Official Handbook Source Text
Handbook page 208
Source: LCMS Handbook 2023, page 208.
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.
6. AUXILIARY AND RECOGNIZED
SERVICE ORGANIZATIONS
6.1 Auxiliaries
6.1.1 An auxiliary exists as an arm of the Synod and has as its primary function
aiding the Synod, specifically in programs that extend the ministry and mission of the Synod. Auxiliary status is presently limited to the International Lutheran Laymen’ s League and the Lutheran Women’ s Missionary League.
6.1.2 An organization desiring to be recognized as an auxiliary of the Synod shall
apply for that status to a convention of the Synod through the Board of Directors of The Lutheran Church— Missouri Synod.
6.1.2.1 An organization desiring to be recognized as an auxiliary of the Synod shall
satisfy the following requirements:
(a) Be national in scope and voluntary in membership and participation.
(b) Identify itself with the Synod but not be a part of the Synod ’s constitutional structure.
(c) Operate with freedom and self-determination as a ministry and be independent of the Synod in its organization and administration, in the establishment and evaluation of its own objectives, activities, and programs, and in financial matters, while complying with the responsibilities outlined in this bylaw.
(d) Coordinate plans and programs with those of the Synod through regular sharing and contact with representatives of those boards and offices to which the Synod has assigned specific responsibilities (boards and offices of the Synod will share with the auxiliaries in a similar manner).
(e) Be classified by the Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) corporation.
(f) Have membership made up of persons who are baptized members of congregations that are members of The Lutheran Church— Missouri Synod and all partner churches.
(g) Seek, when calling an ordained or commissioned minister, the counsel of the district president who would, by virtue of the call, assume ecclesiastical supervision of the minister (Bylaw section 2.12).
(1) If the call is such that the district president to assume ecclesiastical supervision is not known, the counsel of the president of the district within which the entity is located or with which it is associated shall be sought.
(2) If such a call involves multiple districts (such as by entity location or connection and/or position locale), the presidents of all such districts shall be consulted and mutually agree on which one of them will counsel the entity regarding the call and ass ume ecclesiastical supervision of the worker called.
