LCMS Commission on Constitutional Matters — Minutes St. Louis, Missouri — April 29, 2003, Page 6

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An emeritus member not regularly serving any congregation or other agency shall
continue to hold membership through the District through which membership was held at
the inception of the emeritus status unless a transfer is approved by both the President of
that District and the President of the District to which membership would be transferred.
In determining the District membership of individual members of the Synod, Bylaw 2.41 j applies in
every case:
The District through which an individual holds membership and the District through
which a member is ecclesiastically supervised, will not be determined in any case on the
basis of District membership of the congregation to which the individual belongs.
On the other hand, laypersons are not eligible to be members of the Synod. They are eligible to be
members of the Board of Directors by being members of voting congregations of the Synod. Therefore, a
layperson is “from” that “District” of which his or her voting congregation is a member.
Therefore, the bylaw phrase “from one District” is applied according to the District membership of the
individual member of the Synod and the District membership of the congregation to which the layperson
belongs. An individual member of the Synod and a layperson being members of the same congregation is
in itself of no consequence. The decisive qualification is the District membership of the individual
member of the Synod and the District membership of the congregation of which the layperson is a
member.
Further, the Commission has previously stated in Opinion 98-2127:
The Commission would clarify that while two current members of the Board of Directors
of the Synod may reside in the same state, the decisive qualification for board
membership on the part of church workers is not the place of residence but District
membership, as stated in Bylaw 3.189 of the 1998 Handbook [Bylaw 3.181 of the 2001
Handbook]….So long as District membership is held in different Districts of the Synod,
residence in the same state is of no consequence. A board member may be an emeritus
church worker who has upon retiring changed his place of residency. His synodical
membership, however, ordinarily remains in the District where he last served, in accord
with Bylaw 2.41 e.
It is therefore conceivable that current members of the Board of Directors can reside in the same state, be
members of the same member congregation of the Synod, and yet not be “from one District”(Bylaw 3.181
a).
While, however, two memberships as defined above may in fact be held in the same one District, there
may not be two persons from that same District elected to the Board. Bylaw 3.181 states: “No more than
one of these 13 may be elected from one District.” When persons are elected from two separate Districts
and one transfers to a District that already has a person from that District elected to the Board of
Directors, that does not disqualify either person from serving on the Board and finishing his or her term of
office. The decisive qualification is the status of membership at the time of the election.
Question 2:

What is the distinction between 3.181 a (“no more than one of these 13 may be elected
from one District”) and 3.407 d (No more than one of these seven members elected
by the Synod in convention can be from the same District of the LCMS)?

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