The ELCA Celebrates 20 Years of Apostasy

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America celebrated 20 years of back-sliding this month. Apparently most people have forgotten, just as I did. A story from a newspaper reminded me that ELCA came together in May of 1987, Columbus, Ohio.

Normally I check the ELCA news archives every few days to see if they have done anything shockingly new. Nothing for May is listed under the topic of anniversaries. I also looked up The Lutheran magazine online. I did not see an anniversary story there either.

Perhaps it is more of a hangover than an anniversary. Augsburg Fortress Publishing finally put out a news release claiming to have a profit for one quarter. Their only stories for the last few years have been about how much red ink they were gushing, even though they have a basic market of 5 million comatose Lutherans with plenty of money. ELCA is not only the largest Lutheran denomination in America. It is also the most affluent per capita and the most educated.

Twenty years ago ELCA had about 5.3 million members and a combined budget of around 130 million dollars. Now ELCA has 4.85 million members and a budget of around 85 million dollars. I am not sure of the budget even though I have been looking through the ELCA website for 20 minutes trying to find it. Wait, I just found it. Only 81 million dollars, up a whisker from last year's. World Hunger is another $17 million, showing that the best way to raise money in ELCA is to make people think the money is not for ELCA. In fact, much of that World Hunger money is siphoned off to pay for Left-wing lobbyists in all the state capitals and in Washington DC. A lot of money goes for "education and advocacy." Here is the link:

http://www.elca.org/hunger/whatwedo/2006-WH-Budget.pdf

The treasurer is Christina Jackson (not my wife). This treasurer got her MBA only a few blocks from our house, at the famous Thunderbird School of International Business.

ELCA will meet in Chicago in August. WELS, Missouri, and the ELS will all convene this summer as well. ELCA dominates the Lutheran agenda since the leaders of the other groups look up to, admire, and emulate ELCA as much as possible. Through Thrivent branches, all the Lutheran groups (minus a few crazies) are linked up. De facto, all the Lutheran groups have merged via Thrivent.

The Braaten/Jenson Christian Dogmatics, 1984, has to be read to be believed. Perhaps believed is the wrong word. All the doctrines of the Apostles Creed are clearly and fervently denied in Braaten/Jenson, yet Wikipedia lists Robert Jenson as one of the leading theologians of America.

The Braaten/Jenson work symbolizes everything wrong with ELCA. Perhaps it would not matter if nobody read or noticed the book. However, it was written to prevent ELCA from getting even worse in doctrine. Some called it "confessional." The book was the standard text at all the ELCA seminaries at one time, even though ELCA officials did their best to deny it.