LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1995, Page 66

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66 REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT

the world, “This is what we believe, teach, and confess—
and also practice.”

Committee 4: Program and Finance

To the members of Committee 4: Ours is the time of un-
precedented: opportunity and challenge in the Lord! Look-
ing through the overtures before your committee, one of the
most significant issues you face has to do with full finan-
cial openness and disclosure. It is totally appropriate for
the members of our Synod to expect full financial openness
and disclosure at every level of our synodical structure.
Wherever I go, people in the Synod ask me whether we as a
Synod are practicing full disclosure. My response is that we
are working toward that goal but have not yet fully
achieved it. It is clear that our people do desire full finan-
cial openness and disclosure, and rightly so.

I would like to draw the attention of Committee 4 to the
Task Force on Finances Report and my own letter to the
Synod regarding this report. These materials are printed
in the Workbook (Reports R1-8-04 and R1-8-05). The Task
Force on Finances did some very careful work and arrived
at very perceptive conclusions, While our Synod’s Board of
Directors approved many of the task force’s recommenda-
tions, there were also some that were declined due to a dif-
ference of opinion between the task force and the Board of
Directors. I believe your committee also has a copy of the
Board of Directors’ response to the task force on Finances.
Your committee would be well advised to take a close look
at the task force report and also look closely at the Board of
Directors’ Overture 4-06 concerning full disclosure. The
other overtures concerning full disclosure will no doubt
prove helpful as you make decisions in this regard (Over-
tures 4-01 to 4-09). ,

Also significant for your committee’s consideration is the
call for the establishment of a Chief Financial Officer
(Overture 4-13). The Task Force on Finances report (R1-8-
04) has significant observations in this regard. The matter
of Vice-President—Finance/Treasurer is another issue to
which your committee will want to give prime attention.
Perhaps a clarifying word on this issue is in order to give
guidance to our Synod as we consider the duties and re-
sponsibilities of this elected position.

Committee 5: Higher Education

Committee 5, ours is the time of unprecedented oppor-
tunity and challenge in the Lord! Your committee has many
overtures to consider, but the most lengthy is the overture
submitted by the Board for Higher Education calling for
significant revisions in the Bylaws of our Synod governing
our system of Higher Education (Overture 5-25). This is a
very important issue. It is not possible for me to go into
great detail in this presentation, but what is clear is that
your committee will need to scrutinize these proposed
changes very carefully. I have offered my more detailed ob-
servations in my letter to your floor committee chairman.

I believe the Board for Higher Education needs to be
asked by your committee to provide clear rationale for the
many and numerous overtures suggesting changes to the
Bylaws. In some cases, changes are suggested which do not
seem at all necessary to serve the desired outcome of the

Bylaw changes. I have a genuine concern that some of the
proposed Bylaw changes would seem to move our schools,
especially our colleges, further away from the Synod. I
would also question the wisdom of the proposed change to
Bylaw 6.03 h and the proposed deletion of Bylaw 6.03 j. To
me, these changes would remove the Synod’s Board of Di-
rectors from the picture in its role as custodian of the
Synod’s property and turn the matter of property decisions
over to the Concordia University System. I am not sure how
wise it would be to remove this supervisory function for
CUS properties from our Synod’s elected Board of Direc-
tors. ;

I also have some concerns regarding the changes sug-
gested for our colloquy system. I wonder how wise it would
be to remove our seminary faculties from involvement in
establishing standards for the colloquy process (proposed

- Bylaw 6.89 b) or in approving those who meet the estab-

lished standards (Bylaw 6.89 c). I notice also that several
colloquy categories are eliminated all together (current By-
laws 6.91 3, 4, and 5). There are no detailed proposals to
replace them. It would be my feeling that it is ill-advised
for your floor committee to approve the removal of several
key Bylaws governing the colloquy process without know-
ing precisely what is supposed to replace them, and without
having an adequate opportunity to evaluate and possibly
recommend alternative routes to the ministry for the con-
vention’s approval.

If your committee should feel that the proposed Bylaw
changes are of such an extensive nature that they require
further study, it may be worth considering whether or not
to return the overture to the-Board for Higher Education
for elaboration, clarification, and/or modification during the
next triennium. This may be particularly appropriate in
light of the CCM ruling and the work of the Independent
Blue-Ribbon Committee on Structure which I have recently

- appointed.

It may also be worth your committee’s consideration as
to whether or not we need at this time to evaluate our en-
tire system of higher education (Overtures 5-15, 5-16, 5-18,
5-20, 5-21). Many private colleges in this country started
out as church-owned institutions, created for the purpose
of providing church workers. However, many of these pri-
vate colleges have lost the primary mission for which they
were created. This certainly is not the direction we as a
church body want to head in the future.

It may be wise to create a committee independent of the
Concordia University System which could take a very close
look at our system of higher education. Overture 5-18 sug-
gests a number of helpful points which your committee may
wish to consider in this regard. Our Synod has a great op-
portunity and challenge to train church workers for the
years to come. Nobody can do this better than we, if we
keep our standards high and our institutions strong and
healthy.

Committee 6: Human Care

Again, ours is the time of unprecedented opportunity
and challenge in the Lord. Committee 6, while you may not
have as many overtures as some of the other committees,
nonetheless, your committee is all about the second point: