CONSEQUENCES OF HOSANNA-TABOR

The unanimous decision that the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) just handed down has far reaching consequences for religious liberty. While many have written how the case has probably settled the relationship between church organizations and civil governments, few have addressed the questions of how the opinion changes the relationship within a church organization.
The Supeme Court decision essentially concluded that disputes between a congregation and its pastors or other "ministers" must be decided within a process by the church body.
In Hosanna-Tabor the Missouri Synod argued that "church doctrine" required that the controversy between a LCMS congregation and it's commissioned minister must be resolved within the Synod's Dispute Resolution Process.
Fortunately, the majority of the Supreme Court did not depend on the availability of a the dispute resolution process within the church body. Only two justices gave any weight to the existence of this ecclesiastical procedure adopted by the Missouris Synod or to the position that compliance with its processes were required as "church doctrine"

However, the decision means that each Church organization will have to adopt some such procedure to settle employment disputes in the future. It will be up to each Church Body to decide whether the decisions will be made solely in the local congregation, or under the supervision or active participation of a regional or national church office.

But the truth is, congregations within the LCMS have already given up autonomous dispute resolution. The Synod has decided church disputes must be handled within the framework adopted by the Synod..
This process, outlined in our Handbook, requires the involvement of the District Office in every internal matter of each congregation where controversy exists.

The District has declared that its dispute resolution process is a church doctrine. Is it really "doctrine" that the District, not the local congregation, will be able to control the entire dispute resolution process, including who hears the dispute, what evidence shall be considered, as well as the time, place and conditions of hearings.

The system is ripe for abuse.

In cases where the District may have an interest, such as those involving real property or large amounts of money, a District may even engineer a dispute on its own, then force the "disputing parties" to resolve their differences within the process it controls.

It may well be time for pastors, commissioned ministers and all fair-minded laity to take another look at the format of the dispute resolution process. Is the involvement of the District President and his staff always a welcome development? May a congregation of the LCMS adopt a dispute resoution process of its own to preserve local autonomy? How do pastors and other "ministers" secure their rights stated in the congregation's Constitution, Bylaws and their Letter of Call? Can they be guaranteed impariality in a process controlled by a faction of a congregation hostile to his presence? Finally, how are fairness and impartiality to be preserved in cases where the District has a vested interest in the outcome of the dispute?

DISTRICT PRESIDENT DENIES "CHURCH DOCTRINE- TWICE

Regardless of  the  impact of Hosanna -Tabor, one  matter is clear.  Officially,  "church doctrine" requires that any controversy within a congregation must be  resolved within the dispute resolution process.  Since 2010 Gloria Dei Lutheran Church has been in a dispute regarding decisions made in December of that year.  Members of the congregation, their pastor (myself) and others have  repeatedly asked the Northwest District to allow the dispute  resolution process to proceed in this matter.  However, District President Paul Linnemann has refused to allow it to proceed.   It wasas denied  when I spoke to President Linnemann, and again denied when a petition was filed with the District Secretary, in accordance with our Handbook.

Perhaps this is because a decision in that process may require the District to give back real property owned by Gloria Dei and deeded to the District  under "odd circumstances".    We should all ask ourselves whether it is appropriate for the District to have a President who denies  what the Synod has declared to be church doctrine.  And may a party denied an opportunity to use the dispute resolution process  then bring an action in a secular court for a court order requiring the District to proceed with its own established procedures.  These are questions that may soon require answers.

LCMS WINS AT U.S. SUPREME COURT: Clergy, Commissioned Exempt From EEOC Protection

This important case will have significant impact on the rights of ministers, ordained and lay in relation to their congregations and the District and Synod. I encourage everyone to read the summary on the link provided. Just click on the title of this post.  I will be writing more on the impact of the decision, and how it helps Gloria Dei in its dispute with the NW District.

WALKING TOGETHER: WHERE? Are We Following Christ?

It has been a year since Gloria Dei Lutheran haz been exiled from its own worship facility.  The Northwest  District of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod continues to hold the  property in its own name.  Gloria Dei Lutheran, also known as Community Lutheran, continues to meet in a home in the same area.

