The life of a Christian isn’t always an easy one. Wasn’t it Jesus who said, “the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few” (Matthew 7:14)? Not only that, but a cursory reading of the many letters of the New Testament, including Revelation 2 and 3, shows that life in the early Church was “everything” but idyllic. If that was the case 2000 years ago, why should it be any different today?

The challenges we face now, many of which we try to articulate and address at Lutheran CORE, are myriad: Critical Race Theory, soup-de-jour sexual ethics, finding a pitcher large enough to contain “gender fluidity,” the waning of Scriptural authority, substantial clergy shortages, a high degree of apathy among the “nones” in America (to say nothing about spiritual malaise among some of the faithful). Life in the Church today is everything but idyllic. The challenges we are facing seem, at times, overwhelming.

What if something else is amiss? What if we have gone too soft, lost our moxie, can’t find our “get up and go” because it “hurried up and went”? It’s easy to point fingers at many things out there, and there certainly are viruses more noxious than COVID-19 which have entered the bloodstream of American Lutheranism. But what if the fundamental issue isn’t out there but a problem with in here? C.S. Lewis wrote about “men without chests” in the Abolition of Man, a staggering assessment and stinging indictment on modern man (the 1940’s British man, at least) for their lack of character. Or to put it in another way, I’ve heard criticisms of a heartless or a mindless Christianity, but what about a spineless Christianity? The body of Christ surely has a spine, does it not? Surely we aren’t just a sagging bag of skin!

When I talk with some of the older members of the churches I currently serve and think about those saints I have served, one of the common comments I hear about pastors of ages past is how forthright they were. They weren’t forthright in a mean-spirited way, something akin to a rabid political protestor or a politician trying to show their constituents how righteous they are or (perhaps more likely) to show off the deep pockets that fund their ambitions. They were forthright in a pastoral, Christian way. Of course, the occasional mean, curmudgeon of a pastor would happen from time to time. But at least the coarse pastors got their point across clearly.

Perhaps we need to recapture or revamp that old “Herr Pastor” model of ministry. Those “Herr Pastors” had a strong backbone. The pastor spoke and led; the parish listened and followed (sometimes). The prophets and apostles spoke and led; Israel and the Church (sometimes) listened and (sometimes) followed. Jesus, the Good Shepherd, spoke and led and like the prophets before and the apostles after Him; some listened, some followed. This might not be considered the “perfect” way to lead a Church but it is a Biblical way to lead. It is a way to lead with a spine, a spine that is held steady and secure, like a good back brace, by God’s grace and power.

Perhaps this is the kind of moxie we should like to see in our pastors and church leaders.  Forthright, yet tender; stern and loving, just like Jesus. Not domineering but also not flapping back and forth like a reed in the wind. Jovial without being trivial. Gentle (a fruit of the spirit!) while also having gravitas. And this is the kind of character we should like to see in the people of God, the flock of Christ’s pasture, is it not?

Think of the saints of the New Testament whose spines were strong because of the one true faith passed on to them through their preachers and pastors; Priscilla and Aquilla, Lydia, the authors of the Gospels, and all those names Paul often mentions at the end of his letters. Think of all those early Church fathers who wrote voluminously against heresy and paganism, even at the cost of their lives and livelihood. Think of all those faithful women through the ages who taught the faith to their children and, through their love and devotion, many of them became the means by which their unbelieving husbands came to be saved (1 Corinthians 7:16).

Like the Church today, they all no doubt had bouts of uncertainty, seeing an easy road to travel through compromise…if they only gave in just a little. But as we all know and have seen, especially in various denominations, when you give an inch, soon you will be giving up a mile. Perhaps those early Christians failed more than we realize as did those who lived during decades of swelling Church numbers in the 1940’s and 50’s. But they had a burly backbone, a strong spine.

We also know that we share in the same faith, the same baptism, the same Lord: Jesus who is the same, yesterday, today, and forever (Hebrews 13:8). Jesus, the Lamb of God, has conquered the world (John 16:33) and will return to this weary world soon (Revelation 22:20). And Jesus has promised that even the gates of hell will never overwhelm the Church (Matthew 16:18), the “pillar and buttress of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:15). Because of Jesus and Him alone, can we have a spine capable of withstanding any backlash against the Church from wherever it may come. Because of Jesus can we witness to the truth of God “with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience” so that if we are slandered, those who “revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame” (1 Peter 3:15-16).

It is always a joy when you go to a Pastors’ conference and leave with a sense of energy and enthusiasm for ministry.  Over my twenty-eight years of ministry, I have been to my share of such events.   They have been a mixed bag.  To quote Forrest Gump, they “are like a box of chocolates.  You never know what you’ll get.”  Some are definitely worth your time.  Others are mediocre, but since you have the chance to see old friends, you don’t mind.  Others leave you positively frustrated.  Of all the conferences I have attended, good, bad and indifferent, I must say that the NALC Pastors’ Conference held in Orlando, Florida, from February 15 to 18, was one of the best. 

Although I am not a pastor in the NALC, I was able to attend as a representative of Lutheran CORE.  The theme of the conference was: “Always Be Ready: Apologetics in Real Life,” based on 1 Peter 3:15.  The keynote address was given by the Rev. Dr. Mark Mattes, with plenary addresses by Rev. Dr. Maurice Lee, Rev. Dr. Dennis DiMauro, and Rev. Dr. Thomas Jacobson.  Each speaker addressed the topic of apologetics from a different perspective.  Rather than giving a full synopsis of every presentation, I will mention what were the highlights for me.

Mark Mattes identified one of the major mistakes that Christians made in the second half of the 20^th Century.  This was to adopt the world view of unbelievers and skeptics, in an attempt to show that the Christian faith can be made to fit into those worldviews.  Instead of arguing against people from the point of view of modernity or post-modernity, we should argue with them from the point of view of the Christian faith.  Our goal should be to help people see what difference it would make if the Christian worldview were true.

Maurice Lee reminded us of the approach taken by Justin Martyr.  As his name indicates, Justin Martyr was not only an apologist, but died as a martyr.  Justin sought to refute false rumors about Christianity and engaged with pagan philosophers like Socrates and Plato.  However, he had a third strategy.  This was to describe what happens in the liturgy of the Eucharist.  In addition to saying what Christianity is not, we need a picture of what it is.  There is no better place to find this than weekly Sunday worship.  The same is true in 2022.

