Search for spirituality leading mid-life execs to answer higher calling

April 21, 2000
There was no burning bush, no desolate wandering, nary a voice in the wilderness. But Polly Moore knew it was time to cast aside her 18-year Genentech Inc. career for a life serving God.
"As soon as I made the decision, everything just seemed right," says Moore, who will enter Berkeley's Pacific School of Religion this fall. "Kind of `ahhhhhhhh,' `yeahhhhhhhh.'"
Mid-career converters to the ministry for the past two decades have abandoned their highrise offices for contemplative seminaries, trying to make sense of their own lives, capture the meaning of life or simply respond to some deep inner urging.
And the 20- and 30-somethings of the Internet revolution -- after cashing in their stock options or watching their paper wealth wither away -- are expected to form the genesis of classes to come.
"What happens when the dot-commers sell their options and turn 35?" says Jennifer DeWeerth, director of recruitment and admissions at Pacific School of Religion. "They're going to wonder about their spiritual health."
Already, PSR's classes fill every year with doctors, corporate executives, even lawyers who have chucked the material life to pursue the divine.