There is increasing support for the Church and Ministry of Wilhelm Loehe in place of C.F.W. Walther in the LCMS.

The most glaring symbolic example of this shift was the "Lutheran Witness" making Loehe's picture larger than Walther's on the front cover of its 1997, 150th Anniversary Issue.

To further illustrate the Loehe bias at the Seminaries, in the Dec. 1997 issue of Fort Wayne's "Life of the World," Rev. Joel Brondos, writes:

He [Wilhelm Loehe] had to ask permission from church officials to have the practice of confession and absolution reinstated when it had been all but lost. Reluctantly, permission was granted. Thankfully so, because this little parish experienced tremendous growth as the direct result of the Lord's blessings and benefits bestowed through the reintroduction of individual confession and absolution.

Loehe's efforts here are commendable, but Walther clearly taught private confession and absolution in his Pastoral Practice. Why is Loehe used as an example instead of Walther?

Walther understood congregations as independent, self-governing, self-perpetuating, God ordained groups of people called a church, who called a pastor into the office of the pastoral ministry to administer the Word and Sacraments to them in their behalf.

On the other hand, Loehe understood the clergy as independent, self-governing, self-perpetuating, God ordained individuals who gave out the Word and Sacrament to a group of people called a church, who are an extension of the pastor's office.

In the late 1840's the Synod publicly rejected Loehe's position and Loehe later broke fellowship with the LCMS to form the Iowa Synod, later part to become part of the ALC, and now part of the ELCA.

Even if Loehe's name is not mentioned, his teaching is often proclaimed as good and necessary for LCMS congregations. At this time neither Seminary will support Walther's design for Voters' Assemblies and Voter Supremacy to which Loehe was also completely opposed.

Even the "Pastoral Theology," by former Fort Wayne President, Dr. Norbert Mueller and published by CPH in 1998, dropped all the traditional directions on the proper order and conduct of congregational Voters' Assemblies, once the centerpiece of Walther's church administration for all LCMS congregations.

Walther rejected Loehe's position as non-Lutheran and Loehe himself came to the conclusion that the Lutheran Confessions were in error on the doctrine of Church and Ministry.

Walther wrote a series of articles in "Der Lutheraner," (later to become the "Lutheran Witness") from 1860 to 1861 condemning Loehe's rejection of Congregational self-government.

Walther writes:
"In the past we always sincerely rejoiced that Pastor Grabau here in America still granted congregations the right to choose pastors, while, on the other hand, Pastor Loehe in Germany denied congregations even this right. We were happy that congregations here were at least able to live in quiet, undisturbed possession of this most important right, and that we were thus not compelled to begin a battle also for this treasure that was so dearly won for us by the Reformation."

"That Pastor Loehe really denies to congregations that right to choose their pastors may be seen among other things from an article of his which he wrote in the 'Aphorisms about the New Testament offices and their relationship to the congregation.' In it Pastor Loehe writes, e.g., the following: 'In Acts 14:24 we find that Paul and Barnabas appointed elders (pastors) for the new congregation in Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch without the least participation on the part of the congregation without an active participation being ascribed to congregations in the choice and appointment..'" ("The Congregations Right to Choose its Pastor," Der Lutheraner, C.F.W. Walther, Translated by Fred Kramer, Vol. 17, No. 3 September 18, 1860, pp. 17-19)

Again Walther writes:
"In what follows Loehe maintains it is even less proper now than at the time of the Apostles to grant the right to choose their own pastors. 'No', he exclaims in what follows, 'An unconditional right of choice on the part of the congregation is not only unapostolic, but also most dangerous..'" (Der Lutheraner, C.F.W. Walther, Vol. 17, No. 3 September 18, 1860, pp. 17-19)

Again Walther writes:
"The reason that Loehe fights so decidedly against the right of the congregations to choose their pastors is his false doctrine of the ministry. He rejects the biblical doctrine of the Lutheran Church that Christ gave the office to his whole church, and that the pastors merely publicly administer this universal office as servants of the church. Rather, Loehe believes and teaches that pastors constitute a special, privileged class of people, a special estate in the church, a 'sacred aristocracy' a certain ecclesiastical class of nobles and priests. Just as only the children of nobles or such as are created noblemen are members of the nobility, so, Loehe thinks, only a pastor can create a pastor; and as in the Old Testament only the son of a priest could become a priest, so only ordination by a clergyman could make a clergyman. Loehe writes, e.g.:
'Everywhere in the New Testament we see that only the sacred office begets congregations, nowhere that the office is merely a transferring of congregational rights and plenary powers, that the congregation bestows the office. The office stands in the midst of the congregation like a fruitful tree, which has its seed in itself; it replenishes itself.'" (Der Lutheraner, C.F.W. Walther, Vol. 17, No. 3 September 18, 1860, pp. 17-19)

And Loehe writes:
"One could call the presbytery (the pastors) a holy aristocracy (the rule of the distinguished) of the church, while something democratic (the rule by the common people) lies in the election of the deacons."

Walther responds:
"When Pastor Loehe wrote this eleven years ago and we read it, we were deeply alarmed. For with this he took away from the Christian congregations the most precious and important right, which they possess. The poor German congregations groan under the godless rule of thousands of unbelieving preachers who are foisted upon them, who have now for more than half a century robbed them of their orthodox agendas, catechisms, and hymnbooks. And have forced unbelieving books on them, and preached to them the most wretched doctrine of men instead of the Word of God. Now instead of fighting so that the poor, shamelessly tyrannized congregations, which are cheated by their pastors out of their faith and salvation, might be freed from these their tyrants, Loehe rather fights for this, that the congregations only remained tamely in their chains, and praises it as the proper help for them, if the preachers also in the future retain all the power in their hands and the congregations remain in the old slavery." (Der Lutheraner, Vol. 17, No. 3 September 18, 1860, pp. 17-19)

Walther writes:
"For when Pastor Loehe had in his heart fallen away from the symbols of our church, then he also confessed honestly and publicly with mouth and pen that he could no longer subscribe to the symbolic books of our church unconditionally because he had found errors in them." (Der Lutheraner Vol. 17, No. 7. November 13, 1860. page 49)

The 2001 LCMS Convention may be the last opportunity for the congregations to preserve Voter Supremacy in all LCMS congregations. From all observations, a majority of the LCMS Clergy, including both Seminaries, see no reason in preserving congregational government by laity in the LCMS.

We must pass a resolution that reaffirms Voter Supremacy as the only agreed upon polity of all LCMS congregations and we must demand the removal of LCMS professors who do not publicly teach Voter Supremacy as the only congregational polity in the LCMS.