Dennis DiMauro recounted an experience he had while doing door to door evangelism.  A young man whom he met shocked him.  He wasn’t interested in general information about Christ, or the Church.  What he wanted to know was what had happened in Pastor DiMauro’s own life to make him believe in the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  He reminded us that while there are intellectual arguments and rhetorical strategies that can be helpful, what is most important is being able “to give an account for the faith that is in us.”  Lutherans tend to shy away from the term testimony.  Nevertheless, we need to be able to testify to what God has done for us.

Thomas Jacobson reminded us of the class differences that need to be taken into account in reaching the unchurched.  Lutherans have tended to follow Schleiermacher by focusing on the “cultured despisers” of Christianity.  The problem is that the largest group of un-churched people in America today are not the cultured people of the upper middle-class.  They are the blue collar and the poor.  In recent decades, church attendance remained fairly stable among the successful and well to do.  Meanwhile, among the poorer classes, the bottom has fallen out.   We need to find a way to speak to them too. 

While at the NALC Pastors’ Conference, I was also able to attend two break-out sessions.  The first was led by Rev. Doctor Russell Lackey of Grand View University in Des Moines, Iowa.   He spoke about the NEXUS Institute, a summer theological institute for high school youth, which is held each summer at Grand View.  (This summer it will be held on June 12-18.)  Pastor Lackey shared information about research that has been done on such summer theological institutes.  This research was cross-denominational, cross-cultural, and multi-faith.  It indicated that summer theological institutes are very effective.  As many as 25% of young people who attend these summer theological institutes end up entering the ministry in their respective religious communities.  With the growing shortage of ministers in the Lutheran Church today, institutes like NEXUS are extremely valuable.

In the summer of 2022, there are twenty-five spots for young people at NEXUS.  Bishop Dan Selbo challenged the pastors at the conference to make sure that there will be fifty attending NEXUS in 2023.  I was so impressed that I rushed home and nominated a young person from my congregation for this year’s institute.

The second break-out session that I attended featured Pastor Dave Keener.  It was an introduction to the newest phase of the Life-to-Life Discipleship.  I was excited to hear that the NALC is developing its own resources for Discipleship ministry.  These resources will be tailored specifically for Lutheran congregations. The first will be a 24 week-long introductory curriculum on discipleship.  Those resources are meant to be available on the NALC website in the near future.

Of course, like most conferences, there was good fellowship.  I was able to reconnect with old friends and make new friends.  I also enjoyed visiting my hometown of Orlando, where I was born in 1964.  As I returned home, I was grateful for the six insights that I shared above.  They either confirmed what I am already doing or gave me new areas of ministry to explore.  If you have never been to the NALC Pastors’ Conference before, I encourage you to attend next year.  I also encourage you to get in touch with the speakers above if you want to learn more about what they shared.

Rev. David Charlton

Vice-President, Lutheran CORE

Lutheran CORE’s Congregations in Transition ministry (CiT) was launched back in 2019 to assist Lutheran congregations who are contending with the shortage of available pastors to serve their churches.  This ministry challenge has only become more severe during the pandemic.

This crisis is so widespread it has now come to the attention of the mainstream secular press.  A recent article, in the Wall Street Journal, is entitled, “Houses of Worship Face Clergy Shortage as Many Resign During Pandemic.”  This article was just published last month, on February 21, 2022.  And while the article focused on the degree to which the pandemic has directly contributed to the number of clergy leaving the ministry, the shortage of pastors — as you probably already know — has been an issue for many years.  This pandemic has only made a bad situation even worse.

1. Consider the many factors which, over at least the last twenty years, have contributed to a shortage of available ordained pastoral candidates looking for a call.
2. A very large percentage of pastors have or are about to reach retirement age.
3. Seminaries in general are struggling to recruit new students.  And many of the students they do enroll are far older than was typical when I was ordained back in 1981.  This of course means that many of our more recent seminary graduates will only be in the ministry for a limited number of years.
4. The rate at which our culture is becoming secularized is only increasing; this directly impacts how many people feel “called” to the ordained ministry.  Consider this: Pew Research recently reported that millennials — most American adults under 40 — are the first American generation where those identifying as Christians are in the minority.
5. And, as reported by Wall Street Journal, the pandemic has contributed to the number of ordained clergy who are leaving the ministry.  This includes Boomer pastors who, due to pandemic-related stress and congregational conflict, are retiring earlier than they had originally planned.

Then, in addition to the shortage of available pastors, the local church, more often than not, is struggling.  Thom Rainer is a pastor who is CEO of Church Answers, a large congregational coaching ministry.  Church Answers describes itself as “the largest online community in the world for practical advice on church growth.”  In a recent podcast Pastor Rainer stated that, even before the pandemic, 90% of American churches were experiencing a decline in worship attendance.  He also claims that the pandemic has accelerated that rate of decline by three years.

So what can congregations do to address these challenges?  And especially smaller congregations?  Because the clergy supply crisis presents particular challenges for small churches, and the hard truth is that the shrinking number of available pastors will tend to accept calls to mid-sized and larger congregations.

At this point I want to focus on those of you who attend smaller churches; let’s say churches with 100 or fewer members.  I pick this dividing line because Mike Bradley, the Service Coordinator for the LCMC, just revealed that over 500 LCMC churches in the U.S. have 100 or fewer members.  (This out of a total of 786 LCMC churches in the United States.)  It is my conviction that with the combination of your congregation’s size and the clergy supply crisis, it is time for your lay leaders to consider and plan for a future where you might not be able to find and call a seminary-trained, experienced pastor.  And that might even be the case whether or not you have the financial resources to pay a full-time pastor’s salary with benefits.

