LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 190

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9. STRUCTURE AND ADMINISTRATION
Hilfsprediger, “assistant pastors,” listed as advisory
in Const. Art. V B and XII 10 B. This is also the sense
of the earlier language between 1847–1917, e.g., 1847
Const. Ch. III 3, “Advisory members are those
orthodox pastors not empowered to vote by their
parishes, and all candidates for the ministry and the
teaching profession, and all representatives of
parishes of Synod besides the delegates.” (This is the
clear sense of Bylaw 4.2.3: “All nonvoting ordained
and commissioned ministers who are members of
the Synod within the district shall serve as advisory
delegates.”) With the acceptance of associate pastors
and the removal of assistant pastors from the list,
however, the constitutional language has been
deprived of its original sense in this respect. The
constitutional language needs to be adjusted to
maintain the original sense in a changed context:
that all pastors of a parish other than the designated
pastoral voter are advisory to the district
convention.
2. Language allowing multi-congregation parishes
to send additional advisory lay delegates needs to
be restored (Ov. 9-18): The earlier historical
practice in the Synod and the custom in certain
districts more recently has been to allow for
advisory lay representation from the congregations
of a multi-congregation parish that did not provide
the parish’s voting lay delegate. For example, the
1873 Handbuch (Handbook) provided: “While it is
hoped for and desired that the various
congregations of one pastor might each send its own
[lay] delegate…only one at a time can represent [as
voting lay delegate] the interests of the parish,” and
the 1899: “A parish consisting of several
congregations but having only one pastor can send
only one voting [lay] delegate. Others sent are…only
advisory members.” The commission, noting the
continued increase in the number of multicongregation parishes in the Synod, recommends
restoring this historic practice in explicit
constitutional language, to guarantee these advisory
delegates their voice at district conventions.
3. Confusion of individual membership with
convention representation and attendance
demands clarification (Ov. 9-18 and CCM Op. 192903): The dual-purpose nature of Const. Art. V A
(XII 10 A) and V B (XII 10 B) has resulted in
confusion. Not only are terms member, representative,
and delegate commingled, so is the sense. Successive
conventions have, on the one hand, added to Const.
Art. V B with the intention of adding categories of
commissioned ministers, and removed from it, on
the other, to grant to assistant pastors the ability to
represent their congregations as voting delegates.
The lists of Const. Art. V B and XII 10 B are
190 | PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2019 (67TH) LCMS CONVENTION

simultaneously permissive, extending the boundaries
of individual Synod membership, and restrictive,
preventing those so listed, including “professors at
Synod’s educational institutions” from serving as
voting members even if they are pastors called and
installed to member congregations and otherwise
eligible to serve as their congregations’ voting
delegates. As “dual calls” become more prevalent,
this has deprived at least one congregation that has
regularly called and installed a pastor to its service
(Const. Art. VI 3) of pastoral voting representation.
The CCM has suggested that this should be
corrected.
4. Opportunity to correct excessive duplication of
language and absence of chief categories of
individual membership (Ov. 9-39): Walther’s
theses and book on Church and Ministry, declared to
be the position of the Synod and the “pure doctrine”
on Church and Ministry in 1851–2 and reaffirmed in
2001 Res. 7-17A, holds that “The preaching office
[Predigtamt] is the highest office in the Church, from
which flow all other offices in the Church” (Office
Thesis VIII, The Church and the Office of the Ministry
[CPH, 2012], 284). These other public offices are the
auxiliary offices [Hilfsämter], which flow from the
chief office and assist it in various aspects of the
work of public ministry. All offices are
comprehended under the category of ministers of
religion; the preaching office consists of ministers of
religion—ordained (before 1986 and 1992 Bylaw and
Constitution changes, respectively, “ministers of the
Gospel”), and rostered members of the auxiliary
offices comprise the ministers of religion—
commissioned (before 1986 and 1992 changes,
“teachers” or “teachers and deaconesses”; now
including many added aspects of auxiliary ministry).
The list of categories of commissioned ministries
has been adjusted over time, and an attempt is being
made to do so again this convention. Were the broad
categories to be acknowledged, and the details left
to the bylaws, it would relieve the Synod of making
many changes to its constitution, requiring
congregational ratification, to add to or adjust the
names of the various offices. Related unclarities
relating to the non-listing of emeriti and the fact
that membership is available only to those
candidates who have previously been installed to a
first call in the Synod, should likewise be corrected.
5. Concordia University Wisconsin (CUW/CUWAA)
wishes to build upon the lay ministry program and
adopt new nomenclature in harmony with other
offices in the church such as director of Christian
education and director of Christian outreach. This
change would be reflected in Bylaw 2.6.1.1. The
director of church ministries (DCM) major and
Resolutions