Collection › LCMS Convention Workbook (St. Louis, Missouri) › 2026 · 69th Convention, Phoenix › Page 501
LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2026, Page 501

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod
Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

ECCLESIASTICAL SUPERVISION AND DISPUTE RESOLUTION
others who are aware of the public sin.” (LCMS CTCR,
Public Rebuke of Public Sin [adopted 2006], 22)
4. “That Christian charity would require private and personal
discussion rather than public rebuke for wrongdoing or
misunderstandings discovered online.” (ibid., 25)
5. That “the ministers of the Church, therefore have the
command to forgive sins; they do not have the command to
investigate secret sins.” (Ap XII [ed. Tappert], 104)
6. And that if suspected wrongdoing is discovered online, the
person discovering such wrongdoing needs to follow
scriptural and confessional principles regarding the offense,
starting with Matthew 18. If need be, the appropriate
ecclesiastical supervisor should be notified for appropriate
action.
and be it finally
Resolved, That such guidelines be produced in consultation with
the Council of Presidents by the 2029 Synod convention so that they
may be reported upon at that meeting.
Florida-Georgia District
Ov. 10-03

To Address Use of Named or Anonymous
Social Media Accounts to Create Strife
and Division within the Church
WHEREAS, Our Lord commands us to not bear false witness; and
WHEREAS, Martin Luther, teaching on the Eighth Commandment
in the Large Catechism (LC I, Triglotta), sharply reminds us that
this commandment “forbids all sins of the tongue whereby we may
injure or approach too closely our neighbor” (263), and reminds us
that “here belongs particularly the detestable, shameful vice of
speaking behind a person’s back” (264). He continues:
Therefore, to avoid this vice we should note that no one is
allowed publicly to judge and reprove his neighbor, although he
may see him sin, unless he have a command to judge and to
reprove. For there is a great difference between these two things,
judging sin and knowing sin. You may indeed know it, but you
are not to judge it. I can indeed see and hear that my neighbor
sins, but I have no command to report it to others. Now, if I rush
in, judging and passing sentence, I fall into a sin which is greater
than his. But if you know it, do nothing else than turn your ears
into a grave and cover it, until you are appointed to be judge and
to punish by virtue of your office.
Those, then, are called slanderers who are not content with
knowing a thing, but proceed to assume jurisdiction, and when
they know a slight offense of another, carry it into every corner,
and are delighted and tickled that they can stir up another’s
displeasure [baseness], as swine roll themselves in the dirt and
root in it with the snout. This is nothing else than meddling with
the judgment and office of God, and pronouncing sentence and
punishment with the most severe verdict. For no judge can
punish to a higher degree nor go farther than to say: ‘He is a thief,
a murderer, a traitor,’ etc. Therefore, whoever presumes to say
the same of his neighbor goes just as far as the emperor and all
governments. For although you do not wield the sword, you
employ your poisonous tongue to the shame and hurt of your
neighbor.

501

God therefore would have it prohibited, that any one speak evil
of another even though he be guilty, and the latter know it right
well; much less if he do not know it, and have it only from
hearsay. But you say: Shall I not say it if it be the truth? Answer:
Why do you not make accusation to regular judges? Ah, I cannot
prove it publicly, and hence I might be silenced and turned away
in a harsh manner [incur the penalty of a false accusation]. ‘Ah,
indeed, do you smell the roast?’ If you do not trust yourself to
stand before the proper authorities and to make answer, then hold
your tongue. But if you know it, know it for yourself and not for
another. For if you tell it to others, although it be true, you will
appear as a liar, because you cannot prove it, and you are,
besides, acting like a knave. For we ought never to deprive any
one of his honor or good name unless it be first taken away from
him publicly.
False witness, then, is everything which cannot be properly
proved. Therefore, what is not manifest upon sufficient evidence
no one shall make public or declare for truth; and, in short,
whatever is secret should be allowed to remain secret, or, at any
rate, should be secretly reproved, as we shall hear. Therefore, if
you encounter an idle tongue which betrays and slanders some
one, contradict such a one promptly to his face, that he may
blush; thus many a one will hold his tongue who else would bring
some poor man into bad repute, from which he would not easily
extricate himself. For honor and a good name are easily taken
away, but not easily restored. (LC I 266–70)
…
But the true way in this matter would be to observe the order
according to the Gospel (Matt. 18:15) where Christ says: If thy
brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault
between thee and him alone. Here you have a precious and
excellent teaching for governing well the tongue, which is to be
carefully observed against this detestable misuse. Let this, then,
be your rule, that you do not too readily spread evil concerning
your neighbor and slander him to others, but admonish him
privately that he may amend [his life]. Likewise, also, if some
one report to you what this or that one has done, teach him, too,
to go and admonish him personally, if he have seen it himself;
but if not, that he hold his tongue. (LC I 276)
and
WHEREAS, The Synod has policies and procedures designed to
allow those in disagreement to reconcile with one another and to
reprove and correct those in error so as to restore them to Christ and
His Church and not to cause public division, scandal, and shame;
and
WHEREAS, Church workers and laity of the Synod who use social
media accounts so as to cause division within the Church do so in
direct violation of the scriptural and confessional understanding of
the Eighth Commandment and therefore engage in unrepentant sin;
and
WHEREAS, Those who engage in such actions harm the public
witness of the Church and greatly sin against their brothers and
sisters in Christ; and
WHEREAS, Those who engage in such behavior should in
Christian love be called to repentance so as to be restored to the
brothers and sisters they have sinned against and be forgiven;
therefore be it

2026 Convention Workbook