Grinning is for Martin Marty, Archbishop Weakland, Leonard Sweet, Ed Stetzer, and Andy Stanley.
Someone asked why the Synodical President is not doing anything. He is, and that is why the Church and Chicanery people want to get rid of him at the next convention.
Under Mischke, Gurgel, and Wayne Mueller, the Church Growth Movement was encouraged and expanded in every direction. The Little Sect on the Prairie, under Orvick, could not say "Amen!" enough times. They imported the worst CG people (Hartman) to brainwash their pastors.
As someone commented, the pastors never addressed the doctrinal issues at the circuit or conference level. I did so at every level, prompting hissy fits from: Roger Kovaciny, Floyd Luther Stolzenburg, Paul Kuske, Doctrinal Pussycat Robert Mueller, Wally Oelhafen, Fred Adrian, Paul Kelm, David Valleskey, James Tiefel (not to mention cousin Paul Tiefel), and a few others. John Seifert wanted to be DP too much to do anything about real issues. He worried about his neighbor ELS pastor's unionism but repeatedly "forgot" that Frosty Bivens went to Fuller and supported CG.
The so-called conservatives are too tired from throwing each other under the bus to anything about apostates. Besides, finding an ELS or WELS pastor with a drop of martyr's blood in his veins would be a miracle today. If one or two can be found, they should be put in a museum.
ELS Pastor Jay Webber got his chasuble in a bunch over WELS women consecrating Holy Communion. He ordered a WELS pastor to do something about it. Webber is on the doctrinal board of the ELS, so that means he is completely safe. Has he objected to the Church and Change congregation at Cottage Grove, Wisconsin, in his own synod? Webber had no trouble working with Floyd Luther Stolzenburg, via Kovaciny (both Church Growth gurus, by their own estimations)- to collect money for the Ukraine rent-a-church project, courtesy of St. Marvin of Schwan.
One member of the ELS doctrinal board was a raving Fuller graduate, years ago. He sent a letter around about the value of studying at Fuller. Imagine, Orvick picked that character to deal with doctrinal issues. What a joke.
Aaron Frey participated in the timid Tendrils paper, which threw a few spitballs at Church Growth, while praising CG congregation for their great shows. But Frey is also an active and willing participant in WELS Church and Change, as shown on Ichabod not long ago. Having Frey help out was like asking Obama to criticize Bill Ayres.
I see very little chance of WELS, the ELS, or the CoLC surviving as Lutheran denominations. The Boomer pastors are too lazy and self-satisfied to address doctrinal matters. Twenty years ago, the LCA pastors wanted "to retire in peace." Now it is the turn of the WELS/ELS Boomers to collect their pensions. As one reader said, "The WELS pastors all call you a liar, but they keep reading Ichabod."
Am I lying when I quote them? Am I lying when I publish their hideous web information?
The slander alarm goes off so easily and so quickly when WELS pastors are avoiding the doctrinal issues. They have no hesitation in answering a doctrinal issue with a personal attack, and they never seem to identify the falsehoods they denounce so earnestly.
There is doctrinal discipline in the synods. The synod officials defenestrate anyone who threatens their apostasy. The bunny-like pastors quiver and quake when they hear the stomp of hob-nailed boots coming toward them. Instead, the officials should quake in fear. The officials do not pay the pastors - they soak up offerings from the pastors. The officials tour the world on offering money. Nice work. No wonder they do anything they can to keep it.
