Official Handbook Source Text
Handbook page 155
Source: LCMS Handbook 2023, page 155.
This page reproduces text from the 2023 LCMS Handbook for study and navigation. Readers should verify procedural, legal, parliamentary, or governance questions against the official LCMS Handbook and appropriate LCMS authorities.
(c) The responsibility of conscientious pastoral care recognizes that a pastor will occasionally encounter an exceptional case in which he is called on to administer Holy Communion to a person who is outwardly connected with such an organization. Such exceptio nal cases ordinarily involve an individual who
(1) has accepted the pastoral care of the congregation and is being instructed by its pastor in an effort to lead that person to see the inconsistency of contradictory confession and witness; and
(2) has renounced to the pastor and/or church council the unchristian or anti-Christian character of the organization in which membership is held.
(d) In such exceptional cases the pastor should consult with his brethren in the ministry or with officials of the Synod, as the case may require. He should, furthermore, beware of procrastination and the giving of offense to members of either the congregation or sister congregations.
(e) The Synod instructs its officials to exercise vigilant care and urges all pastors and congregations to carry out these provisions and faithfully eradicate all compromise or negation of the Gospel through members’ identification with objectionable organizations. It shall be the duty of every member, pastor, and especially officials of the Synod to admonish those pastors and congregations that fail to offer counter testimony and take decisive action in matters pertaining to this subject.
Refusal to heed b rotherly admonition shall lead to suspension and eventual expulsion from the Synod.
3.10 Other Councils, Committees, and Boards
A. Council of Presidents
3.10.1 The President, the First Vice -President, the regional vice -presidents, and
the district presidents shall comprise the Council of Presidents.
3.10.1.1 The council shall meet three times each year and in addition at the call of
the President or at the request of one-third of the Council of Presidents.
3.10.1.2 The Council of Presidents shall provide opportunity for the President of the
Synod to advise and counsel his representatives in the regions and districts and for the regional vice -presidents and district presidents in turn to give counsel to the President. The Council of Presidents also exists to provide opportunity for the presidents of the districts and the Praesidium of the Synod to counsel with one another on matters regarding the doctrine and administration of the Synod, its regions, and its districts, and to edify and support one another in the work they share.
3.10.1.3 The Council of Presidents shall serve as the Board of Assignments of the
Synod. It shall assign first calls to candidates for the offices of ordained and commissioned ministers. The Council of Presidents may in its policies delegate authority for interim placement (between its regular meetings) to a committee of its own members or the chairman of that committee.
3.10.1.4 The Council of Presidents shall carry out such assignments as the Synod in
convention may give to the council from time to time.
