Gay Schmeling Needs To Go Straight - ELCA

ELCA NEWS SERVICE

July 5, 2007

ELCA Committee on Appeals Rules in Atlanta Discipline Case
07-123-JB

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Committee on Appeals of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) ruled July 2 in favor of an appeal by the Rev. Ronald B. Warren, bishop of the ELCA Southeastern Synod, Atlanta, who sought removal of Bradley
E. Schmeling, Atlanta, from the official clergy roster of the ELCA. The appeals committee ruled that Schmeling was to be removed immediately from the roster, upholding the determination by a disciplinary hearing committee that Schmeling was in
violation of the ELCA policy regarding the sexual conduct of its pastors.

Decisions of the Committee on Appeals are not made public by the ELCA churchwide organization. According to the ELCA Constitution, Bylaws and Continuing Resolutions, summaries of decisions are to be reported to the next ELCA Churchwide
Assembly, the church's highest legislative authority, which will be here at Navy Pier Aug. 6-11. In this case, the decision of the Committee on Appeals was released July 5 by Warren and posted on the synod's Web site, and it was released at a July 5 news conference at St. John Lutheran Church, Atlanta, the congregation Schmeling has served since 2000.

In the ELCA policy document "Vision and Expectations: Ordained Ministers in the ELCA," it states: "Single ordained ministers are expected to live a chaste life. Married ordained ministers are expected to live in fidelity to their spouses,
giving expression to sexual intimacy within a marriage relationship that is mutual, chaste, and faithful. Ordained ministers who are homosexual in their self-understanding are expected to abstain from homosexual sexual relationships."

Warren filed formal charges in 2006 against Schmeling after Schmeling reported to Warren that he was in a committed relationship with another man, a violation of the ELCA's clergy standards. Seven members of the 12-member discipline hearing
committee, which met Jan. 18-24 in Atlanta, voted to remove Schmeling from the ELCA clergy roster and stayed the effective date of his removal until Aug. 15. That committee issued its opinion Feb. 7.

In separate filings in March, Warren and Schmeling both appealed the decision of the discipline hearing committee.

The 12-member Committee on Appeals met here June 9-10 to consider the appeals. That committee voted 10-1, with one abstention, to remove Schmeling from the clergy roster. It voted 10-2 to reverse the discipline hearing committee's decision to
stay the effective date of Schmeling's removal from the roster until Aug. 15, and it voted 10-2 to remove Schmeling from the clergy roster on July 2.

The Committee on Appeals noted that the ELCA Constitution states that "the decision of the discipline hearing committee shall be final on the day it is issued by the committee," and that "nowhere in ELCA Constitution, Bylaws and Continuing
Resolutions is a discipline hearing committee authorized to stay its own decision."

"In this regard, the Committee on Appeals determines that the effective date of Pastor Schmeling's removal from the clergy roster of the ELCA ... should have been Feb. 7, 2007," the Committee on Appeals said.

The discipline hearing committee's written opinion said most of its members were concerned about certain language in ELCA clergy policy documents, and it made some specific suggestions for change. That opinion suggested synod assemblies ask the ELCA Churchwide Assembly to consider proposals for change.

The Committee on Appeals said its role, as well as that of a discipline hearing committee, is to serve as a judicial body, and that legislative authority to change policies is the responsibility of the ELCA Churchwide Assembly and the ELCA Church Council, which serves as the church's board of directors.

"Nothing in the ELCA Constitution, Bylaws and Continuing Resolutions allows a discipline hearing committee to make any particular recommendations to the egislative bodies of this church, urging them to take a specific policy action. By doing so in this case, the discipline hearing committee exceeded the authority granted to it by the ELCA Constitution," the Committee on Appeals said.

Responses to the Appeals Committee decision
In response to the decision, Warren posted a pastoral letter July 5 on the ELCA Southeastern Synod Web site. "My decision to seek Pastor Schmeling's removal from te ministry of this church was difficult because of my deep respect for the pastor and the congregation at St. John's, but the policy of this church is clear," he wote. "It was my responsibility as bishop of this synod to enforce the established standards of this church, particularly after the 2005 Churchwide Assembly decided that the church would not create a process for possible exceptions to existing behavior expectations for pastors. As this church continues prayerfully to consider the issue of clergy who are gay or lesbian and in committed relationships, both the synod and I will continue to work on finding ways to live together faithfully in the midst of our disagreements."

Schmeling and the St. John Lutheran Church congregation shared the news of the Committee on Appeals on July 3, Warren wrote. Warren said he and Schmeling talked by phone July 5. They agreed that Warren and synod staff will meet with the congregation council's executive committee and the St. John congregation in the coming weeks.

"Please remember all of us who are involved in this difficult and challenging process in your intercessory prayers," Warren's statement concluded.

"I'm deeply disappointed by the decision, although I'm not surprised," Shmeling said in a July 5 news release in response to the appeals committee ecision. "Change has always proven difficult for the church. I continue to hope that the church will be centered in God's message of love, compassion, and justice, rather than in the enforcement of discriminatory policies. The church can only resist the Holy Spirit for so long. In the meantime, I plan to continue to follow my call in ministry at St. John's and to pray for the day when all God's children are equally welcomed into the Lutheran church," he said.

