LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2010, Page 201

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Seminary and University Education
Lay Ministry Colloquy Admission and Curriculum
3.8.3.5.8 Before submitting an application to the lay ministry colloquy program, each prospective applicant shall have been a communicant member in good standing of a congregation of the Synod for at
least the past two years and shall possess a bachelor’s degree from an
accredited institution. Additional admission requirements may be established by the Board for University Education in consultation with the
(Synod) Colloquy Committee for Commissioned Ministry and campus
program directors.
3.8.3.5.8.1 Students shall complete eight courses in biblical interpretation, church history, the Lutheran Confessions, doctrine, the beliefs
of other religious bodies, and the ministry of the lay minister.
(a) The courses shall be taken in a traditional classroom setting from a
Synod college/university, with faculty of a Synod college/university
teaching via CUEnet, or in another setting with the prior approval of
the Board for University Education.
(b) Students shall complete an internship under the supervision of a
Synod institution offering a bachelor’s degree leading to lay ministry certification or one year of successful lay ministry in an LCMS
congregation.
Director of Parish Music Colloquy Admission and Curriculum
3.8.3.5.9 Before submitting an application to the director of parish music colloquy program, each prospective applicant shall have been
a communicant member in good standing of a congregation of the
Synod for at least the past two years and shall possess a bachelor’s
degree from an accredited institution. Additional admission requirements may be established by the Board for University Education
in consultation with the (Synod) Colloquy Committee for Commissioned Ministry and campus program directors.
3.8.3.5.9.1 Students shall complete eight courses in biblical interpretation, church history, the Lutheran Confessions, doctrine, the beliefs
of other religious bodies, and the ministry of the director of parish
music.
(a) The courses shall be taken in a traditional classroom setting from a
Synod college/university, with faculty of a Synod college/university
teaching via CUEnet, or in another setting with the prior approval of
the Board for University Education.
(b) Students shall complete an internship under the supervision of a
Synod institution offering a bachelor’s degree leading to director
of parish music certification or one year of successful parish music
ministry in an LCMS congregation.
Director of Family Life Ministry Colloquy Admission and Curriculum
3.8.3.5.10 Before submitting an application to the director of family
life ministry colloquy program, each prospective applicant shall have
been a communicant member in good standing of a congregation of the
Synod for at least the past two years and shall possess a bachelor’s degree from an accredited institution. Additional admission requirements
may be established by the Board for University Education in consultation with the (Synod) Colloquy Committee for Commissioned Ministry
and campus program directors.
3.8.3.5.10.1 Students shall complete eight courses in biblical interpretation, church history, the Lutheran Confessions, doctrine, the beliefs
of other religious bodies, and the ministry of the director of family life
education.
(a) The courses shall be taken in a traditional classroom setting from a
Synod college/university, with faculty of a Synod college/university
teaching via CUEnet, or in another setting with the prior approval of
the Board for University Education.
(b) Students shall complete an internship under the supervision of a
Synod institution offering a bachelor’s degree leading to family life
ministry certification or one year of successful family life ministry
in an LCMS congregation.

Board of Regents
Concordia University St. Paul, MN

201

5-27

To Revise Bylaw re Admission to Commissioned
Ministry by Colloquy
Preamble
The 2007 Synod Handbook (Bylaw 3.8.3.5) states:

Colloquy programs prepare men and women who are currently serving in ministry roles for membership in the Synod.
(a) Colloquy programs ensure that those who seek to join the Synod
have been educated in theology, have become oriented to service
in the Synod, and have demonstrated the professional and spiritual
attributes that the Synod expects of its members.
(b) Qualified applicants are competent workers in the field for which
they seek colloquy; therefore, colloquy does not provide basic
preparation for the field of service (emphasis added). For example,
colloquy does not provide courses in lesson preparation; rather, it
provides a theological education to professionally qualified teachers.

As stated, the colloquy process was designed to accommodate
teachers who had received teacher certification from a non-Synod
school. Having met the same teaching preparation standards, these
individuals needed only to add the missing theology courses. That
operational paradigm fails when applied to other commissioned
ministries.
Other than a very few programs in other denominations, “basic
preparation” does not exist for directors of Christian education
(DCEs) outside of those programs offered through our Synod’s
schools. Our DCE preparation institutions provide the highest level
of academic excellence in preparing individuals for ministry who
possess a wide array of skills and understandings as related to educational ministry in the Church. Most of these programs consist of
more coursework than is present in a typical major. To assume that
an individual without these courses has an adequate knowledge base
and needs only a set of theology courses along with two general “DCE
courses” is akin to expecting a person prepared as an engineer to be
certified as a teacher with just the theology courses and two teacher
preparation courses.
All of the Synod’s schools offering DCE certification have the
wherewithal to deliver postbaccalaureate programs for individuals
seeking DCE certification (five of the six schools already manage
their programs in this manner). The Board for University Education
(BUE) has already entrusted these schools with the task of managing an appropriate curriculum to prepare DCEs—a committee of five
individuals from a variety of backgrounds would be hard pressed to
provide the necessary oversight to manage the intricacies of DCE
preparation.
It is for these and other reasons that the DCE program directors
from the six universities providing DCE certification seek to either:
a) modify the existing BUE memorial to require a standardized DCE
certification colloquy only at institutions that have DCE certification
programs, so that curricular requirements can be maintained; or
b) omit DCE certification from the commissioned ministries served
through the colloquy option, allowing programs to certify individuals through a postbaccalaureate program.

Whereas, The 2007 Synod Handbook states that “colloquy does
not provide basic preparation for the field of service” (3.8.3.5); and
Whereas, Director of Christian education (DCE) programs
throughout the Concordia University System have a fairly standardized program of study consisting of up to 56 semester hours of
DCE-specific course content (not including internship and standardized theology coursework); and
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