LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2007, Page 211

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

⤓ Download .txt · copy text

SEMINARY AND UNIVERSITY EDUCATION 211

dents, and synodical officers certain powers in the area of doctrinal
supervision that do not belong to other clergy, though all clergy are
equally clergy within the one Office of the Holy Ministry. For ex-
ample, the Synod has granted to district presidents de iure humano,
the power to supervise the teaching and spiritual life of the pastors
and congregations within their district:

Each district president, in accordance with the Constitution of the
Synod, shali supervise the doctrine, the life, and the official adminis-
tration on the part of the ordained or commissioned ministers who are
members through his district or are subject to his ecclesiastical supervi-
sion, and shal] inquire intg the prevailing spiritual conditions of the con-
gregations of his district.

Thus we see that the principle that there is only one Office of
the Holy Ministry into which all who are engaged in the public
proclamation of the Gospel and administration of the sacraments
are to be ordained is not abrogated through the establishing by
human authority of grades within the office or by the doctrinal su-
pervision of some ministers by others.

Principle 3: The church may establish, by human authority, restrictions
upon the scope of the service of ministers so long as these restrictions do
not compromise the authority of the office, undermine the Gospel, or
burden the consciences of Christians by confusing human regulations
with divine commands.

We demanstrated above that the Lutheran Confessions allow
the church’ to establish a wide variety of regulations and prac-
tices so long as these do not undermine the Gospel or burden the
consciences of Christians by confusing human regulations with di-
vine commands. This recognition is also a part of our current ec-
clesiastical practice. For example, the Bylaws of the Synod with-
hold from some clergy (assistant pastors and seminary professors,
for example) the de iure humano right given to other clergy to
serve as voting delegates to district and synodical conventions
without diminishing their status as holders of the Office of the Holy
Ministry.

With that in mind, we believe that they church may continue to
observe the distinction between the power to administer the min-
istry of Word and Sacrament that belongs to ordination and the
scope within which that ministry is conducted that belongs to a
minister’s jurisdiction. We also affirm that the church may limit
the jurisdiction of some categories of clergy so long as their right to
exercise the power of the office in the place where they are called
to serve is not restricted.

What kinds of restrictions can be placed upon such men? As we
have seen above, no restriction can be placed upon the service of a
man ordained into the Office of the Holy Ministry in the exercise of
his authority to preach, teach, hear confession and pronounce ab-
soluti n, administer (or withhold) the sacraments, or excommuni-
cate“ within the confines of the ministry to the congregation to
which he has been rightly called and installed as pastor, for these
are powers that belong to the office itself; they cannot be properly
denied to any who hold the office. It is, however, both possible and
appropriate for the Synod to restrict in other ways the service of
ministers. Such restrictions may be especially appropriate in the
case of those who have received a minimal form of preparation that
is tailored to their being called and ordained to serve in specific
and limited kinds of ministries.

In the case of clergy who have received a minimal level of
preparation before ordination to enable them to enter as quickly as
possible into the Office of the Holy Ministry, the church might, for
example, require that they complete a basic program of instruction
after ofdination in order to remain on the clergy roster of the
Synod. *” In the case of ministers whose training has been tailored
to a specific kind of ministry, the Synod might limit the scope of
their service beyond the specific kind of ministry for which they
have been prepared.

Another form of restriction that might be placed upon the ser-
vice of those who preparation has been both limited and tailored to
a specific kind of ministry is lateral mobility. Mobility from place
to place within the Office of the Ministry is, by definition, a de iure
humano matter. For the majority of its history the church has regu-
lated the movement of clergy, both to prevent abuse and to ensure
the best use of its human resources in fulfilling Christ’s Great Com-

mission. In some cases this regulation has consisted of the church
(in the form of its ecclesiastical hierarchy) directing clergy to move
about. In other cases this regulation has taken the form of estab-
lishing rules or guidelines within which congregations may extend
calls, and clergy may receive and accept them. Within The
Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod the latter approach has pre-
vailed.

If the church were to adopt a program for ordaining (largely bi-
vocational) ministers whose preparation for service in the Office
of the Holy Ministry were tailored to the minimum necessary to
function in a particular kind of ministry and whose service was
practiced under the supervision of a more broadly educated (and
probably more experienced) minister, it seems reasonable that the
lateral mobility of such clergy should also be restricted in some
manner. This restriction might be to the single place to which the
minister has been called and for which he has been prepared. An-
other alternative might be to restrict his service to the single dis-
trict under whose supervision he has served, unless he is formally
received into another district. A third possibility is to restrict his
service to the specific kind of ministry for which he has been pre-
pared, wherever it may be in the Synod, unless he receives addi-
tional preparation to broaden the scope of his ability to serve. While
this latter option seems the most reasonable to us, it would create
some additional challenges for record keeping and personnel man-
agement, as it would require that the kinds of ministry for which a
man has been prepared, and for which he has been certified, be
recorded, tracked, and taken into account by congregations that
might consider calling him. One way of doing this might be to es-
tablish different roster categories for the various kinds of specific
ministries for which pastors are certified (as, for example, “Or-
dained Minister—Evangelist” and “Ordained Minister—Curate”).
Another possibility would be to create a single roster category of
“Ordained Minister—Specific Context” and track different certifi-
cations with that category. Such jurisdictional restrictions must not
be enacted or interpreted as belittling the Office of the Holy Min-
istry or the honor that every pastor is to be given as a servant of
the Word regardless of his years of academic study or parish expe-
rience. All who hold this office, whatever their roster status, are
due the honor that attends to this office. All who hold this office
should likewise be encouraged to continue to seek further opportu-
nities for growth in ministry through an ongoing program of stud-
ies.

Principle 4: Ordination vows may be taken prior to the conclusion of a
complete course of study provided that the ordinand has received a
preparation sufficient to preach and teach the Gospel rightly, administer
the sacraments correctly, and take his vows with integrity.

The biblical standard of qualifications for service in the pastoral
office requires that men have a genuine and relatively mature faith,
lead a life that does no bring the Gospel into disrepute, and exhibit
an aptitude to teach. "* We have understood the obligation to have
an aptitude to teach as implying not merely the possession of the
communication skills necessary to teach, but also a breadth and
depth of theological understanding sufficient to communicate the
Gospel and the teachings of Christ to those whom the pastor will
serve, teach, and shepherd. This is not a single fixed target: what it
takes to be apt to teach in a working-class or inner-city congrega-
tion will be different from what it takes to be apt to teach in a con-
gregation comprised largely of professional people or university
faculty.

For many years now the Master of Divinity (M.Div.) degree has
been understood as the standard measure for pastoral education
among us. This has not always been the case. In the scope of the
history of the church, having the M.Div. as the standard measure of
pastoral education leading to a call and ordination is a rather recent
development. Within our own Synod, the former fast-track pro-
gram established an educational standard for ordination that was
well below today’s M.Div. level. Even today the church allows
some men to be ordained into the Office of the Holy Ministry with
less than an M.Div. through various alternate route programs.

Still, there are good and important reasons for continuing to re-
quire the M.Div. as the standard educational level for most pastors.
Not the least of these is the fact that the increasing diversity and