Someone disgusted with WELS asked, "Why do you think we would be interested in the LCMC? They have women's ordination and open communion?" I thought, "And WELS does not have both?"
Most WELS members do not realize how much the real WELS, Missouri, and Little Sect are like the LCMC, a group which began as soon as the ELCA merger took place, 1987. The LCMC remained in the background until the 2009 ELCA convention, when the wraps came off the hidden agenda. ELCA voted for homosexual ordination and marriage. The retired ELCA bishops soon started the NALC, quickly adding about 200 congregations to the 700 parishes from NALC, most of them exits from ELCA. The Barnhardt website has regular updates.
The websites of the LCMC and NALC suggest they promote:
- Open communion.
- Vague confessionalism.
- Women's ordination.
- A flexible attitude about the Scriptures.
- Backdoor Pentecostalism.
The Emmaus Synod Presidents--Hopeless, Helpless, and Hapless--do not want their members thinking about being in bed with ELCA. The Syn Conference leaders have far more affinity for ELCA attitudes than they do for their own historic standards.
Exhibit A - The First VP of WELS is a Fuller Seminary alumnus. I do not know if he actually bought a drive-by degree there, as MLC Professor Larry Olson did. But Huebner did study at Fuller, making him one of many WELS leaders to do so. And Jim Huebner is a walking-talking Ken Doll for Fuller, mouthing the Fuller doctrine and livin' the Fuller dream, Soul Cafe and all.
SP Mark Schroeder thinks that getting people to stop posting on Ichabod will change the public image of WELS. Hardly. He should look at his own posts, if he wants to spin the image of the Wisconsin sect. Who endorsed and promoted the feminazi women's conference from Church and Change? SP Schroeder. Who elevated a founder of Church and Change to President of the Portable Asian Seminary? SP Schroeder. Who first quietly and now loudly supports the porno-mytho translation called the NNIV? SP Schroeder. He is always Helpless when it comes to dealing with Church and Changers, but most Helpful in promoting them and their causes.
I was 25 years early in publishing about the ELCA. Northwestern Publishing House printed that book--Liberalism: Its Cause and Cure--and it sold well.
So here is my prediction about the Syn Conference - Missouri, WELS, and the Little Sect will formalize the de facto merger they have enjoyed the last few decades, perhaps staying as geographical entities within one legal corporation. To save face and legal complications, this may be a paper unity rather than one where they share each other's scandals and lawsuits on a formal basis. They have to close plenty of schools but keep something open, for fund-raising purposes if nothing else. They will be like ELCA, claiming ministries all over the world that are really token participation in ecumenical storefronts.
For instance, all three can be in Peru if they chip in for one ELS missionary. All three can be dealing with sin in Rio if Missouri alone stays in Brazil. But all three will continue to abuse their members and pastors, so people will look for similar doctrinal laxity without the baggage. The LCMC and NALC will suit all those people looking for a fresh but familiar alternative.
The Syn Conference is financially bankrupt because they were doctrinally bankrupt long ago. Hopeless, Helpless, and Hapless cannot even teach justification by faith. They are blood-brothers for Enthusiasm, as exemplified by J. P. Meyer.
