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LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2023, Page 173

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

OFFICER, BOARD, AND COMMISSION REPORTS
in the best sense. Pursue, retain, and appropriately compensate theology professors. Place them at the center of the university’s life.
Let them bring theological insight to administrative decisions and
student concerns. One of your theology faculty spoke at length with
members of the Black Student Union and was well received by
these Christian students. He helped them to see the goodness of the
Bible’s perspective on race and racism and to understand that diversity need not include errant views of marriage and human sexuality. Be uncommon by requiring regular catechesis for all faculty in
Lutheran doctrine. Catechesis takes years, not a single hour in a day
of new faculty orientation.
Be uncommon by calling a theologian pastor to be the next president of CUWAA. Let him fill his cabinet with the people he needs
to assist him with the knowledge and experience he lacks. That
worked for President Ferry, and the institution was blessed remarkably because of it. It can work for the next president too.
Be uncommon by focusing on what Concordia can do better
than all other universities, not by trying to look like all the other
universities. Be competitive by being truly uncommon. Double
down on the liberal arts. Emphasize philosophy, languages, rhetoric, critical thinking, ethics, and biblical humanism. Read the
Scriptures, Luther, Dante, Milton, Aristotle, and C.S. Lewis more
than Kendi, Hannah-Jones, DiAngelo, and Gladwell. Emphasize
the uncommon nature of a science faculty that values science and
confesses a Creator. Celebrate and strengthen what Concordia has,
before looking to acquire what it does not have.
Be uncommon by training students not primarily for careers but
for vocations in the God-ordained estates of church, family, and
society. I know you believe this.
Concordia can thrive. It can be a modest-sized but mighty institution that exposes students awash in secular ideologies and identities to the washing and renewal of the Holy Spirit, giving them
eternal baptismal identities. It can be a powerhouse in the LCMS’
wonderful CUS, churning out zealous and faithful church workers and pious, well-rounded, deep-thinking laymen and laywomen
who will be assets in their Lutheran congregations and broader
communities. It can draw students seeking an excellent liberal arts
education free from the narrow-mindedness of modern progressivism, and then graduate them equipped with the knowledge of genuine truth, beauty, and goodness. It can do all this and weather the
storms threatening higher education. But its current trajectory is too
common. What it needs is something truly uncommon: a crystalclear confession of Jesus Christ.
By God’s grace, Concordia can be an uncommon beacon of
hope, a university set on a hill, built on the foundation of Jesus
Christ. As the CUW seal says, Timor Domini principium sapientiae.
“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”
Matthew C. Harrison, President

173

R64

Ecclesiastical Visitation
of Concordia University Texas
By the Office of the President,
The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod
This report was publicly promised to the Synod. Since my
visitation and delivery of a report to the Board of Regents,
the Board of Regents has expressed willingness to reconsider
their November 2022 governance decision and to address
issues raised in the report. I am very thankful they expressed
this willingness along with a commitment to the Synod. I remain hopeful for a positive outcome and our common work
together in shared mission and ministry.

Introduction
On April 20–22, 2022, consistent with the duties and responsibilities given my office by the Constitution and Bylaws of The
Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS), which also govern
Concordia University Texas (CTX), I conducted an ecclesiastical
visitation of the university. This is a summary of the report I sent
to the CTX Board of Regents (BOR) with some changes made in
response to a reply by CTX President Dr. Don Christian.
I announced my intention to conduct this visitation in a March
31, 2022, letter to Dr. Christian. I wrote, in part:
I am taking this action because Concordia has been such
a precious blessing to the LCMS, to her Gospel-defined mission, and to countless thousands. This is a fitting time for a
visitation, as the CTX Board of Regents recently expressed
its desire to administer the university in a manner less directly
connected to the national Synod. I am also acting because of
concerns addressed to me by lay and clergy members of the
Synod, CUS representatives, current and former faculty, and
students of CTX.
CTX has been established by the congregations of the
Synod, and its Board of Regents and administration are responsible to them for its faithful operation. The congregations allow the school great freedom in accomplishing its
mission, but that mission is defined “within the broad assignment of the Synod” (Bylaw 3.10.6.1). Concordia, as an
“agency” of the Synod, has a sacred responsibility to operate in accord with the bounds of the confession of the Synod
(“the written Word of God as the only rule and norm of faith
and practice,” and in accordance with the Symbolical Books
of the Evangelical Lutheran Church), as expressed in Article
II of our Constitution.
The President of Synod “has the supervision regarding the
doctrine and administration of … all such as are employed by
the Synod” (Article XI B 1 b). “It is the President’s duty to
see to it that all the aforementioned are acting according with
the Synod’s Constitution, to admonish all who in any way depart from it, and, if such admonition is not heeded, to report
such cases to the Synod” (Article XI B 2).

Composition and Methods of the Visitation
The visitation team:
Rev. Dr. Matthew C. Harrison, President, The Lutheran
Church—Missouri Synod
2023 Convention Workbook