So assuming your church leaders are ready to address this possible future scenario — a future where you are unable to find a competent, ordained pastor — what then?  Well then it will be time to identify one or two active members whom you can convince to become ministers-in-training; ministers who will eventually serve your congregation.  Here are some of the steps that would be involved in pursuing this ministry strategy:

1. Most important, identify the right person!  (Lots of prayer will help.)  The “right” person would be someone who is already known as a congregational lay leader and as someone with the personal integrity, faith commitment, and skills to become your future minister. 
2. Next would be the challenge of convincing that individual to say “yes” to this ministry opportunity.
3. Offer, as a congregation, to pay for online seminary classes to help your future “minister” prepare to serve your members.  These classes, taken on a very part-time basis, would not necessarily lead to ordination.  (That would be up to your “candidate.”)  But either way, they would give this person the tools to better serve your congregation in the future.  The LCMC has a list of recommended Christian seminaries; all of which offer most of their courses online.  Just one example: St. Paul Lutheran Seminary in St. Paul, Minnesota, offers an occasional six-week preaching class for just $50.  These seminaries also, of course, offer courses in biblical studies and Lutheran theology.
4. Determine your “minister’s” eventual job description; including whether it would be part-time or full-time.  Note: If you assume it needs to be full-time you just might be ruling out the best person for your future ministry.  Be open to the possibility that your minister-in-training would always be bi-vocational, that is, serving your church while continuing with his or her secular employment. Also, this job description needs to be based on a combination of your congregation’s needs and your future minister’s ministry gifts.
5. Eventually determine this person’s length of service once he or she is officially employed.  One year, two years, three years?
6. At the appropriate time decide on the number of working ministry hours in a typical week, and the financial compensation.
7. Identify a mentoring pastor who will have an on-going, informal “coaching” relationship with your minister-in-training.  This could be either an LCMC or NALC pastor serving in your community or region.  Or, a Congregations in Transition coach could serve in this role by offering online coaching and emotional/spiritual support for your minister-to-be.

It would be presumptuous of me to speculate any further on what this ministry strategy might look like for your congregation.  There are simply too many possible scenarios, which would be and should be based on what is unique about your congregation’s needs, and your ministry context. 

Congregational leaders of smaller churches need to start thinking “outside the box” when it comes to the assumption that viable and vital church ministries always require the leadership of an ordained seminary graduate.  Too often smaller churches — when they are unable to find and call a pastor — assume their only options moving forward are to either settle for “rotating,” occasional supply preachers, or to simply shut their doors.

Remember one of the most important lessons from early church history: The Body of Christ need not rise or fall based solely on the presence or absence of ordained pastors to lead a congregation’s ministry.  The Apostolic church thrived — often under persecution — without the benefit of a professional clergy class.  This is about the priesthood of all believers, not a priesthood limited to the ordained.  Or to put it another way: Sometimes the life and ministry of Christ’s church is simply too important to be left solely to the “professionals.”

Lutheran CORE continues to provide monthly video reviews of books of interest and importance.  Many thanks to Steve Shipman, NALC pastor and former director of Lutheran CORE, for his review of the book, A Harvest of Lutheran Dogmatics and Ethics: The Life and Work of Twelve Theologians 1960-2020 by Carl Braaten.

As Pastor Shipman points out, Carl Braaten personally knew or knows all of the people whose lifework is described in this book.  His concern is that the contributions of this notable group may be forgotten rather than remembered and built upon. 

Steve tells us, “The names are a Who’s Who of Lutheranism in my lifetime.  If you want to understand the Lutheran theological giants of the generation immediately preceding or including most of us, this book is an excellent place to begin.  I would wish that it would be required reading for anyone preparing for parish ministry.”

Carl Braaten shared, “During the pandemic lockdown in our community, I could think of nothing better to do than write a book.”  Steve Shipman commented, “We can hope that there are many more books to come from his keyboard and that God will continue to bless him with health, strength, and wisdom.”  

This review, as well as seventeen others, have been posted on our YouTube channel.  A link to the channel can be found here.

PLAYLIST

If you would like to watch Lutheran CORE’s playlist of all of our video book reviews, click here, then scroll down and start the video by selecting the play button or click on the three vertical lines near the top right of the first video to select a new video from the list that will pop up. 

I would like to tell you about two communications which I recently sent to ELCA leaders.  The first one I sent to Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton.  The second one I sent to a synodical bishop.  As usual, I have heard nothing from Bishop Eaton.  I am very grateful to the synodical bishop, who I feel has very graciously and respectfully listened to and heard my concerns.

My communication to Bishop Eaton had to do with the slowness of her response to a crisis brewing within the ELCA’s Sierra Pacific Synod (SPS – northern California and northern Nevada).  Last December the SPS synod council took action to terminate the call of a Latino mission developer, and they implemented their decision on a day that is very special to the Latino community.  Please notice that I am not taking a position regarding the action taken by the SPS synod council.  What I am taking a position on is only the slowness of Bishop Eaton’s response – particularly in light of how quickly she will take a position and send out a communication on other matters that are not within her scope of authority, responsibility, and expertise.  Here is what I wrote to Bishop Eaton.

* * * * * * *

Dear Bishop Eaton –

I was astounded to learn that it took you over three weeks to send a communication to the ELCA Latino Ministries Association regarding the termination of call of the mission developer for the Mision Latina Luterana in Stockton, California. 

You have said that, as presiding bishop, you have no authority to interfere with the actions of synodical councils and synodical bishops, but I do not understand why it would take you over three weeks to reach out to the Latino community and acknowledge their confusion and pain over the loss of their pastor. 

When the verdict regarding Kyle Rittenhouse was announced, you almost immediately had a response and you spoke critically of the judicial system, as if you knew the facts of the case far better than those who were involved day after day with the case.

In your communication on the occasion of the eightieth anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, you did honor the veterans of World War II, and you did honor the memory of those who died in that conflict, including at Pearl Harbor, but you could not let it stay at that.  You also had to speak against racism.

There are plenty of issues, situations, and problems that need your attention in the organization over which you have oversight and responsibility.  I would suggest that you clean up your own house before you claim to be able to speak helpfully, insightfully, and authoritatively concerning matters over which other people have oversight and responsibility.

As one who has a deep love for Jesus,

Dennis D. Nelson

Retired ELCA Pastor

I purposefully signed the letter as “Retired ELCA Pastor” rather than “Executive Director of Lutheran CORE,” hoping that might increase the chances of my receiving a response.  So far it has not.

* * * * * * *

WOKE FRAGILITY

My letter to a synodical bishop had to do with that synod’s joining with the ELCA in making a Statement of Land Acknowledgement as a primary part of all of its communications.

