# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1956_S213
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

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SEMINARIES AND COLLEGES 213

that the door of opportunity for effective ministry of the Gospel
is more widely open today than ever to The Lutheran Church —
Missouri Synod. Earlier studies by the Board for Higher Education
Teported to Synod in 1950 and 1953 are confirmed, which indicated
that the synodical growth rate proceeds at an accelerated rate
over the unprecedented recent general population growth in the
United States and Canada. Studies by Synod’s Home Mission
Board indicate that the general synodical growth rate, however,
is not evenly distributed, but in some outstanding cases parallels
or follows great population thrusts taking place in the continental
United States, instead of being evenly distributed District by
District and region by region.

In the face of great opportunities for work in the kingdom
of Christ, very few are content to champion the point of view of
the defeatist who advocates a policy of synodical retrenchment,
or at least nothing more than the maintenance of the status quo
in goals and program. The opposite temptation is likely to prove
attractive to some who enthusiastically feel that every possible
chance for expansion must be seized regardless of the long-range
consequences to the church and its internal strength. The per-
sistent problem for a growing and dedicated church body is the
determination of its own objectives and the mustering of all proper
resources toward the achievement of those objectives in conformity
with the gracious will of God.

It is not surprising that such problems and possibilities of
change affect also the broad Seneral concern of the church for the
nature and function of its leadership-training system, the synodical
colleges and seminaries, for the training of pastors and teachers.

Some of the range of current thought and opinion is exhibited
in various communications that have been addressed to the Board
for Higher Education in the triennium just past, as well as in some
of the memorials which are before this convention.

Some feel that Synod should meet its obligations in the
training of pastors and teachers by a continuing and even un-
limited expansion of existing plants. There are others who hold
that the existing plant capacity should be substantially maintained,
but that the attempt should be made to increase the quantitative
output by the elimination of existing segments of the training |
program leading to a net shrinkage of the span in years of the
training program. There are others who believe that the existing
training institutions should be limited in capacity and that capacity
additions for the training system should be allowed by the develop-
ment of new schools as training units, decentralized and scattered
throughout the area concentrations of Synod’s work.