LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1983, Page 56

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56 PARISH, YOUTH. AND COMMUNICATION SERVICES

panded, and the rubrics affected are altered accordingly. This
book contains some additions over the ‘Pew Edition,” particu-
larly certain indexes. The addition of the notes on the liturgy
should prove to be of significant value in pointing out appro-
priate historical, theological. and practical aspects in the
respective services and rites.

Early sales of the new service books have far exceeded
expectations. As of October 1982, for instance, Concordia
Publishing House had sold/ distributed well over halfa million
copies of the ‘Pew Edition” of Lutheran Worship. It is esti-
mated that approximately 950,000 copies of The Lutheran
Hymnal(1941) are’ were in use in the Synod. Again, in the brief
span of two months 2,300 copies of Lutheran Worship Altar
Book were sold.

To relieve the heavy workload of the Commission on
Worship and its staff of but two people (executive and secre-
tary) and to expedite and facilitate the Synodwide introductory
process of Lutheran Worship, late in 1980 the commission
appointed two adjunct committees—the Introductory Process
Committee (IPC) and the Introductory Materials Committee
(IMC). Members of the IPC were: Dr. David Held, chairman,
Dr. Hugo J. Gehrke, Mr. Walter Gresens, Mr. Fredric W.
Kamprath, and the Rev. Thomas J. Windsor. Members of the
IMC were: The Rev. Dr. Roger D. Pittelko, chairman, Dr.
Dennis Janko, the Rev. Charles McClean, and the Rev. Martin
Taddey. On the Saturdays during October and November of
1981 approximately 400 congregational cluster workshops
were conducted by leaders (pastor, musician, and educator)
selected by their respective District Presidents and previously
trained by six members of the aforementioned committees.
Each workshop included approximately six representatives
(pastor, organist, choir director, worship committee personnel,
elder, education leader) from each of the 15 to 18 area congre-
gations invited to participate at a specified location. It is
estimated that these workshops touched some 12,000 people.
The response to Lutheran Worship (although the actual book
had not as yet appeared on the market) was extremely hearten-
ing and gratifying. The cooperation of the District offices and
their respective Presidents and the enthusiasm and painstak-
ing efforts exhibited by the leaders of the workshops were
nothing short of phenomenal.

The cost of these introductory events, plus that of the vast
bulk of introductory materials distributed, was borne by a
grant of $175,000 from Lutheran Brotherhood, a fraternal
benefit society in Minneapolis, Minn.

In the process of producing the aforementioned service
books, pastors frequently expressed the desire that The Lu-
theran Agenda (1948), a companion volume to The Lutheran
Hymnal (1941), be updated and that it include various addi-
tional rites necessary in the worship life of the congregations.
In its report to the 1981 convention, the Commission on
Worship, considering this a valid need, requested convention
authorization to proceed with such a project. Two overtures
appeared in the Convention Workbook, 1981. In consequence,
the convention adopted Res. 3-13:

WHEREAS. Pastors are asking for an agenda which would include
new and updated forms, rites, and occasional services helpful in the
worship of the Synod; and

WHEREAS, The Commission on Worship has found the need valid
and requests the authorization to proceed with such a project; and

WHEREAS, According to Bylaw 11.115, such a service book shal]
be given official status only by a convention of the Synod after a
process of exposure and testing has taken place; therefore be it

Resolved, That the Synod authorize the Commission on Worship
to prepare such an agenda in keeping with Bylaw 11.115; and be it
further

Resolved, That the Commission on Worship present this new
agenda to the next convention of the Synod for acceptance as an
official service book of the Synod.

With the adoption of Resolution 2-04A by the 1981 conven-
tion of the Synod, the Commission on Worship was placed
under the Board for Parish Services, formerly the Board of
Parish Education. This newly created program board would
now include the earlier functions of the boards or commissions
of Parish Education, Church Literature, Worship, Lay Higher
Education, and Services to the Mentally Retarded.

