ILT Library Remodel

Phase One Complete

Fifteen years ago, the ILT library was comprised of around 2,000 volumes and housed in two small rooms in the basement of the Old Sanctuary facility. In fact, those two small rooms housed the entire campus of ILT. Over the last fifteen years our library has grown to ten times its original size (now holding 20,000 volumes). During this time, the library remained in that same basement. Now, the library is rising into the sun. We are pleased to announce that over the last year the ILT Library has been relocated to a ground floor building on the campus and has undergone a major remodel.

Our new library is complete with collection space for over 35,000 volumes (including space to house a 5,000-volume doctoral level special collection), and plenty of space for student and faculty research as well as on-site conference space. More than this, our library is now a place where students and faculty will feel welcome and at home in their research. In fact, when our library recently hosted the Christ School of Theology comprehensive evaluation by The Association of Theological Schools, we received many comments and compliments regarding the quality of our new library. And this is just the beginning.

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In Phase Two of our library remodel, we will expand our collection capacity to over 40,000 volumes, make our collection spaces even more inviting, and build our existing conference room into a world-class media classroom that will allow us to bring together students and scholars on-site with their peers around the world.

In Phase Three of our library remodel project, we hope to expand our special collection capacity by 20,000 volumes (giving us an overall collection capacity of 60,000 volumes), as well as provide space to house the Center for Teaching and Learning, the Office of Information Affairs, the North American Lutheran Archive (each dedicated to preserving the proclaimed Word of God, through the literature of the classical Christian tradition from a Lutheran perspective), ILT Media (dedicated to promoting the proclamation of the Word of God through the development of new literature and video productions that engages the contemporary cultural and intellectual horizon), and the ILT Think Tank (dedicated to propagating the Word of God through original research, discussion, and disputation bringing the classical Christian tradition from a Lutheran perspective into direct engagement with the contemporary intellectual and cultural horizon).

It is our hope (with the Lord’s blessing and your support) to provide more than a library. It is our hope to provide a true center for the Word in which we might facilitate and foster the proclamation of the Word by our students, our faculty, our partner congregations, pastors, evangelists, and teachers around the world.