LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 213

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11. CHURCH AND CULTURE
To Give Guidance and Encourage Action on
Beginning-of-Life Issues
RESOLUTION 11-01A
Report R60 (CW, 325–29); Overture 11-01 (CW, 538)

Preamble
The 66th Regular Convention of The Lutheran Church—
Missouri Synod (LCMS) adopted Resolution 3-04, “To
Create Task Force for Study of Issues Relating to
Procreation, Fertility, and Care for the Unborn” (2016
Proceedings, 143), which affirms the Bible’s teaching that
God’s creation of human life begins at conception and that
“Children are a blessing from the Lord” (Ps. 127:3, 5). This
resolution also identified the complexities and everchanging landscape of procreation, fertility, and care for
the unborn. It noted that science and technology have
significantly changed since the publication several decades
ago of various Commission on Theology and Church
Relations (CTCR) documents and reports on life issues.
The adopted resolution called for the President of Synod to
appoint a task force to take up these issues and report back
to the next convention. The members of this task force
(including representatives from pertinent Synod offices
and entities, Lutherans For Life [LFL], the seminaries, and
laypersons who have expertise in the fields of medicine,
procreative science, theology, ethics, etc.) were specifically
asked to do the following:
• identify the important issues to be addressed to
best help and support families and parents dealing
with the issues of procreation, fertility and care of
the unborn;
• identify specific actions leading to the production
of appropriate LCMS responses to these issues.
The task force was appointed by the Synod President and
met three times during the past triennium. At those
meetings, it carefully assessed its assignment from the
Synod and heard and discussed reports on specific issues
such as procreation, medical advances in areas such as
genomics, questions raised by medical consent forms, and
questions and concerns about procreative technologies
such as in vitro fertilization (IVF).
The task force also determined that while the items raised
in the resolution all relate to human reproduction and tend
toward a consideration of technological “advances,” there
are underlying cultural assumptions and questions that
challenge the Christian. The task force agreed that it was
important to try to address “foundational matters” relative
to these questions and assumptions. For example, the
biblical view that parents are blessed with a child as a gift
of God today faces a competing view wherein children are
Resolutions

viewed more as a parental reproductive project and an
entitlement. In response to this specific concern, one
member of the task force, Dr. Gilbert Meilaender, was asked
and agreed to prepare a paper for study and discussion.
This paper, titled “The Child as a Gift of God” (Workbook,
326–29), was thoroughly discussed by the task force, and
all members agreed that the paper identifies fundamental
issues that deserve broader dissemination, study and
discussion.
WHEREAS, Children are not something we choose for
ourselves, but more correctly a heritage from the Lord,
which God freely gives and takes away in his own grace and
wisdom (Psalm 127; Gen. 30:2; Job 1:21); and
WHEREAS, The Resolution 3-04 Task Force was formed
with the mandate to study issues relating to procreation,
fertility, and care for the unborn in order to identify actions
leading to the production of appropriate LCMS responses
to these issues, and to make recommendations in the form
of appropriate overtures to the Synod’s 2019 national
convention; and
WHEREAS, The task force met on three occasions during
the past triennium for careful deliberation and discussion
of beginning-of-life issues; and
WHEREAS, The task force has identified certain proposed
“actions” for the Synod to consider; therefore be it
Resolved, That the following specific recommendations of
the task force be adopted and implemented:
• to commend the paper “The Child as a Gift of God”
(Workbook, 326–29) to members of the Synod and
Synod congregations for reflection, study and

Committee 11 Chairman Terry Forke
PROCEEDINGS OF THE 2019 (67TH) LCMS CONVENTION | 213