movement
• Christian Theology, including Missionary Theology and Missiology
• Christian Ethics and Moral Theology
• Studies in Contemporary Society, including Racial and Minority Groups
• Liturgics and Church Music
• Theory and practice of Ministry

The General Ordination Examination, written by the General Board of Examining Chaplains, is based on these seven areas. In preparing the questions the board assumes that candidates have completed two and a half years of seminary training or the equivalent.

The questions are designed to allow candidates to demonstrate, in an integrated and applied fashion, their grasp of what they have learned in their studies. Essay questions usually ask for answers drawn from two or three canonical areas. Some essays are closed book while others are open book, allowing the candidates to demonstrate their familiarity with Bible, Prayer Book and other resources. Shorter questions are generally based on topics from the area of Theory and Practice of Ministry, but they may call as well for knowledge of facts - facts about church history, for instance, or about the “lore” of the church - or for the kind of information that is commonly sought by lay people during inquirer's classes and adult forums.

The results of the GOE are evaluated initially by readers and members of the GBEC who do not know candidates' identities and who have no connection with their Commissions on Ministry, their seminaries or their bishops. These evaluations are reviewed by other members of the GBEC, by the Administrator of the GOE, and at the diocesan level. Candidates thus have the benefit of a series of independent evaluations.

Anonymous evaluation by persons outside the diocese guards against intentional or unintentional intrusion of personal bias into the process. The readers are concerned only to evaluate the level of proficiency which is evident in an anonymously written exam paper. Their judgments of particular examinations provide candidates with honest and thoughtful appraisals, which may be used by bishops, commissions, and candidates for a number of purposes.