First, some background information.

The February 2022 issue of ELCA Worship News contains a section entitled “Resources for Land Acknowledgement.”  A link to that section can be found here.

Reading that section raised several questions in my mind as I realize that the ELCA Churchwide offices on Higgins Road, as well as the offices of all sixty-five of the ELCA synods, as well as all of the ELCA congregations, are all located on land formerly occupied by native Americans. 

First, the whole matter of land acknowledgement must be very important to the ELCA because its Declaration to American Indian and Alaska Native People commits the ELCA “to begin the practice of land acknowledgements at all expressions of the church.”  The importance of this practice is also displayed in the fact that the introductory letter suggests all kinds of occasions and ways in which land acknowledgement statements could be used – read aloud at the beginning of every worship service, printed at the top of worship bulletins, used to create outdoor signage and a plaque for the narthex, and used at the beginning of zoom meetings.  

Second, this practice is clearly based upon the premise that all land in the United States is stolen land.  The resource document states, “All land is Indigenous land.”  The introductory letter states, “A land acknowledgement is a ritual intended solely to show gratitude to the land and acknowledge the original and Indigenous peoples from whom the land was stolen.”  (A whole other issue is the fact that I do not know what it means to show gratitude to the land – not gratitude for the land, gratitude to God for creating the land and making it a good land, or gratitude to those who developed the land, but gratitude to the land.)

Third, both the introductory letter and the resource document clearly state that the practice of land acknowledgement is only a first step – and an easy first step.  The introductory letter says, “This is arguably one of the easier commitments.”  The resource document adds, “We understand that this protocol is only a first step and that, as we venture into the world, we must learn more, do more and realize healing and justice for the Indigenous peoples whose lands we now occupy.”

In my communication to this synodical bishop, I summed up the content of the introductory letter and resource document.  I then made the following three observations.  I believe that this issue is even more significant and poignant in light of the fact that the congregations in that synod are significantly diminished, the giving from the congregations to the synod has dropped significantly in the past decade, the annual spending plan for the synod is much greater than the anticipated income, and a significant part of the shortfall is made up from funds obtained by selling the properties of closed congregations.  Here is what I wrote to that synodical bishop.

“First, if the synod feels that the land now occupied by its offices and congregations is stolen land, then the synod is morally obligated to return to native American people at least the value of the land whenever a congregation is closed and the property is sold.  If the synod does not do that, then the synod is clearly being complicit in the stealing of land from Indigenous persons.  The word ‘complicit’ is a word that the ELCA uses often to describe those whose attitudes and actions it is critical of.  Before I accuse someone else of being complicit, I need to ask whether there is any area where I am being complicit.

“I can certainly understand the synod’s not returning also the value of the buildings, because the buildings were not present when the land was stolen.  But if the synod does not want to be complicit in the stealing of land by holding onto the value of stolen land, and for the synod to act in a way that is consistent with its values, statements, and priorities, then the synod would need to return to Indigenous persons at least the value of the land.

“Second, if the synod chooses to remain complicit in the stealing of land, how could the synod have the integrity and moral authority to have a statement of land acknowledgement as part of its communications and worship services?  Having such a statement without also returning to Indigenous people the value of stolen land gives the impression that the synod is in favor of justice only if being in favor of justice does not cost the synod anything.    

“Third, if the synod chooses to remain complicit in the stealing of land, how could the synod have the integrity and moral authority – along with the ELCA – to advocate for reparations for people of African descent?

“I am reminded of what John the Baptist said to those who came out to hear him and be baptized by him.  ‘Bear fruit that befits repentance.’ 

“When the ELCA, including the (Synod), calls upon our country to repent of past evils and injustice, then the ELCA, including the (Synod), also needs to think through whether there are any ways in which they are being complicit in perpetuating those evils and injustices.

Blessings in Christ,

Dennis D. Nelson

I am constantly amazed over how arrogant, self-righteous, ungrateful, and inconsistent the “woke” agenda actually is.  You take what they say, bring it out to its logical conclusions, apply their standards and criteria to them, and it collapses.  We hear a lot about “white fragility.”  I think instead we should hear about “woke fragility.”

Have you ever wondered what good it does to “like” something you read on social media?

Lutheran CORE mostly posts information, such as newsletter articles, devotions, and prayers, while others may post about their children or pets. We don’t see everything everyone posts and they don’t see everything CORE posts either. It turns out that each social medium platform (Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are examples) uses math to decide who sees what.

So how do we reach people, especially our youth, who don’t already know about us? It turns out that each platform uses social signals (likes, comments and shares) in deciding what is popular and important. The mathematical formula tracks the social signals and the people doing the social signaling. It also tracks the posters’ friends and their interests.

Why? Because the platform tries to decide whether each post is of general interest or just of interest to your little corner of the Internet. It also considers whether people in other places are interested in the topic. Like it or not, you won’t see a post unless the platform’s math formula decides that it is right for you. To quote Big Commerce [emphasis added], “Increased social signals indicate good domain authority and demonstrate a URL’s value. When large numbers of users share and like a page, it indicates that the page is genuine and contains substantive or entertaining content.” (BigCommerce)

Most of you are probably aware of Facebook or Twitter at this point, but what about Instagram? Instagram is a social media platform that emphasizes photo and video sharing and, more importantly, lots of young adults and high school students use it.

If we want to combat the secular world by making it possible for our children and grandchildren to read our posts, then we need to use the apps they use, write the way they absorb information, and do all we can to let the various platforms know that our posts are worth reading.

How do we do that? In a nutshell, we start by creating accounts for each of the major social media platforms. We then need to increase the popularity of a page and its posts by liking / following the posts, and by occasionally sharing them or writing substantial comments. We may get flagged as spam if we only write generic comments such as “Awesome post!”

Even better than being a one-man band is to get a small team doing these things regularly! Maybe your bible study or young adult group would accept the challenge. Children and youth may be hesitant to share a post, but they may be very willing to “like” a post.  That helps too.

Lutheran CORE began publishing to Instagram on February 17^th, 2022. We currently have 17 Instagram followers. How many will we have two months from now when our May issue is released? It could literally be hundreds if our dedicated readers create an Instagram account and start to like, share, comment, and follow our posts.

