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LCMS 2026 Convention Workbook: Reports and Overtures, PDF page 225

2026 Convention Workbook
190 
OFFICER, BOARD, AND COMMISSION REPORTS
Question 3: If the required procedure of Bylaw 2.14.4.2 was not 
properly followed, does that procedural failure in-
validate the President’s concurrence under Bylaw 
2.14.4.2 (a), thus restoring the complainant’s right 
of appeal for action?
Opinion:
 With 
regard to the completeness of the record presented 
to the President or the adequacy of his review, the situation here 
presented, the question has been answered above. The President’s 
concurrence, once given in response to a clear request, is finally 
dispositive of the matter as presented in the formal, written accusa-
tion.
Reconsideration of Op. 24-3031, Adjunct Seminary 
Faculty (24-3031A)
Minutes of February 6–7, 2026
By an email and memorandum of May 6, 2025, the presidents 
of Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, and Concordia 
Seminary, St. Louis, requested that the commission reconsider its 
Opinion 24-3031, Adjunct Seminary Faculty, which can be found 
in the minutes of March 21–22, 2025. The commission accepted 
the request and solicited input, under Bylaw 3.9.2.2 (b), from the 
boards of regents and presidents of the seminaries and universities 
of the Synod, as well as from Concordia University System and 
the President of the Synod, some of which (and some members of 
which) responded with written materials.
Two concerns are expressed in the request to reconsider Op. 24-
3031:
1.
 That Bylaw 
3.10.5.5 (g) should be considered as applicable 
to full-time faculty only, not, as the opinion states, to all 
faculty (part-time and/or temporary included).
2.
 That the 
term “staff” used in Bylaw section 3.11 should not 
be considered, as the opinion states, as applicable to “facul-
ty” (including part-time or temporary).
Opinion: As to the first concern, the request for reconsideration 
cites several bylaws in which the unqualified word faculty must be 
meant to refer only to full-time faculty, in some cases because only 
the full-time faculty vote and some action of the faculty is being 
referred to. The fact that they do not vote (or do not tend to receive 
sabbaticals), however, does not place the part-time faculty outside 
the faculty, as Bylaw 3.10.5.7 makes clear. In fact, Bylaw 3.10.5.7 
must limit which faculty can vote precisely because the part-time 
and temporary faculty are faculty. The commission finds no reason 
in the bylaws cited to conclude that Bylaw 3.10.5.5 (g)’s use of the 
term faculty can, on the basis of the bylaw language, be determined 
to refer only to full-time faculty.
While the commission recognizes that understanding the reference 
to “the appointment of faculty members” in Bylaw 3.10.5.5 (g) to 
apply beyond the full-time faculty runs counter to now-common 
practice, the commission stands by its interpretation of the bylaw 
as stated in the original opinion. The commission further restates 
that because the primary purpose of each seminary is to teach and 
train those going into the ministry, the involvement of the boards of 
regents in the appointment of all those carrying out that education 
would seem to be their “fulfilling of the mission of the seminary” 
(Bylaw 3.10.5.1).
As to the second concern, the commission finds that the term “staff” 
is used in a wider sense in Bylaw section 3.11, as opposed to the 
narrower sense used in contradistinction to faculty in, for example, 
incompleteness of the prerequisite material does not give him the 
right to withdraw or void his concurrence and proceed to take up 
the now-precluded appeal for action.
Second: That, the concurrence feature of Bylaw 2.14.4.2 having 
been added as “a mechanism to help district and Synod presidents 
to speak ‘with one voice’ in potentially contested declinations to 
suspend” (Secretary Memo), its purpose would be frustrated if such 
concurrence, once granted, did not terminate the matter at hand. 
The concurrence mechanism brings a matter, so far as it extends, 
before the ultimate sitting authority responsible for the doctrinal 
and practical unity of the Synod, namely the President, and gives 
him a stated window in which to act (or not) upon such facts as are 
presented to him. This preserves the right of the accused to time -
ly process, while allowing the President either to “speak with one 
voice” together with a district president in dismissing a matter or—
should he have any doubts about concurring—the right at the time 
to preserve the ability of an accuser to appeal for action.
Third: That the onus of “the supervision regarding the doctrine and 
the administration” and the responsibilities to “conscientiously use 
all the means at [the President’s] command to promote and main -
tain unity of doctrine and practice in all the districts of the Synod” 
(Const. Art. XI B 1–3) rests here, as elsewhere, on the President. 
These are duties he is expected to perform in good faith, upon 
which good faith the Synod ultimately relies. His concurrence con-
cludes with finality the process initiated by the formal written accu-
sation presented to him. The President is the ultimate determiner of 
whether the requirements of Bylaw 2.14.4.2, upon which his con-
currence is contingent, have been carried out, and the time for him 
to make that determination—as regards the process for potential 
expulsion of the accused—is before he would grant concurrence in 
the disposition of that process. There is no mechanism provided in 
the Bylaws for independent or latter-day review of the sufficiency 
of materials provided to the President under Bylaw 2.14.4.2, much 
less, of the extent or quality of his review of those materials. The 
district president and President must be accountable for the conduct 
of their offices, but that is a matter outside the particular Bylaw 
section 2.14 process and with no impact on it.
Question 2:
 Does the 
complainant have the right to request and 
receive confirmation or evidence that the President 
of the Synod received and reviewed the full written 
charges and the record of the district president’s in-
vestigation, as required by Bylaw 2.14.4.2, prior to 
concurring under Bylaw 2.14.4.2 (a)?
Opinion:
 See above as to “and reviewed.” There is no standard or 
finder 
of fact for latter-day review of this aspect. As to “received,” 
neither the Bylaws of the Synod nor the relevant SOPM establish 
such a right. The concurrence of the President of the Synod under 
Bylaw 2.14.4.2 necessarily includes the implicit certification that, 
in the determination of the Synod’s ultimate ecclesiastical supervi-
sory officer, the procedure stated has been followed in good faith, 
including the provision of all required materials. The President 
could explore doubts in this regard as part of his ecclesiastical su-
pervision of the district presidents, but the complainant has no such 
independent right.
The Bylaws do not preclude an accuser from inquiring of the ac-
cused’s district president whether the entire formal written state -
ment of the matter was conveyed to the President, or of the Pres-
ident, whether such was received or how it was reviewed. At the 
same time, the Bylaws do not establish a right to a response.