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This year Congressman William Dannemeyer was the only lay speaker at the
IV National Free Conference on C. F. W. Walther, but he was the most
effective speaker at the Conference.
This writer has not heard any member of the LCMS, layman or pastor; speak
more clearly, concisely, or forcefully on the usurpation of church power
by District Presidents. Dannemeyer's speech at the Walther Conference was
a riveting spellbinder. It is all on video and cassette tape.
(Future Reclaim News Releases will contain Dannemeyer's resolutions,
published for the Walther Conference, to restructure LCMS District and
Synodical Conventions.)
Dannemeyer is a lifelong Lutheran, a graduate of Valparaiso Law School, a
successful trial lawyer, a seven term U. S. Congressman, a delegate and
observer to Synodical and District Conventions, and is currently President
of his Congregation.
He is appalled at the lack of lay representation at LCMS Conventions and
the lack of accountability, the sheer arrogance, and the manipulation of
floor committees exercised by most LCMS District Presidents. They
have turned many Districts into the Presidents' private property.
Dannemeyer explained to this writer that the District Presidents do not
understand that he is not on their payroll, they have no control over his
call, and they have forgotten that their first work is to serve lay
people. He says, "We pay their salaries!"
The following letter was sent to District President Larry Stoterau by
Congressman William Dannemeyer, President of The Lutheran Church of Our
Savior in Fullerton, California.
THE LUTHERAN CHURCH OF OUR SAVIOR
1521 West Orangethorpe Ave.,
Fullerton, California 92833
(714) 525-5584
October 29, 2002
Rev. Larry Stoterau
President, Lutheran Church Missouri Synod
Pacific Southwest District
1540 Concordia East
Irvine, CA 92612
Dear President Stoterau:
Thank you for your letter of October 14, 2002. Let me first address
your comment in the second paragraph of your letter:
"I was disappointed to see that my letter to you was posted almost
immediately on Reclaim News."
So that there is no misunderstanding on what letter you are referring to
when you use the phrase "my letter" it was your letter to me
dated May 23, 2002. Indeed it was published in Reclaim News.
And my question to you is, why should you be disappointed with this fact?
Perhaps it is time that someone explains to you the reality of holding
elective office. When you, the Board of Directors, and the Vice
Presidents of the PSWD make a decision committing the PSWD to a certain
action, any congregation in the PSWD, and any member of one of these
congregations, has the right, not the privilege, to know about that
decision. And what is just as important about knowing if the action
is right is to communicate that action to other persons in the church by
oral communication, by letter, or by having it published in a news service
dealing with church matters.
The same right to know relates as well to the expenditure of PSWD funds,
which may have been expended in implementing a policy decision adopted by
the PSWD. Specifically, did the PSWD expend any of the PSWD funds
incidental to the decision on February 15, 1998, to extend an interim call
to Dr. Norbert Oesch to be Executive Director of the Pastoral Leadership
Institute?
You need to know that this letter is being distributed to the following
people:
1. Vice Presidents of the PSWD
2. Members of Board of Directors of the PSWD
3. Clergymen serving congregations in the PSWD
4. Presidents of congregations in the PSWD
So that persons receiving this letter will be able to understand the
issues involved, copies of the following letters will be included in this
letter:
1. My letter to you dated May 16, 2002
2. Your letter to me dated May 23, 2002
3. My letter to you dated September 30, 2002
4. Your letter to me dated October 14, 2002
[note: the next Reclaim News release will contain these four letters]
Anyone reading this correspondence must ask himself a simple question, why
are you unwilling to provide detailed responses to my letter to you dated
May 16, 2002? Is there something you are trying to hide?
You may be inclined to believe that your letter to me dated May 23, 2002
was a matter of personal correspondence and I should have contacted you to
ask your permission to share it with others before it appeared in Reclaim
News. If this is your inclination, please disabuse yourself of any such
notion. When an elected official of a church body writes a letter to
another elected church official of that church body, the contents of that
letter can be shared with any other person in the church. Why?
Because if you choose to run for re-election to the office you now hold in
2003, what you have done with the stewardship of power is a factor to be
considered by those whose votes you seek.
Also enclosed with this letter are three Overtures, which have been mailed
to the Presidents of the congregations in the PSWD. Hopefully these
Overtures will be adopted by enough congregations in the PSWD to convince
you that they raise legitimate issues, which the delegates at the next
PSWD convention in 2003 should consider.
You may be inclined to run for re-election to the position you now hold at
the convention in 2003. If such is your plan, our congregation is
interested in voting for a candidate for District President at the
convention in 2003 who will agree to do the following:
1. Answer all questions in writing concerning the relationship between the
PSWD and PLI as set forth in my congregation's letters to you dated May
16, 2002, and September 30, 2002.
2. Constitute committees at the PSWD Convention in 2003 by following the
process described in the enclosed Overture on that subject.
3. Come before the committees of the Convention to which the Overtures are
assigned and testify that each of them have merit and contain issues which
the convention delegates should vote upon on the convention floor, which
is another way of saying that these Overtures should not be bottled up in
Committee.
4. Personally endorse the sense of the Overture, which would eliminate the
position of the four facilitators, which were created at the 1997
convention of the PSWD. If the reason for creating the positions was
to expand the Kingdom of Jesus Christ to unsaved souls in the
congregations of the PSWD, the opposite result has developed, witness
these numbers:
Full and Part-time staff in the PSWD office for the years indicated
1996 - 5
1997 - 9*
1998 - 10.5
2001 - 9 full time and 4 part time
*At the 1997 PSWD Convention Los Angeles, the convention voted to add four
full-time facilitators to the PSWD bureaucracy - none of the information
about the reduction of contributions to Synod 1991-1992 was revealed.
Baptized members of the LCMS Churches in the PSWD for the years indicated
were as follows:
1991 - 104,941
1998 - 108,551
2000 - 101,454
(Source of all data is The Lutheran Annual)
In your letter of October 14, 2002, addressed to the Lutheran Church of
Our Savior in Fullerton, you indicated you would be happy to come and
visit with our congregation and answer questions concerning PLI and the
PSWD.
We would be honored to have the District President come and visit our
church at any time. Before you visit, may we suggest that it would
be best for you in writing to answer all of the questions posed in this
letter, which would include but not be limited to your position on the
three enclosed Overtures. [These Overtures will be published in future
Reclaim News Releases]
The reason for this suggestion is a recognition that the church is full of
sinners, not saints. We are forgiven by Christ's death on the Cross,
but we are all sinners. Life has taught us that just as beauty is in
the eye of the beholder, so is it that sometimes we hear things that were
not said or recollect some things that with the passage of time have
produced a memory recall that is out of sync with all of those who were
present. On the speaker's side of the coin, he believes he did or
did not say something, which somebody in the audience heard.
The issues raised in this letter are serious matters for all of us who
love the Lord and serve the church to expand His Kingdom. We believe
that we have a better chance to advance the cause of collegiality if you
first put your answers in writing to all of these concerns addressed in
this letter before your visit.
Your servant in Christ,
Bill Dannemeyer
President, Lutheran Church of Our Savior
Enclosure [to be published in the next Reclaim News Releases]
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