From Lutheran Notes:
Perennial report used to deceive LCMS seminarian recruits
Rev. Scott Stiegemeyer, the Director of Admissions at Ft. Wayne Concordia Theological Seminary commented that matriculations were up there, even though overall enrollment is down. Rev. Stiegemeyer didn't mention how he convinced more seminarians to enroll, but there is a good indication from the Fort's web site, that being a bogus (or misunderstood and misrepresented) report that I blogged on before. (I copied the report at the bottom of this post.) On 22 May 2008 I wrote:
For the longest time, there's been a report floating around the LCMS that there are 500 ministerial slots that need to be filled. Liberal women wanting to enter the ministry often bring up that report. However, when it comes down to it on call day, up to now there have been just enough calls to go around. So evidently, the 500 ministerial slots must be work-for-nothing positions. Anyway, I don't think they should use that perennial report to lure unsuspecting youths into the ministry.
I've known of this report since 1992, and it came up in conversations I had several times in the 1990s. In one conversation, a women who supported women clergy in the LCMS said they really needed women pastors badly. I said, "Really?" She said, "Of course, there are 500 unfilled vacancies each year." I had to tell her that the seminaries struggle to place all their graduates, so these 500 vacancies the report cites must be unpaid positions, or something. (All I know is that those vacancies can't be the kind of vacanies people assume they are.) Here, for example, in 2008, Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, did not place 19 graduates and 2 vicars:
In addition to the 281 calls and vicarage assignments, 17 residential students, one Distance Education Leading To Ordination (DELTO) student and two Cross-Cultural Ministry Center (CCMC) students are awaiting calls; and two residential students are awaiting vicarage placements. In each of these cases, the Seminary is awaiting calls in order that these candidates may be assigned their first calls.
A lot of times even the calls that are filled are not exactly ideal, and some don't compensate enough. I'll refrain from relating some not-so-humorous stories I've heard, but here's a humorous example. A seminary graduate received his first call down to Louisiana. They couldn't afford to pay his health insurance, so he worked at Hollywood Videos on the side. He then was dubbed "Father Hollywood."
I've talked to seminarians who went to seminary (or pre-sem) thinking there was a great need for pastors because recruiters mentioned that report. They were too committed to back out, but if they had found out earlier there wasn't so great a shortage, they would have chosen a different field, or kept in the career field they were at. Some of them don't really have the interest to do ministry unless there's an actual pressing need for pastors, and some students know that their mediocre academic performance will count against them. Some students even have bad marks in their students records, so they figure they'll get a buzzsaw call.
Apparently, they weren't getting enough sem students based on the old report, so they hyped it even further then when I saw it last. In 1992 is was around 500 vacancies, but in 2008 the report says there are 1155 vacant pastoral positions! The report also says by 2010, 25% of pulpits will be empty. That's surprising given that in 2008 nineteen graduates at Concordia Sem in St. Louis couldn't be placed right away, and 13 were not placed at the Fort.
Lest anyone think that the report is explained and put into perspective, everyone knows that Kieschnick is making dire predictions about the looming pastoral shortage in all the synod's glossy mags. In other words, the average person will think there are 1155 pulpits empty every Sunday when they hear of, or read, the report.
Here's the perennial report take from the Concordia Theological Seminary Ft Wayne site on 8 Aug 2008:
"Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" Matt. 28:19 (NKJV)
We cannot continue the Lord's Great Commission without fully equipped pastors.
At Issue:
The number of pastoral vacancies has increased by an average of 50 per year the past six years.
At the same time the Synod has resolved to begin 60 new congregations and send out 15additional missionaries each year.
In future years the number of retirements among our clergy will escalate as more numbers of second career pastors reach retirement age at the same time as other, longer-term pastors.
Simply to maintain the status quo requires an increase of 50 additional seminary graduates per year.
To maintain the status quo plus fill the proposed new congregation and missionary goals require an increase of 125 seminary graduates per year.
To close the gap of vacancies by 50 per year and fill the proposed new congregation and missionary goals requires an increase of 175 seminary graduates per year.
To close the gap of vacancies by 50 per year, fill the proposed new congregation and missionary goals, and meet the need that will increase by larger numbers of retirements require an increase of over 200 seminary graduates per year.
Year Congregations Preaching Stations Vacancies
1995 5995 6175 881
1996 6004 6191 869
1997 6022 6215 971
1998 6022 6218 1045
1999 6025 6220 1075
2000 6043 6150 1155
The challenge before us . . .
Even if current efforts are sustained, the pastoral shortage will continue to grow. If recent trends continue, it is projected that nearly 25% of all LC-MS pastoral offices could be vacant by 2010. [snip]
***
GJ - The facts explain why the District Popes have no trouble removing men from the ministry for any cause or no cause. Ft. Wayne will probably move to St. Louis with a few more financial crises - or even one more.
Mother Angelica said this about liberals in the Roman Catholic Church, but it applies to apostates everywhere:
1. They don't give money.
2. They don't build churches.
3. They don't encourage vocations.