Click here to visit Lutheran CORE’s linktree which includes links to Lutheran CORE’s Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube pages as well as other posts of interest.

You can also click (or select) on the buttons below to go directly to Lutheran CORE’s accounts. When you visit our YouTube channel, please subscribe to it and enjoy the video book reviews we have posted there.

Jesus said, “Go!” and this is one practical way you may help reach the lost and looking.

Introduction

A question I am often asked by people is this – How did it happen?  How did LGBTQ+ values, priorities, and agenda completely take over the ELCA, and so quickly?  The purpose of this article is to show how the principles of community organizing were used most effectively to bring about this change.

The ELCA was formed in 1987 and began functioning as a church body in 1988.  At the 2005 Churchwide Assembly traditional values prevailed, though just barely.  It was not until 2009 that standards changed, and look at all that has happened since.  For nearly twenty-two of the thirty-four years that the ELCA has existed, at least the officially recognized position was more traditional.  It has only been during the last twelve years that revisionist views have prevailed.  Actually and officially, the 2009 ELCA Churchwide Assembly only gave its blessing to (PALMS) publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous same sex relationships.  But in reality the ELCA has fully embraced the LGBTQIA+ agenda, values, priorities, and lifestyle.  The ELCA has completely marginalized anyone who holds to any other view, and it is charging ahead at such a rapid pace that it makes you wonder whether anything could stop it except a total crash.

How did it happen?  Part of the answer can be found in the fact that those who have been driving this are super focused and relentlessly dedicated.  Part of the answer can also be found in the image of lily pads on a lake.  Let’s say that the area of the surface of the lake that is covered by lily pads doubles each year.  At first, the amount of increase is small.  Then it becomes larger and more noticeable.  Eventually lily pads are covering half of the lake.  At that point and at that rate how much longer will it take for lily pads to cover the entire lake?  One year.

Community Organizing

A more detailed answer can be found in the principles of community organizing and how that methodology has been used extremely effectively by such groups within the Lutheran community as ReconcilingWorks.  ReconcilingWorks is an organization that since 1974 “has advocated for the full welcome, inclusion, and equity of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual/aromantic (LGBTQIA+) Lutherans in all aspects of the life of their Church, congregations, and community.”  Specifically we will be looking at how community organizing is the central approach employed by the Building an Inclusive Church Toolkit (BIC) developed by ReconcilingWorks in order to change peoples’ minds, turn the minority position into the majority position, and thereby take over the church.  A link to the Toolkit can be found here. 

Community organizing is also the primary approach employed by many other social justice activists – in the secular world as well as in the mainline church – in order to push for social change.  It is popular because it works.  Its techniques are effective, which is why and how the liberal/progressive movement has been so successful in taking hold of the mainline church and secular society.

Lutherans who hold to a high view of the authority of Scripture need to be aware of this process, so that we might develop and offer an effective response.  Our failure to do so is a major reason why we are losing the battle – in the mainline church as well as in the secular world – to the LGBTQ+ agenda and other liberal/progressive concerns. 

Texts

Here are some resources that you can use for further study.  Fortress Press is “an imprint of 1517 Media.”  1517 Media is “the ministry of publishing of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.”

• Building an Inclusive Church Toolkit by Reconciling Works
• Doing Justice: Congregations and Community Organizing by Dennis A. Jacobsen (Fortress Press)
• Faith-Based Organizing by Charles Frederickson, Violetta Lien, Herbert E. Palmer, and Mary Lou Walther (Fortress Press)
• Faith-Rooted Organizing by Alexia Salvatierra and Peter Heltzel (Fortress Press)

Theological Education

Several ELCA seminaries offer classes and/or training in community organizing as part of the public theology and/or practical theology components of the seminary curriculum.  At one ELCA seminary the “public church” curriculum has become the primary organizing principle around which the degree programs are structured.  At other ELCA seminaries, efforts have been made and/or are in progress to expand the “public theology” focus, often at the expense of Biblical and confessional theological content.  At one ELCA seminary a career in community organizing is one of the possible career pathways that the Master of Theological Studies (M. T. S.) degree leads to and prepares for.

Background

Community organizing methodology was developed by Saul Alinsky, a secular Jewish man, in the late 1930’s.  Although Alinsky never identified as a socialist and/or a communist, he shared in common with them radical left (for his time) ideology, concern for the poor, and support for working-class communities and labor movements.  Alinsky saw the need to fight for specific goals and used the principles and techniques of community organizing to achieve those goals.

Overview

Community organizing relies on two main things – strong relationships and shared values.  Community organizers use these two things to change the minds of community members in order to get them to support a cause.  In this way they build a coalition of supportive people.  They then rally these people together and work together to press for change.

Community organizing begins with the following steps –

• Gather together a small core team of people who are already committed to your cause. These are the people who will start the process of pushing for change.
• Gather information about individual people as well as about the community. Build relationships with people.  Learn about what they believe and why.  Use what you learn to plan your approach.  Identify key influencers and supporters who may be assets to your cause.
• Tell stories which evoke sympathy and support for your cause.
• Build common ground with your community (shared values and/or experiences).
• Educate the community in order to bring its members to your side.
• Once the initial prep work has been done, choose a course of action.
  • Either a conflict approach, where the people in power are seen as your enemy.  If so, confront them and take them down.
  • Or a consensus approach, where the people in power are seen as people who can change their minds.  If so, convince them to side with you.

Building an Inclusive Church Toolkit

The Building an Inclusive Church Toolkit from ReconcilingWorks builds upon, and relies upon, the community organizing method.  Its approach assumes that there is already support from the leadership (clergy, church council, lay leaders, etc.) and that what needs to be done is to convince the rest of the community – enough to secure a 75% vote for RIC (Reconciling in Christ) status, as required by ReconcilingWorks.

As such, the proposed course of action is similar to the consensus approach.  However, normally in community organizing the primary target is people in power (i. e. the clergy).  However, in the BIT Toolkit, the primary target is the community at large (i. e. the congregation).  The primary target’s minds need to be changed in order to accomplish the desired goal. 