Whereas previously the Commission on Worship, as a self-
standing synodical commission, reported directly to theSynod,

affording the Synod the vital decision-making role, the newly
named and constituted Standing Committee on Worship would
now report to the Board for Parish Services and through that
board to the Synod. Furthermore, instead of a Commission on
Worship consisting of seven members, appointed by the Presi-
dent of the Synod in consultation with the Vice-Presidents, the
newly constituted Standing Committee on Worship would
consist of a small group of five specialists, appointed by the
respective program board, and would provide professional or
technical assistance to the Board for Parish Services.

Immediately prior to the 1981 convention the Commission
on Worship consisted of the following: The Rev. Dr. Alfred
Fremder, chairman, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis; Dr. Ralph
C. Schultz, secretary, Concordia College, Bronxville, N. Y.; the
Rev. Dr. Roger D. Pittelko, pastor of Holy Spirit Lutheran
Church, Elk Grove Village, Ill.; Mr. Norman Troyke, Pitts-
burgh, Pa.; Dr. Paul Bunjes, Concordia College, River Forest,
Ill.: Dr. Henry Lettermann, Concordia College, River Forest,
Ill. and the Rev. Dr. Norman E. Nagel, Valparaiso University,
Valparaiso, Ind. Dr. Fred L. Precht served as executive secre-
tary. The Rev. Dr. Robert C. Sauer, First Vice-President of the
Synod. served as the synodical President’s representative.

In the restructuring process, the normal size of a standing
committee was considered to be three members. The huge task
of producing additional new service books for the Synod’s
congregations prompted the Board of Directors to permit a
standing committee of five members. The Board for Parish
Services subsequently appointed the following to serve on the
Standing Committee on Worship: The Rev. Dr. Roger Pittelko,
the Rev. Charles J. Evanson, Dr. Paul Bunjes, the Rev. Dr.
Alfred Fremder, and the Rev. Dr. Norman Nagel. In organizing
itself, Dr. Pittelko was elected chairman; the Rev. Charles
Evanson, secretary.

In one of the early meetings of the newly constituted
Standing Committee on Worship, the question arose as to who,
in the light of Res. 3-13, is responsible for both the preparation
of the manuscripts for the new agenda and the field testing
process. The committee resolved to request an official opinion
from the Commission on Constitutional Matters (CCM). In its
meeting of March 5, 1982, the CCM ruled as follows:

1. Even after the last convention had restructured various
boards, thereby making the Commission on Worship a standing
committee of the Board for Parish Services, the convention never-
theless in Res. 3-13 later in the convention declared that the
development of a Lutheran Agenda was to be the responsibility of
the Commission on Worship and that the commission was to carry it
through to conclusion.

2. In view of the principle that the Board for Parish Services is to
be the board which deals with the parishes through the Districts, it
might be advisable to have the method of field testing determined as
a mutual decision of both the Board for Parish Services and the
Standing Committee on Worship, since the convention itself had
failed to carry out its Bylaw responsibility to prescribe the manner in
which such a product should be tested.

In accordance with Bylaw 11.115 of Res. 3-15, and after
consultation with the Board for Parish Services, the Commis-
sion on Worship developed a plan for field testing. In October of
1982 the Commission on Worship sent the first drafts of the
various rites to be included in the new agenda to all pastors,
teachers, professors, and deaconesses in the Synod, together
with a covering letter soliciting comments, criticisms, and
suggestions for improvement. In January of 1983 the Commis-
sion met to assess and evaluate the validity of the suggestions
received from the field and to make, where deemed necessary
and judicious, emendations in the respective rites. The final
result of this field testing process was put into the Convention
Workbook, 1983, first of all for discussion at preconvention
Circuit meetings and secondly for examination by convention
delegates. It is the hope of the commission that the convention
will approve these rites and accept them as essentially con-
stituting the contents of an official service book of the Synod, to
be entitled Lutheran Worship Agenda.

The production of a new service book and hymnal plus its
companion volumes invariably calls for certain spinoffs of
liturgical and music materials, directly or indirectly relating to
the new service books—for organ, choir, instruments, and the
like. Itis planned that the Committee on Worship not only give
direction to such materials but that its members also become