Overture To Return Facilitators To Pastoral Ministry By Dannemeyer

By: Rev. Jack Cascione
During his speech at the IV National Free Conference On C. F. W. Walther, Congressman William Dannemeyer presented an overture to have full-time District Facilitors return to serving as pastors in congregations.

Many LCMS Districts now have as many as five full-time Facilitators who are called by the District to serve the District.  There is no biblical office of "Facilitator."  Each Facilitator's combined salary, expense and travel account, health and pension plan, and secretarial and office expenses can easily exceed $100,000.00 per year.

Dannemeyer is convinced that these positions are a needless and redundant expense to the Districts and that a congregation would be much better served by calling a full-time parish pastor.  As the Districts call more Facilitators they send less funds to the Synod.

Congregations are encouraged to submit a modification of the following overture to their own District Conventions.  The statistics and names in Dannemeyer's resolution apply to his own Pacific Southwest District. Congregations should look for similar numbers for their districts in past issues of the Lutheran Annual, statistical yearbooks, and on page 462 of the 2002 Lutheran Annual.

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OVERTURE RELATING TO RESCINDING THE DECISION TO ADD FOUR FULL TIME FACILITATORS TO THE STAFF OF THE PSWD BUREAUCRACY

WHEREAS, since 1991 the Pacific Southwest District (PSWD) has sent the sums
listed to Synod:

1991 - $673,722
1992 - $271,500

Reduction -  $402,222

1999 - $166,003
2000 - $180,000
2001 - $200,000

WHEREAS, some officials in the PSWD claim the reduction in the amount sent to Synod in 1992 was because an endowment had been left in St. Louis for mission work in the PSWD, but the funds were not forthcoming from Synod so the reduced amount sent to Synod was to replace these funds not received from Synod which had been expended by the PSWD, and

WHEREAS, the actual amount which the PSWD was to receive from Synod was $36,000 per year, which is a small fraction of the $402,222 which the PSWD
reduced in the amount it sent to Synod in 1992 from what it contributed in 1991, and

WHEREAS, in the fall of 1999, an examination of the books of the PSWD revealed that in the item "Mission and Ministry" for the years 1991 and 1992 was

1991 - $1,922,572
1992 - $2,051,742

An increase of $129,170 which sum is substantially less than $402,222, and

WHEREAS, in 1997, the PSWD convention voted to authorize four full-time facilitators to the PSWD bureaucracy when none of the data previously described was ever revealed to the delegates, and

WHEREAS, these four full-time facilitators will consume at least $100,000 each for their maintenance and support for a total of $400,000 per year, and

WHEREAS, the Full and Part Time staff in the PSWD office for the years indicated is as follows:

1996 - 5

1997 - 9*

1999 - 10.5

2001 - 9 full part 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, and

WHEREAS, the 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

and

WHEREAS, the increase in full-time staff at the PSWD office since 1997 had been in excess of 100%, at a time when the baptized members has decreased, a gross disparity, and

WHEREAS, the LCMS experienced rapid growth during the period from 1940 to about 1975, and that Franklin Little of Temple University wrote in a 1976 atlas entitled The Macmillan Atlas History of Christianity about the LCMS:

"Church growth today seems to be a function of lay initiative and lay initiative seems to be most vigorous in those churches which have no strong hierarchies or judicatories.  One of the most rapidly growing churches is the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod which has in the last fifteen years added nearly 600,000 members.  Since 1940 it has shown a 120% increase, while the more liberal Lutheran churches have registered less than 60% increase.Under (Walther's) leadership an extensive system of parochial schools was inaugurated.  In 1872 a Lutheran Synodical Conference came into being which united several conservative groups which stressed the responsibility and initiative of members of local congregations."

Little stated that the most important cause of growth is decentralized policy which he properly defines as those churches which have no strong hierarchies or judicatories.  The term "Judicatory" means a system of courts of law for the administration of justice.

Rev. Martin R. Noland, in his address to the Association of Confessional Lutherans on April 4, 1997, at Chicago stated:  "The survival of Biblical and confessional theology in the Missouri Synod was chiefly a result of its decentralized policy, not of any particular virtues in its membership or even its theology," and

WHEREAS, in the thirteen year span from 1987 to 2000, the number of vacant pulpits in the LCMS went from 457 to 1155, 80 of which are now in the PSWD, and

WHEREAS, since 1970, the number of pastors serving at Synod or District offices went from 247 450, an increase of 203, and in the PSWD, four facilitators were added in 1997, three of which slots are now filled by Pastors, and the fourth by a Commissioned Minister, and

WHEREAS, the growth of bureaucracy in the PSWD has created a structure of
our church which detracts from rather than enhances the mission of our church, namely, to save souls for Christ by means of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and

WHEREAS, investing the resources of our church at the congregational level
rather than continuing the current expansion of the bureaucracy at the PSWD
office level enhances the achievement of the mission of our church, and

WHEREAS, the financial data distributed by the PSWD to the congregations is
severely deficient in that it publishes what income is received and the money expended for programs but it does not reveal the salary and befits paid to PSWD officials, and

WHEREAS, the heritage of the LCMS has stressed the Voters Assembly model of
self government as opposed to the Board of Directors model for congregational governance, and

WHEREAS, voices are being heard in the LCMS to alter how we train our future
pastors so that they will become a CEO rather than a Shepherd of a congregation, therefore be it

BE IT RESOLVED, that our congregation, a member of the PSWD, requests at the 2003 convention of the PSWD that the following changes take place:

1. The decision to add four full time facilitators is rescinded;
2. The full-time staff of the PSWD be reduced to 5 from the current level of 9 full time and part time;
3. That the autonomy of the congregation as recorded in Article VII of Synod's Constitution be affirmed;
4. That the congregations of the PSWD be encouraged to adopt a Voters Assembly model of self government;
5. That the PSWD be required to publish and distribute to the congregations monthly statements of income and expenses and that the salaries and benefits of PSWD staff be included in the information distributed to the congregations, and that semi-annually it publish and distribute a record of income and expenses over the preceding three years and projecting into the next three years;
6. That the PSWD amend its by-laws to provide that the District President be a part-time position whereby the District President serves a congregation in the District as well as District President and that the PSWD provide a vicar for the congregation which is served by the District President and that a District President be limited to two terms, successive or otherwise.

Dated this _____ day of __________,2002


_____________________________________
Name of Congregation

_____________________________________
President

_____________________________________
Secretary



THE LUTHERAN CHURCH OF OUR SAVIOR
1521 West Orangethorpe Ave.,
Fullerton, California 92833
(714) 525-5584

November 20, 2002