A Faith Community Assessment Survey is taken to evaluate the faith community’s current position(s).  A link to the survey can be found here. Based upon the results, one of three timelines is suggested – Cautious, Moderatus, and Adventurous.  The timetable ranges from six years to under one year.  But no matter how long it may take, those working to bring about change are focused and relentless.  

Whichever timeline is followed, the process is broken down into eleven steps, and there are six tools that are employed in order to work the process.  These steps and tools are described in the Toolkit.  Four of the six tools are Graceful Engagement, One-to-One Visits, Public Storytelling, and Scriptural Engagement.

Scriptural Engagement

It is interesting – and significant – that the sixth step – Providing Educational Opportunities – and the sixth tool – Scriptural Engagement – both come so late in the process.  Typically, people who hold to a high view of the authority of Scripture would begin by focusing on what the Bible says.  But that is not what the BIC Toolkit does.  Instead the primary means of building community support are finding shared values – such as diversity, equity, inclusion, and welcome – and then engaging in carefully crafted storytelling in order to evoke sympathy and support for the cause.  “Scriptural Engagement” does not actively come into play until the steps that build support from the community have already been completed. 

It should not surprise us that “Scriptural Engagement” does not come until late in the process.  The Bible does not support what ReconcilingWorks is trying to accomplish.  The Scripture passages that are included in the BIC Toolkit include Luke 10:29-37 (the parable of the Good Samaritan), John 4: 4-26 (Jesus and the woman at the well), Matthew 22: 35-40 (the Greatest Commandment), Matthew 26: 51-52 (Peter’s cutting off the high priest’s servant’s ear), and Luke 23: 34 (one of the words of Jesus from the cross.)  There is obviously no way that these passages support the LGBTQIA+ agenda.  They do not even address LGBTQIA+ issues.  No wonder support and agreement must be built in other ways rather than on the clear message of Scripture.  Relying on the principle that feelings are often more important and more powerful than facts when it comes to convincing people to change their minds, the BIC Toolkit focuses on feelings-based approaches, such as storytelling, rather than on facts-based approaches, such as asking what the Bible says, in order to get people to come on board with the cause. 

By the time the “Scriptural Engagement” tool comes into active use, the community’s minds and hearts have already been shaped into being LGBTQ+ affirming.  Very little of Scripture is engaged with, and the purpose as well as the message of Scripture is distorted.  The whole of Scripture’s message is reduced to three themes –

1. We are called to love God and love our neighbors.
2. It is not our place to judge.
3. Treat others as you would want to be treated.

Specific passages from Scripture which appear to support these themes are selectively chosen in an effort to demonstrate that these ideas form the fundamental message of Scripture.

Other themes of Scripture – such as sin and our need for God’s forgiveness, God’s command that we repent of our sins, our need to obey God, and the Bible’s instructions regarding holy living – are minimized or avoided entirely. 

The prescribed approach to the so-called “clobber passages” (the passages that clearly speak against same-sex sexual behavior) is to avoid them, or else to minimally engage with them only as needed, until the three themes mentioned above are firmly established in the hearts and minds of the community as the primary message of Scripture.  Only then are the “clobber passages” engaged with, under the assumption that, if indeed the primary message of Scripture is one of welcome and inclusion, and the “clobber passages” are neither welcoming nor inclusive of LGBTQ+ identified people who are engaged in same-sex sexual behavior, then either we have misunderstood these “clobber passages” or the “clobber passages” must be wrong in some way. 

With so little engagement with Scripture, and with what little of Scripture is utilized being so badly misrepresented, people are left with an understanding that is far from biblically sound.

I will be completing this article in my February Letter from the Director.  In that second part I will tell more about how the Building an Inclusive Church Toolkit uses the principles of community organizing to change people’s minds and get them on board with the cause.  I will also offer several suggestions as to what those with a high view of the authority of Scripture need to do and can do in order to provide a viable, effective, and convincing alternative. 

Lutheran CORE continues to provide monthly video reviews of books of interest and importance.  Many thanks to NALC pastor Jeffray Greene for giving us a video review of the book Ethics by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  According to Pastor Greene, “The thoughts are profound and will cause you to think on a different level.”  Pastor Greene acknowledges that “it is not an easy read,” and this is the third time he has read it, but he shares that “if you allow it to be digested, it will help you to further shape the understanding and wisdom that God gives through Scripture.” 

Bonhoeffer was a deep thinker who struggled with the good and evil which surrounded him.  His was a keen mind which wrestled with the horrific realities which the twentieth century produced.  Unlike many of his fellow citizens, he was fully aware of the atrocities of the Holocaust and the decadence of the Nazi regime.  After lengthy incarceration and concentration camp privation, he was executed by the Nazis on April 9, 1945, just days before the Allied liberation. 

While wrestling with these things in the privation caused by a tyrannical and self-destructive regime, Bonhoeffer did not focus on what he saw around him with eyes that judged the evil.  Rather he focused on the goodness of God, which calls us to live according to the Lord’s purposes.  Pastor Greene concludes, “To do so is what ethics is all about.”     

This review, as well as fourteen others, have been posted on our YouTube channel.  A link to the channel can be found here.

A concerned member of the ELCA contacted me, asking me to do a review of a new curriculum from Augsburg Fortress’s Sparkhouse. That curriculum is entitled T.B.D.: Think. Believe. Do.  Sparkhouse touts it as their newest youth curriculum.  A blogpost describes T.B.D.

as a new small group series that gives students the tools to articulate, investigate, and test out their beliefs on a broad range of topics that connect to their daily lives. However, the goal isn’t to come away from each series with a settled idea about the topic. Although they might feel more settled than they did before. Instead. T.B.D. focuses on how students think, not just what they think.

https://blog.wearesparkhouse.org/youth-faith-process

Currently, T.B.D. offers six topical courses on Prayer, Sin, Mission, Salvation, and Bible, broken up into four sessions each.  Each session begins with a “Provocative Statement” before moving through three major sections: Think, Believe and Do.  After answering a series of thought provoking questions in their journals, students watch a video and reflect on two Bible Passages.  Following this, they come up with an honest statement of what they believe as individuals and as a group.  Finally, the group brainstorms a low risk way to test out that belief in the following week. 

