# LCMS Convention Workbook_St. Louis Missouri_1969_S162 # Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration) 162 CHURCH RELATIONS Someone may have been patiently waiting a long while to make the interjection that in and for this matter of “consensus” for “declaration” of proposed “altar and pulpit fellowship between The Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod and The American Lutheran Church” statements had been made to the effect “not to dig up the past.” However, in judicial courtroom pro- cedure cross-examination for clarity or for correction or for refutation is common legal practice and recognized procedure, but it must refer and be related to something introduced while processing the case in trial and in order to establish the true and relevant facts for the matter in hand. This is not only proper legal procedure but the logical course in sound and consistent reasoning for the establishment of facts and the right administra- tion of justice. Therefore to bring into reference past records in intersynodical doctrinal matters is in this instance fully proper, and not only proper but required by reference in the 1967 Proceedings to this matter, as printed in the 1967 Convention Workbook, where in the “Joint Statement and Declaration” on p. 421, in para- graphs 3 and 4, past history of intersynodical meetings is brought into reference for some implication in linking together the present “consensus.” However, above all that, it is demanded by God’s Word for the solemn and right consideration of the Scriptural basis and principles in the special matter proposed: Does in deed and fact Scriptural “consensus exist for pulpit and altar fellow- ship between The Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod and The American Lutheran Church”? A quotation which sheds light on this matter and gives the general observations of doctrinal conditions between The Lutheran Church — Missouri Synod and the former American Lutheran Church and which still is displayed in the present merged body, The American Lutheran Church, is the following report in part as pre- sented by the official Doctrinal Unity Committee, Pro- ceedings, 1947, pp. 494, 497, and 498: Efforts on our part to arrange a meeting with the Fellowshin Committee of the American Lutheran Church failed until August 23, 1946. At that meeting we received what was to us disappointing information. It was stated that in many sections of the American Lutheran Church there prevailed an apathy, a reluctance, to study the Doc- trinal Affirmation, and that this document did not receive a favorable recevtion where it was studied. that only three Districts of the American Lutheran Church ap- proved it. but not enthusiastically, that some Districts reiected it, and that some Districts took no action at Now what is the situation? There are chiefly three difficulties standing in the way of fellowship with the American Lutheran Church: 1. The manifest lack of doctrinal unity. Although the members of the Fellowship Committee told us that they were not aware of doctrinal differences between our two bodies, yet reports indicate the existence of doctrinal dif- ferences. Writes the editorial staff of the Lutheran Wit- ness (1947, p.76): “We have reported the fact that in some conferences our men have found A.L.C. pastors taking a wrong stand on conversion, inspiration, pre- destination, and other doctrines. We have reported the action of several A.L.C. conferences ... which definitely revived old accusations against the Missouri Synod... . Differences in doctrine still exist in various areas ... be- tween the A.L.C. and Missouri.” It would seem to us that if doctrinal unity actually prevailed, it would not be difficult to formulate a document acceptable to all con- cerned expressing such agreement. 2. The difference in conviction regarding the degree of doctrinal unity required for fellowship. The American Lutheran Church in its resolution adopted at Appleton makes mention of an Overture on Unity to which the American Lutheran Church agreed, and which proposes that each Lutheran church body remain faithful to its particular confessional statement without subscribing for itself to the confession of any other Lutheran church body. Thus by ignoring the existing differences in doc- trine, fellowship is to be established by resolution, rather than by actual agreement in doctrine as Scripture re- quires. 3. The membership of the American Lutheran Church in the American Lutheran Conference. Nine years have elapsed since the American Lutheran Church gave the promise in its Declaration, Proceedings, p.226: “At the same time we recognize it as our duty to do what we can to bring about the acceptance of these doctrinal state- ments by the bodies with which we are now in fellow- ship.” To date we have not been informed that any definite action had been taken in that direction. Our Synod has insisted and still insists that fellowship must be based on unity in all doctrines clearly revealed in Holy Writ. That type of unity alone agrees with Saint Paul’s admonition quoted in the Constitution of our Synod under the caption “Object,” to wit, 1 Cor. 1:10: “Now, I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you, but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judg- ment.” If church bodies can do no more than pledge that each group be loyal to its own distinctive confession, they are not speaking the same thing, nor are they joined together in the same mind and judgment. The present situation forbids us to propose that altar and pulpit fellowship be established with the American Lutheran Church. From the above quotations of just one particular part of official Missouri Synod intersynodical reports it must be figured that to present pertinent matter in detail would require extensive documentation of many typed, or even printed, pages as taken from Missouri Synod Proceedings, and from other official sources, to bring the right description of previous actual conditions. Here also there is to be remembered that the official notice re memorials as published in the Lutheran Witness Re- porter of Dec. 1, 1968, had the succinct and terse sug- gestion: “And please be brief.” In consequence a docu- mentary supplementation would have to be prepared for this memorial, to further substantiate by document, page, and direct verbatim contextual quotation the fact from past intersynodical meetings, and also from the three documents of the intersynodical committee: “Grace Alone,” “Scripture Alone,” and “The Doctrine of the Church in the Lutheran Confessions,” and from its “Joint Statement and Declaration,” as they read, that no kind of “consensus exists” to the effect of doctrinal unity “for altar and pulpit fellowship between The Lu- theran Church — Missouri Synod and The American Lutheran Church.” In conclusion, therefore, passages of Holy Scripture, according to the Revised Standard Version translation, will now be quoted which forbid in their simple and clear sense and meaning and application under the above circumstances the practice of altar and pulpit fel- lowship and of any other kind of ecclesiastical fellow- shiping with such church bodies or such local congrega- tions or their members.