John Ballew, president of St. John Lutheran Church, said in the congregation's news release: "We are going to go to (the) Churchwide Assembly in August, to witness to our ELCA the costs of this decision, based on an absurd policy. This is not just
about us and our wonderful pastor; this is about all those called to minister to God's people, who lead exemplary lives, who provide a model for faithful, loving companionship with each other and with Christ."
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The written decision of the ELCA Committee on Appeals is available from the ELCA Southeastern Synod at http://www.ELCA-ses.org/Hearing.htm on the Web.

Be sure to view this site:
Extraordinary Candidacy Project

Is Everything Church Growth?

An anonymous person has asked if everything is Church Growth. The same person seems to favor CCM, sometimes called Charismatic Church Music.

Two trends are happening at the same time. ELCA has led the way in working with Roman Catholics. My favorite ELCA photo is one with a Roman Catholic priest who was sharing a building with a very attractive ELCA female pastor. He was beaming at the prospects of the working relationship. The LCA, then ELCA pursued the Church of Rome, only to be declared defective by the Antichrist.

The ELS had its Lutheran/Roman Catholic religious service at Bethany, Mankato. WELS had its lectureship by priests and Archbishop Weakland at Wisconsin Lutheran College. Weakland, in deep trouble for pursuing a young man, was quoted as saying children initiated sex with adults. Rome could not wait to dump him, but WELS said, "Now there is the keynote speaker we need!" Damage Central later claimed that he only spoke at a private luncheon at WLC. Ha. The college heavily promoted this as a community-wide event. I had the brochure at one time. Several priests were also on the schedule.

In the next 20 years a surprising number of Lutheran-trained pastors will either be Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox. One mini-micro bishop is already calling himself The Right Reverend So-and-So.

WELS is the most heavily invested in Church Growth. They are so besotted with Fuller doctrine that no clergy can escape being injected with all the marketing hooplah of the Devil's Playground. Some of this has slopped over into the ELS.

Missouri and ELCA have their Church Growth factions and those who resist Fuller Seminary.

Lutherans ought to learn their own confessional hymns before they start aping the Evangelical/Pentecostal wing of Christianity. Mequon and Bethany both celebrated Paul Gerhardt recently, but both seminaries spit on his memory with their adoration of unionistic doctrine, compromise with the Reformed. Gerhardt paid a heavy price for refusal to go along with any form of union.

Starbuck's - Facing the Awful Truth

From time to time I order a mocha at Starbuck's (Barnes and Noble) while checking on some new book titles. They used to ask, "Do you want whipped cream?" Several times I have answered with a smile, "That is not whipped cream. That is white stuff." They had to agree each time. Now they do not ask me.

Today I was drinking a mocha straight up when I heard the manager ask a customer, "Do you want whipped topping?" I thought, "Finally, truth in packaging."

This morning I learned that Reddi-Whip was originally owned by the Capone gang. It was the first aerosol food product. I have similar feelings about Reddi-Whip, coffee creamers that make my stomach flip, and margarine slopped on the table as "butter." More than once I have said, "I ordered real butter." More than one young waitress has has shot back, "That is butter." Butter glistens with little specks of water, but margarine has the complexion of Glidden paint: plastic, solid, deadly. Someday people will realize that the factory oil industry (shortening, margarine, etc.) was a massive and dangerous fraud.

All this is directly related to the fake Lutheran doctrine that has been marketed for the last three decades or so. Every step has taken various Lutheran bodies farther away from their confessional roots. Now they are so lost that the apostate leaders act with impugnity while insulting the intelligence and faith of their members.

I wonder how proud the founders of the ELS would be to realize that the entire Bethany Lutheran Seminary faculty marched in a religious procession with a Roman Catholic ex-bishop. Apparently Erling Teigen arranged this disgusting display. The local newspaper bragged about the ex-bishop's creditentials but the Bethany yearbook hid them. At the time, Rolf Preus (briefly in the ELS) announced, "Erling doesn't have an ecumenical bone in his body, and Greg Jackson knows it."

I always wonder how these ELS pastors mind-read from a distance. This must be a power given to them when they enter the sacred precincts of Rivendell. Rolf was able to discern my brain-waves from a distance and report them infallibly on SpenerQuest. Did Erling defend Rolf so publicly? I must have missed that pronouncement.

The brave ELS leaders went into damage-control mode, a skill they have improved through practice. The ex-bishop was married, as if that made him a Lutheran. He was no longer a bishop. Was he no longer a Roman Catholic? As any student of Roman doctrine knows, the bishop could repent, dump his wife, and become an active priest again. The priesthood is an indelible character - a priest forever.

I had a reliable witness at that tragic service at Bethany. The seminary faculty marched in with the ex-bishop. The service was religious, dedicating the Ylvisaker building. (Wouldn't he be honored! He was just about the only theologian in the ELS and they associate his name with a Roman Catholic speaker.) Oh yes, the Roman Catholic was the featured speaker that day. Damange Control Central said that the religious service stopped being religious when he spoke. Perhaps an altar boy rang the mass bells, creating a miraculous transubstantiation. The appearance of a unionistic religious service remained, but the substance (ding-a-ling) was changed into a secular gathering.

Thus we have the Lutheran Church today. They call it Lutheran orthodoxy but it is really whipped topping - full of air and heaven knows what ingredients.