# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1905_S48
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

48 Proceedings of the 26th General or

students from these parts should be spared such a disastrous
change of institutions in the middle of their gymnasium years, and
the not inconsiderable additional expenses that come with it; for
it is precisely these points that give many parents pause, so that,
although otherwise willing, they cannot find the necessary
cheerfulness to give up their sons to study. We mention here in
passing that Concordia is about 500 miles from each of the existing
full gymnasiums. Our students from Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma,
Colorado, and Texas must therefore, once they have finished the
institution at Concordia, travel a considerable distance further to
continue their studies at the full gymnasium. How necessary and
useful the expansion and completion of this institution is has also
been recognized by the Western District at its last session, which
gave expression to this conviction by resolving unanimously and
with great cheerfulness to recommend this proposal to the
Reverend Delegate Synod. And that the same conviction prevails
throughout the West and Southwest of our synod, we believe we
may confidently conclude from the many personal conversations
and private letters on the subject.

"Finally, as far as the present circumstances of this institution
are concerned, now is in fact a favorable time for its expansion
and completion. The top class of this institution numbers 25
students. Since graduating students do not tend to distribute
themselves between the two full gymnasiums but rather to enter
one or the other as a body, these students would swell the Secunda
of whichever institution they chose to an unwieldy size and would
likely force the establishment of a parallel class — which, as
experience has taught, was in its time perhaps a necessary evil,
but an evil nonetheless. For the institution at Concordia, however,
the number of students named above would furnish a substantial
Secunda class, and since we hope, God willing, to take in at least
40 new students each in the following two school years as well,
we might well stand, after two years, as a full gymnasium with the
quite substantial number of 170 to 180 students, and might, after
two years, already be able to supply a quite substantial contingent
to the body of theological students in St. Louis.

"If, then, as we wish and hope, the Reverend Synod can convince
itself that the good of the Church, and thus its own interest, calls
for the expansion and completion of the Progymnasium at
Concordia into a full gymnasium, it will also expect nothing other
than that new sacrifices will be necessary for that