The Video

In the videos that accompany each session, a young person wrestles with questions about the topic of the session.  This is very interesting.  Like many people today, both young and old, the character in each video turns to the internet, searching for an answer.  As you would expect, answers come from all quarters.  The internet search yields many quotes from the Bible.  Quotes are also given by Luther, Augustine, Calvin, Bonhoeffer, St. Benedict, and other Christian teachers.  Others come from more dubious places, like Bart Ehrman and Richard Dawkins.  This is what you would expect from an internet search.   The character in the video is left with more questions than answers as a result.  Pastors and catechists are very familiar with the kind of idiosyncratic views that people develop from their use of the internet. 

Values Clarification

The question is where to turn.  The answer is more than a little surprising.  After pondering challenging statements, watching the video, and looking up two Bible verses, the students are immediately asked to formulate their own responses to the questions.  The result is something very similar to the kind of “values clarification” that was practiced decades ago.  It’s almost as if the students are told, “You’re on your own.  The Bible is unclear and unreliable.  The Christian tradition is too varied and contradictory.  Who’s to say what is true.  You need to chart your own path.”

As a person who grew up in the 1970s, I am quite familiar with this way of teaching.  I learned to ask open ended questions and to accept the challenge to decide for myself.  Fortunately for me, I had pastors and college professors who pointed me to the answers.  (I attended a Lutheran college.) Otherwise, I would have been lost.  During my senior year of college, the process of asking open questions and deciding for myself overwhelmed me.  I realized that I was drowning in a sea of meaninglessness and purposelessness.  In the midst of this, I became acutely aware of my sinfulness.  It was then that I turned to the things I had learned from my pastors and professors.  In particular, I remembered what I had learned about the Cross and the Resurrection.  If I had been left entirely to my own resources, I don’t know where I would be.

A Third Resource?

In T.B.D., youth are presented with two resources with which to interpret the Bible: 1) the confusing diversity of answers given by the internet and 2) their own wisdom and the wisdom of their peers.   It’s too bad that a third resource is not introduced into the discussion, namely, the wisdom of the Creedal and Lutheran tradition of interpreting the Bible. If the person teaching this curriculum is a pastor or a well catechized lay person, T.B.D. might not be harmful.  The same would be true if it was used with well catechized youth.  As one reads the lesson book and watches the video, it is easy to identify answers to the questions that are raised. 

For instance, in the unit on Prayer, the video character, a young woman, wrestles with the meaning and purpose of prayer.  What does the Bible teach?  How is one to pray?  Does prayer change things?  Why pray if God already knows everything?  As I watched, I thought to myself, “It’s too bad the Lutheran tradition doesn’t have a simple but profound explanation of the meaning of prayer; or even better an explanation of the Lord’s Prayer.”  At one point, the character finds a link to an article on St. Benedict.  She decides to download his daily prayer schedule to her calendar, only to be shocked by the notion that it calls for prayer seven times a day.  Again, I found myself thinking, “Too bad Luther didn’t simplify the seven hours of prayer on behalf of the laity, reducing them to two or three times a day.”   At another point, the character does a search for the Ten Commandments, hoping that there is something there about prayer.  She concludes that the Ten Commandments are no help, since prayer is not mentioned.  As one knows, however, Luther’s interpretation of the Second Commandment has a lot to say about prayer. 

Unanswered Questions

After reflecting on this curriculum, I am left with a final question.  Is the failure to use the catholic and Lutheran tradition a bug or a feature of T.B.D.?  In other words, do the developers of T.B.D. assume that teachers and facilitators will make use of the Great Tradition and the Lutheran Confessions?  Have they simply forgotten to explicitly remind facilitators of these resources?  Or is the intent to encourage students to utilize the widest possible resources, from St. Benedict to Richard Dawkins, to formulate their own system of beliefs?  If so, the result will not be formation in the Christian faith, but instead in an eclectic post-Christian form of spirituality. 

Ironically, I can remember a time when Augsburg Fortress was criticized for being too Lutheran, too Confessional, too heavy in doctrine.  Other publishers, like Group Publishing and Youth Specialties, were preferred because they were more user friendly, more engaging, and more broadly Evangelical.  To see a curriculum that makes such sparse use of the Catechism and the Lutheran Confessions is surprising, and not an improvement. 

As we entered 2022, and I faced the deadline for this article, I found myself struggling with what to write; what topic did I find compelling enough to spend time seriously reflecting upon?  What in the Church’s life was I passionate enough about at the moment that I thought I could add something substantive to Her discussion and deliberation?

Surprisingly for me, I had trouble identifying that thing.  Oh, sure, there was plenty that concerned me, problems around which my thoughts tend to eddy and swirl as I seek some pastoral, theological, philosophical, or practical understanding, strategy, or stance, but what was lacking was the passion that typically makes me put pen to paper — or hands to keyboard.

Passion… it is a word with a storied history in the Church.  In my first ecclesial job as a youth minister, our church’s youth ministry decorated the youth room wall with the words “Faith, Passion, Service.”  Upon visiting, a colleague commented, “Passion is something I think my youth already have plenty of… I’d think more about discouraging that.”

But the Church Fathers — the pastors during the Church’s greatest period of missionary expansion did not feel that way.  C. S. Lewis has introduced many modern Christians to the distinctions between the four Greek words for love through his book The Four Loves, and as a result, many Christians think of storge (affection), philos (friendship), and eros (infatuation with the beloved, not necessarily sexual) as immature or degenerate in comparison to the New Testament standard of agape, Christ’s own self-sacrificial love.

But this is not the way the Church Fathers spoke.  They spoke of God’s divine eros that burned for lost humanity so completely it agape’d the world enough to give His only Son… to give Himself.  Far from fearing passion, a Church whose largely convert members had drunk deeply of the wine of Roman success, who had tasted fruits imported from every corner of the conquered empire (now redubbed “the civilized world”), who had participated fully in the “good life,” the Pax Romana for which so many had given their lives in labor or battle, had come to realize that far from their passion being too great, it was too small.  This was a Church quite literally world-weary, who would have agreed whole-heartedly with Lewis when he preached in war time,

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”[1]

They would have agreed with this because they made a distinction that we post-enlightenment, postmodern, post-truth people, whatever our religious convictions, fail to make.  It has been noted by some that we represent “psychological man,” products of what Charles Taylor terms in his eponymous book A Secular Age.  We are people who, however we think of ourselves — straight or gay, cis-gendered or trans, conservative or progressive, believing or unbelieving, a sack of meat directed by selfish genes or made in the image of God — we are a people who almost ineluctably conceive of our identities as emerging from a murky subconscious that is fundamentally comprised of appetites. 

