# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1956_S373
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

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MISSIONS

Il. Special Advisory Home Mission Committees
A. Home Mission Survey Committee

For some time our Board has felt that the entire Home Mis-
sion program of our Synod ought to be restudied. For that reason
we undertook a self-study or a self-evaluation program. We
appointed three men to assist us in this self-study. They are:
Rev. Victor Albers, Atlantic District; Rev. Thno Janssen, English
District; and Rev. Alfred Winter, Central District. It is hoped to
complete this self-study by the fall of 1956. The results and con-
clusions reached are to constitute the basis for the program of
our next general mission conference scheduled for January of 1957.
A vote of thanks is due the members of the Survey Committee.

B. Rural Life Commission

The Houston Convention asked our Board to appoint a Rural
Life Commission, which was to give further study and attention
to rural church work. The following men were appointed to this
commission: Rev. H. Wiechmann, Freistadt, Wis., chairman; Prof.
Wm. Baehr, Kansas State College, Manhattan, Kans., secretary;
Rev. Wm. Stelling, Freistatt, Mo.; Mr. Charles Brandt, St. Paul,
Minn.; and Mr. Herman Wachtel, Altamont, Ill. This commission
has set as its objectives the following:

1. To call attention to the Scriptural principles as they apply
particularly to rural church work.

2. To help develop proper attitudes toward rural church work
and rural life on the part of rural people, rural churches, church
workers, urban churches, and the faculties at our various schools.

3. To call the attention of our preparatory schools and semi-
naries to the training necessary in order to prepare adequately
the workers for rural areas.

4. To indicate to rural congregations various ways in which
they can be more effective in building the Kingdom in their
respective areas.

The Rural Life Commission has endeavored to achieve the
above objectives chiefly by conducting a Rural Life Institute each
summer in co-operation with Valparaiso University, by issuing
a Rural Life Newsletter, by seeking opportunities to speak on the
subject of Rural Life, and by submitting articles on the subject
to our various church periodicals.

Much more could be done by this commission if, like many
other denominations, we had a full-time man on the Home Mission
Staff who would give his complete attention to the subject of rural
church work.