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After only 4 years as Superintendent of
Lutheran Schools for the state of Michigan I took the position of Executive
Secretary for the Board of Parish Education of The Lutheran Church-Missouri
Synod. I took the position even though I had been in Michigan only 4 years. I
took the position knowing that it was the “highest office” available to
any “called teacher” of The LCMS. I took the call at the urging of even
my colleagues in Michigan because they felt they wanted a voice at the highest
levels of the church. I rook the call even though I knew the LCMS had just
elected a new President who had vowed to radically change everything in the
church. I took the call because I felt it came through the work of the Holy
Spirit.
There were some great things about my years
in St. Louis. I had an incredibly supportive and capable staff of some 45
persons. During my tenure there we were able to carry on or introduce many
effective new ministries: we added an Associate Director for Schools, a
Director for Early Childhood Education, a Director of Effectiveness Training
for Lutherans (which was the Lutheran version of Parent Effectiveness). We
provided excellent weeklong couples training for pastors and their spouses. We
conducted nationwide Sunday School conventions. We gained an important voice in
Washington DC through the Council for American Private Education, I was invited
to speak at important Christian education events around the world. I carried on
or introduced very exciting new joint ministries with the then American
Lutheran Church and The Lutheran Church in America. Together we produced some
exciting material and events to deal with urban America and with people of
color or language other than English. `I was named head of the entire Division
for Parish Services and had important in-put on the annual expenditure of some
$28 million of church-wide funding .I was able to secure several hundred
thousand dollars worth of grants from “outside sources”. I was a part of group
of church leaders who had a great inclusive vision of a church grounded in the
Good News of God in Christ working together with fellow-Christians across the
USA and around the world-for people of all ages and ethnicity or color.
And those 4 years were by far the worst
4 years of my life and If I had not resigned when I did I may well have died of
a heart attack or similar at the age of 49.As mentioned above, a new president
had been elected and he and his supporters were determined to get rid of any
staff or point of view that was incoherent to their very fundamentalistic
theology, centralized power, narrow vision of the church. I need not go into
detail, I will simply state that when I was asked to sign a statement which
forbade me to continue my work with non-LCMS Lutheran leaders, to never consider any
biblical interpretation of Bible other than literal, to publicly pray only with
LCMS Lutherans, to not attend Holy Communion anywhere other than in LCMS
churches, etc. I could not accept those conditions of my employment and so I resigned.
Tragically, I had also to terminate the calls to ministry of many staff members
who had been faithful servants of the church.
In retrospect I am grateful for the
experience even though I feel that I was unsuccessful in my attempt to
bring reconciliation to a fractured church. I learned anew the powerful message
which is central to my faith. God is love. God is good. God reaches out to all
God’s children with grace acceptance and hope. That is the God I worship and
the God who sustains and drives me and all that I undertake.
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