# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1956_S747
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

ct 8 ORCL ARE LE ORIOLE ARE

MISCELLANEOUS MATTERS 747

in more than 70 foreign countries. With the exception of Japan,
Hong Kong, and the Philippines, they are countries in which we
have no foreign mission complement. Where no Lutheran chap-
lain is assigned to such contingents, a personal ministry is an
impossibility. The Lutheran soldier, sailor, or airman must depend
solely on the literature mailed him by the home congregation and
the Commission.

The Lutheran Service Commission —the co-operative agency
of our church and the National Lutheran Council —is directing
its major concern overseas. To the 40 parish and service centers
stateside it added during the last three years four overseas centers:
two in Japan; one in Formosa; one in Germany. It assists our
missionaries in a local project in Hong Kong and Hawaii. It is
working on the red-tape problem in the Philippines and Okinawa.
It is surveying other areas in Europe.

Literature was mentioned. The Commission continues to
supply each new enrollee with an initial kit containing a Service
Prayer Book, a Lutheran identification tag, and a few appropriate
tracts. To this a wallet-size directory of all military contact pastors
was added recently. A monthly mailing of the devotional pam-
phlet Loyalty — Christ and Country and a directory of Lutheran
Church — Missouri Synod Chaplains and Lutheran Service Centers
are still being sent; also a quarterly serviceman’s news magazine,
Double-Time. As mentioned above, these materials should be
supplemented by regular mailings of congregational bulletins,
church publications, devotional booklets, and, above all, personal
letters. The Commission has offered a suggested outline of how
the home church can serve her members in the military in the
Armed Forces Committee Manual, published in 1955 and mailed
to all Missouri Synod pastors. A booklet on pre-induction orienta-
tion for the use of home pastors is now being prepared in co-
operation with the Walther League. It will be sent to pastors
this fall.

A constantly increasing ministry is necessitated by the growth
of the Veterans Administration program. The number of VA facili-
ties has steadily increased from about 75 in 1945 to 155 today —
and will continue to increase. (The peak of service to veterans of
World War I will not be reached till 1970.) The patients in these
hospitals, though often called “forgotten men,” are not overlooked
by our church. To serve them — specifically the Lutherans — we
have 11 full-time VA chaplains, 19 part-time VA chaplains, three

full-time hospital pastors serving directly under the Commission

(with a request for a fourth), and 140 parish and institutional
Lutheran pastors serving as volunteers. This ministry is not one