A year after the property was improperly taken from the congregation, by an ecclesiastical process called “suppression” that I explained in earlier posts,  the outline of the future of the LCMS seems to be coming into focus.

It is evident that the District Presidents are amassing for themselves authority over congregations. This desire for centralized control of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod is born of fear; fear that the same dark impulses that led the ELCA  astray are now knocking at the door of the LCMS.   For example, there is the fear that any discussion of the ordination of women may bring with it feminist theology, wholesale biblical error,  goddess worship and acceptance of homosexual  practices within the church.  Experience within the ELCA shows that the concern is not entirely without support.

The impulse for centralized control is common to all human governance, whether  secular or  sacred.   While the impulse for centralized control has risen within the LCMS before,  the Synod has been able to recall its  identity as a Synod that was based in local self-autonomy.  However, the recent financial problems of  the Synod and our nation generally, together with the natural tendency of bureaucracies  to sustain themselves, may be too much   for the Synod’s  leaders to overcome.

And so we find a number of  instances where District Presidents have seen opportunities to protect the Synod from dangerous or threatening situations,  and acted accordingly.  That the District may itself   benefit from the actions taken, either financially, or in terms of control, would only be evidence that God blesses such actions.

But what the District Presidents have been doing  reveals that  as a group, they have lost trust in  Christ himself  as Lord of the Church.  And so they have taken it upon themselves to protect the Church, without realizing the cost.  In the process of saving the LCMS, they  themselves may cause the LCMS to become twisted into something almost unrecognizable.

 They are turning a congregationally based ecclesiastical structure into a hierarchical one.

If recent press accounts are at all accurate,  reliance of the Synod  and its legal counsel  on the use of the Synod’s dispute  resolution process as the exclusive method for resolving disputes within the Synod, and the corollary that recourse to civil authorities is contrary to scripture and those who use them are subject to discipline, is all evidence of both pride and arrogance on the part of those who argue so.

Incidentally, I do not agree with those that have concluded that the Synod has convinced  the Supreme Court of the United States that Missouri Synod Lutherans have no right to seek  remedies or relief for real or perceived injuries at the hands of the Church.  The Court,  even with five Catholic members, is much more likely to conclude that the US Constitution does not allow a Synod or any church body has no right to create an ecclesiastical Court system that bars the rights of Americans from the civil courts..  Our Constitution simply would not allow such practices.

Getting back to  the main point, the leaders of the LCMS  seem unaware that they are reflecting the ELCA in another way as well.   There is a persistent  tendency to confuse  the True Church of Christ  with those organizations which are of human origin.  And of course  our human pride  assumes that the organization in which we lead is a reflection  of the will of Christ, and if we are  certain of our cause, we may not  be  as open to   prayerfully discerning God’s true will.

The relevancy of all this to the Gloria Dei situation  is that while  the Synod argues that the dispute resolution process is either the exclusive forum for resolving disputes, or is at least a necessary precondition to seeking relief in a secular court, the Northwest District President , Paul Linnemann, has  made every effort to prevent  Gloria Dei and its people from  pursuing the process that the Synod holds in such high regard.

In taking this position, President Linnemann has so far denied Gloria Dei a  forum, promised by the Synod’s Constitution and Bylaws in which it may express its grievances or  seek a proper remedy.  In this amazing precedent, the District President may not only be pushing Gloria Dei to seek relief in a civil forum, but also may be putting himself in a position of personal liability, in the event  damages are sought.    It remains to be seen whether the District’s Board of Directors or others are concerned about this enough to take appropriate action.

As the LCMS emphasizes the concept of  walking together,  we might wonder, is anyone asking “:Where are we going?”

THE TRUE GROUND ZERO

One of the big controversies that has surfaced as we recognize the 10^th Anniversary of the Terrorist attack on our country concerns the showing of the terrible images that we remember of that day, the planes flying into the Pentagon and the World Trade center, the people jumping out of windows and the collapse of the two towers.                                                                                                      1

Another controversy was brought by American Atheists who do not want the huge steel cross found in the ruins of the WTC to be a part of the memorial or museum.

