Someone asked about the unrecognized shift in keeping divorced clergy in the pulpit. One mainline clergy database had to stop naming the spouse of the minister listed because the name changes came in so fast.
The case is easily made that divorced clergy should leave the ministry and no longer be listed as pastors. That policy was not debated - even in the liberal denominations a few decades ago. The history of that policy goes back to the pastoral epistles - husband of one wife - and the Old Testament: "I hate divorce."
In WELS, when someone is loses his call for one reason or another, he is automatically off the roster and must beg to get on again. I believe Missouri is similar, with CRM status meaning Can't Recall the Minister.
When I was in Columbus, three of the six clergy were divorced, and all three were Shrinkers. Of course, one was a pseudo-pastor and not a WELS member, but no one seemed to notice.
The new thinking on divorced pastors is now just as strong in WELS, the ELS, and Missouri as it is in the Methodist Church and ELCA.
This is doubly corrupting for all concerned. The man who gets divorced and stays in the ministry is the best liar--"Scriptural divorce!"--or best buddies with the District Pope. A convenient escape hatch is to promote the divorced man to headquarters when he paints himself into a corner with his own actions.
Someone argued years ago that political conservatives lost their credibility when they began divorcing their wives and marrying their mistresses. The same is true for conservative Lutherans, laity and clergy alike. When Marvin Schwan left his wife and married the wife of his manager, pastors said, "It was a Scriptural divorce."
I asked, "Is that like a Scriptural murder?"
The simplest solution is to follow the Word of God. Lenski observed from his years of serving as a district president - that men who are unreliable with the Word are unreliable in other ways as well.
I would not make someone denied custody of his own children the leader of WELS youth. I would not put his second wife on a LWMS board. I would not let him parade around as a pastor until he bought himself another job.
"The peacock is an image of heretics and fanatical spirits. For on the order of the peacock they, too, show themselves and strut about in their gifts, which never are outstanding. But if they could see their feet, that is the foundation of their doctrine, they would be stricken with terror, lower their crests, and humble themselves. To be sure, they, too, suffer from jealousy, because they cannot bear honest and true teachers. They want to be the whole show and want to put up with no one next to them. And they are immeasurably envious, as peacocks are. Finally, they have a raucous and unpleasant voice, that is, their doctrine is bitter and sad for afflicted and godly minds; for it casts consciences down more than it lifts them up and strengthens them."
Martin Luther, What Luther Says, An Anthology, 3 vols., ed., Ewald Plass, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1959, II, p. 642.
"There is a false, ungodly, carnal zeal that does not come from God and is not produced by the Holy Spirit, but is rooted either in animosity against those who teach a different doctrine or in the selfish thought that a display zeal will bring the minister honor, at least in certain congregations, or in fanaticism. In the days of Christ, what zeal in the discharge of their office do we behold in the high priests, elders, scribes, and Pharisees who opposed Christ!"
C. F. W. Walther, The Proper Distinction between Law and Gospel, trans., W. H. T. Dau, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1928, p. 380.