For us, love is almost always conceived of as downstream from appetites in which we are not fundamentally different from animals.  I have 1600 hours of C.P.E. to my credit, and I can tell you that while theological conversation is by no means absent from my cohort groups, it must always be respectfully conditional (to make room for disparate, even conflicting convictions), but the psychological theories that form the substance of our didactics are not so much deferred to as referenced in ways that establish their authority.  These theories, whether Freudian, Behavioral, Object-Relations, or of some other school, all stipulate appetite (conceived of as need) as fundamental and love as an experience later articulated on the basis of such.  Appetite is the water within which we swim, the air we breathe to nourish our sense of self.

This was forcibly brought home to me by my daughter when at age nine she ebulliently showed me one of her bug-eyed Beanie Baby stuffed animals.  After waxing eloquent about how much she loved it, she paused then thoughtfully added, “but you know, I’m pretty much programmed to feel this way about it because it has big eyes.  All mammals are programmed to respond to their babies that way.”  As she skipped back merrily to her play, I not only celebrated inwardly that somehow the brute biological “fact” had not diminished her childish joy, but marveled that this Christian homeschooled, thoroughly-churched girl without social media or unsupervised internet access had somehow been catechized so thoroughly by our culture’s tacit view of humanity… I hoped she would not later be seduced by its reductionism, the storge of a mother for her child diminished to mere genetic necessity.

The Great Tradition of the Church views humanity very differently, in a way that should not sit as peacefully alongside our modern biological and psychological conceptions, as it too often does. If we are truly made in the image of God, the template of our souls is not the paltry desire that modernity stipulates and Kierkegaard lamented.  Rather, what is fundamental to our identities is love — a divine eros that burns hotter than we can imagine, for “our God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:29)

The ascetic tradition of the Church cautions us about passion, but in this, it does not mean the passion of love — any of the four loves about which Greek is so articulate in comparison to English.  Our elder brothers and sisters in the faith knew well from personal experience that appetite could easily obscure love as the prime mover of the soul, for it offered easier and immediate (albeit temporary and incomplete) satiation of the desire that is one of the many aspects of love.  Love desires the beloved, not as a possession but as simply its object, the sun around which it orbits.  A robustly Christian anthropology would see appetite as parasitically imitating love, seeking to consume or possess the thing or person desired, not as the foundation upon which rarified “conceptions” of love would later be built.

The seeds of ascetic Christian spirituality are already evident in 1 Corinthians. There the Apostle Paul states:

²⁴ Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it. ²⁵ Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. ²⁶ So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. ²⁷ But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.[2]

We must not let the force of the Apostle’s words here be softened as I have heard too many well-meaning preachers do into weak-kneed warnings, back-handed reassurances that we might not “finish well.”  The salvation that is by grace through faith may be lost — we may be disqualified — if our appetites convince us that their satiation is the face God’s love takes for us, if our trust in them slowly but decisively supplants our faith in Christ.

The sexuality debates that have riven the Church of late should put a recognizable face on the process, at least for readers of this periodical, but I do not wish to direct this warning toward those who have appetites with which I do not struggle; I need this strong medicine myself, as the consumerism of our unbelieving culture’s annual Christmas bacchanal has brought into sharp focus for me.  I say, “brought into sharp focus,” because what I am seeing as I write this reflection is true of me all year around; though I call myself a Christian, though I believe I have faith, the shape of my life (which reflects the shape of my soul) is still largely formed by the unsanctified narratives of our cultural moment.  My life is far more driven by appetite than I would care to admit on most days.  I too often shop for new theological books rather than re-read those in my library whose arguments I have digested but whose wisdom eludes me in the daily practice of Christian discipleship.  I too often tune-in to pedagogic YouTube videos rather than practice my guitar.  I too often numb the pain of a day in which I have dealt with the tragic consequences of life in a world ruled by the power of death and the devil or the sinful choices of people who know better with a scotch or a mindless movie than with prayer and time with the Great Physician who alone can heal my infirmities.  Too often, my appetites direct my activity rather than my faith.

In that last sentence, I nearly wrote, “my appetites dictate my activity.”  The great hope we have — the promise of discipleship and evangelical freedom — is that I used the proper verb, and that with the help of the Holy Spirit, our history need not be our destiny.  To be sure, “we are in bondage to sin and cannot free ourselves,” but while we are bound, Christ is not and He may direct us differently.

I am coming to believe we focus so much on what we are saved from that we too often neglect what we are saved for.  The 2007 film Amazing Grace about the life of William Wilberforce begins with his motion to abolish slavery being defeated on the floor of the British Parliament because some of those who had promised to vote for it were given tickets to the Comic Opera by his opposition.  The modern equivalent would be binge-watching a Netflix series when, led by the Spirit through our faith, we should be praying, consoling someone, enjoying time with a friend, reading Scripture or similarly engaged.  How many key moments have each of us missed when, through Jesus Christ, God had a Spirit-led motion upon the floor of our lives?  Appetites distract, dim, and partially satisfy, making us forget — and so fail to enjoy — the promise of the freedom for which we were saved.

The acedia, the sloth, the deadly sin of passionless-ness with which I began this little reflection is a sign to me that I have been too much with my appetites, that they have been directing me in spiritually unhealthy ways, leading me to seek satisfaction too often on the penultimate rather than the ultimate.  I generally love the Christmas season, but this year for the first time I found myself discontent and eager for Twelfth Night to arrive so we could begin the process of undecorating.  This year, for the first time I understood in my bones the words of the twentieth century theologian who said, “the only time I don’t feel like a hypocrite is when I am in liturgy.”

The feast of Christmas is over, and I am ready for the fasting of Lent to begin, not because I cannot bear to feast, but so that the joy of feasting — dining with Our Lord — may return.

[1] C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, and Other Addresses

[2] 1 Corinthians 9:24–27 (ESV)