Which brings me to what I want to talk about today.   Russell D. Moore, writing in the latest issue of Christianity Today, has pointed out the connection between the WTC site and  Calvary.  For Calvary is the real ground zero. It is where man sees the full impact and the results of sin and death. They do not relent until there is shedding of blood.   

And whether an Atheist or a Christian, it is really difficult for us to look directly at the suffering of Christ in this way.  Today, some want us to avoid seeing the terrible images that happened 10 years ago.   In the same way, Peter could not envision his master  going to the cross, even after Jesus tried to explain to him it had to happen.  Peter and the other disciples feared the despair that seeing Jesus die would bring them.  Denial is sometimes an attractive alternative to despair.

But denial and despair are what Satan wants. They are his weapons, his tools.  Satan, you see, is the real terrorist.   He wants us to fear him, to cower and hide.

But on the cross, Christ overcame Satan and made powerless all his weapons.

When we are baptized, it means we look straight on at the reality of the human condition, and share in Christ’s death.  When we receive the Lord’s Supper, we are receiving into ourselves the torn body and splattered blood of Christ.

That is why the American Athiests organization is wrong to prevent the steel cross from being a part of the memorial, and why  Mayor Blumberg is wrong to keep clergy from being a part of the ceremony.  The presence of the cross and the clergy remind us that we are involved in a real battle.  We are engaged in spiritual warfare, not against Islam or muslims,  but against otherworldly principalities and powers, against spirits who want to see us dead, both physically and spiritually. Ephesians 6:12.

Some have criticized the United States for going into Iraq, that it was the wrong war to fight.   Regardless of one’s position on that point, unless we understand that we are in a spiritual battle, we are indeed fighting the wrong war.  If, like the Atheists and others, we ignore or deny the supernatural nature of our enemies, we will have to find scapegoats to call our enemies.  This is the real danger to           muslims and others, if we don’t recognize the real enemy is Satan.  Either that or we will be paralyzed into inaction.

We as Christians recognize the real enemy and are on the front lines; we are first responders, when Satan attacks.  We know that the true Church, with its focus on Word and Sacrameny, is the real Department of Homeland Security. And we are confident, because we bear witness that the cross, whether at Calvary or at ground zero, is a symbol of  the victory that Christ has won for us already in this war against evil.  AMEN

Romans 13 and the Northwest District (LCMS)

I have mentioned previously about the efforts of  the Northwest District President Paul Linneman to claim that Gloria Dei Lutheran Church of Spokane was a dissolved/ closed congregation.   If  Gloria Dei no longer exists, than by virtue of the congregation's Bylaws, its real property would apparently belong to the District.  If, however, Gloria Dei Lutheran is still an active congregation, then the District would have no claim to its property.

The District still claims the congregation is gone, in spite of its continuing to meet each Sunday.  But the Corporations Division of the Washington Secretary of State's Office apparently has determined otherwise.  The agency has concluded Gloria Dei remains an active congregation.   The status of Gloria Dei Lutheran Church can be found at this site: http://www.sos.wa.gov/corps/corps_search.aspx
Which brings us to Romans 13:1-10, the epistle text for the  12th Sunday after Pentecost.  

 Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God.  Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves.  For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and you will be commended.  For the one in authority is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also as a matter of conscience.

I am sure that even the Northwest District does not claim that it has the authority to determine when a congregation, a non-profit corporation, is legally active   That authority belongs solely to the civil authority established for that purpose. It now remains to be seen whether the Northwest District will respect the admonition of scripture, voluntarily acknowledge its error, and return possession and title of the property to the congregation.

SEARCHING FOR SOPM

Apparently,  the dispute resolution process for the Northwest District is governed not only by the LCMS  and District Constitutions and Bylaws, (as if they weren't enough) but also by something called the Standard Operating Procedures Manual.

If anyone out there has the SOPM document, I would appreciate your help in providing me a copy.
You can call me at 509 326-0828 or contact me at my email  gdlutheranchurch@netzero.net.