LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2007, Page 62

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62 SYNOD REPORTS

have any doubts about this, check out the daily AM broadcasting
schedule on the KFUO Web site.) Its potential is unlimited. The
BCS earnestly asks the convention, and the church-at-large, to con-
tinue placing its full support behind the Synod’s radio ministry.

‘Point of Truth” TV:

The Synod also has a TV show, or at least it used to.

“Point of Truth,” the brainchild of Dr. Charles Manske and Dr.
Ardon Albrecht, had a five-season run as a worship-based program
featuring some of the leading lights of LCMS preachers. The show
aired worldwide to five continents via eight satellites and in the
United States on DirecTV’s Church Channel, as well as on 20 dig-
ital stations in major metropolitan areas. The ministry received sup-
port from the LCMS Board for Communication Services, the
LCMS Board of Directors, the LCMS Board for Mission Services,
and others, including Drs. Albrecht and Manske themselves. In the
end, however, after some 113 episodes had been produced, budget
realities forced “Point of Truth” out of production.

Yet, the show lives on in the form of its video-on-demand
gallery, which offers downloadable 30-minute programs featuring a
sermon and music in a full church setting, and “Point of Truth
Brief” programs, which run 15 to 20 minutes by including just the
sermon. You can watch and listen to video-on-demand “Point of
Truth” shows on your computer at www.pointoftruth.com.

If you’d like to watch and listen at a later time, you can down-
load “Point of Truth” video onto your iPod or other MP3 device.
Take Lutheran worship with you in a car, train, or plane—or to
your office or on vacation—and participate at your convenience.
You can find “Point of Truth” at the Apple iTunes directory at
www.itunes. com. After selecting “Advanced” and “Subscribe to
Podcast,” type in this URL code: pointoftruth.lcms.org/pointof
truthtv.xml. “Point of Truth” programs in all their forms prove es-
pecially useful for shut-ins or congregations that find themselves
without a pastor from time to time. The show makes it possible for
pastorless parishes to have excellent video sermons at their dis-
posal, around which otherwise normal services can be arranged.
Lutheran students of all ages, and confirmation classes, also bene-
fit from this resource as a teaching tool. What better way to teach
Law and Gospel to a confirmand than by having him or her outline
a sermon by a master Lutheran preacher?

So, while “Point of Truth” no longer is being actively produced,
and though the chances of rekindling the show anew are not likely,
the “Point of Truth” Web site does offer a rich library of programs
that can benefit an array of people in a range of ways. The BCS is
happy and honored to continue administering the video-on-demand
and podcasting facets at the “Point of Truth” site.

Intellectual Property:

It stands to reason that the Synod, a large entity, would have
numerous “marks” on file at the United States Patent and Trade-
mark Office. Some of these registered marks, including the
Synod’s tripartite-cross logo and the very name of the Synod itself,
fall under the purview of the BCS.

When these trademarks are misused, misappropriated, or in any
way infringed upon, either knowingly or unknowingly, by parties
both within and outside the Synod, the-BCS enforces our protec-
tions on the marks. Such guardianship must be vigilant, for sloppy
monitoring or enforcement can lead to a weakening of our protec-
tions.

Just in this triennium was the Synod’s name finally certified as
a wademark of The Lutheran Church—-Missouri Synod, which now
can be written, if one so wishes, as The Lutheran Church—Mis-
souri Synod®. Soon, we should be able to say the same about our
acronym, LCMS, for which the Trademark Office has completed
its final review and which was “published for opposition” on Feb.
17 of this year.

2007 Convention Workbook

If one wonders, “Is it really necessary that we register these
things?”—one need only be aware of how often our name,
acronym, and especially our logo are wrongly used. It happens with
regularity. By registering these valuable pieces of intellectual prop-
erty, we protect them from unauthorized parties and use, thus en-
suring that our marks mean only one thing: our denomination.

Assisting Officers, Boards, Commissions:

Much of what can be said in this regard already has been stated
in the previous ‘Public Affairs and Media Relations” section. In a
word, our department stands ready to help the leaders and boards of
our Synod in their communication needs however we can.

At the time of this writing in early March, BCS staffers were
involved in, among other ministries and initiatives, the Joint Sem-
inary Fund’s national offering; the RSO Process Supervision Com-
mittee; “What a Way”; Ablaze!; Fan Into Flame; KFUO; and
several projects of LCMS World Relief and Human Care, including
the “Get Real with Yourself” campaign (Lutheran Family and
Children’s Services) and the Themba Trust (relating to outreach to
young women in South Africa, where “themba” in Zulu means
“hope”).

We take seriously our Bylaw obligation to “provide resources to
the various boards, commissions, congregations, and other agen-
cies of the Synod.”

Administration:

Several positions in the department either changed hands or
were otherwise affected during the past triennium.

In April 2006, David L. Strand succeeded Rev. J. Thomas La-
packa as executive director of the BCS. Prior to this appointment,
Strand had spent some 23 years in a variety of positions at the In-
ternational Center, among them assistant to the executive director
of Stewardship and Financial Support, managing editor of The
Lutheran Witness, and director of Public Affairs and Media Rela-
tions.

At this writing, Strand also serves as Interim Director of News
and Information Services, a post made vacant by the departure of
Rev. David L. Mahsman as Director of News and Information Ser-
vices (DNIS), a job whose duties include the executive editorship
of The Lutheran Witness and Reporter.

In the aftermath of these changes, as a means of shoring up an
understaffed department—owing to the BCS’s inability to carry out
its Bylaw-given responsibility to fill the DNIS slot (more informa-
tion on that as follows)—Joe Isenhower Jr. was made managing
editor of Reporter. Meanwhile, Vicki Biggs became manager of
Public Affairs and Media Relations, and Donald Folkemer contin-
ued as managing editor of The Lutheran Witness.

The BCS’s inability to fill the position of DNIS has been a
source of frustration for the board. What follows is a chronology
of this still-unfinished pursuit:

July 2005: The BCS authorizes its editorial-search committee
to prepare a slate of candidates for DNIS that, once approved by
the full BCS, will be presented to the Council of Presidents (COP)
in time for the latter’s September 2005 meeting. (The DNIS is
unique in that it is the only International Center staff position re-
quiring the approval of a majority of district presidents.) Anticipat-
ing that one or more of its candidates for DNIS will be approved by
the COP, the BCS plans to conduct final interviews and issue a call
to the chosen candidate that November.

At this same time (July 2005), following an earlier suggestion
of the former DNIS, the BCS approves a job description for the po-
sition of Associate Director of News and Information Services
(ADNIS) and proceeds with plans to select and call a pastor to that
position. This process, however, i$ interrupted in late July when the
Synod President issues an “executive-power directive” to “hold in
abeyance the filling of any staff position under the BCS” until the