Luther - Infant Baptism

"I still maintain, as I have maintained in the Postil (SL 11, 496f.) that the surest Baptism is infant Baptism. For an old person may deceive, may come to Christ as a Judas and permit himself to be baptized. But a child cannot deceive. It comes to Christ in Baptism as John came to Him and as the little children were brought to Him, that His Word and work may come over them, touch them, and thus make them holy. For His Word and work cannot pass by without effect; and in Baptism they are directed at the child alone. If they were to fail of success here, they would have to be entire failures and useless means, which is impossible."
What Luther Says, An Anthology, 3 vols., ed., Ewald Plass, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1959, I, p. 50. Letter to two ministers, 1528.

Chemnitz - On Holy Communion

"The body of Christ is to the sick a medicine, to pilgrims a way; it strengthens the weak, delights the strong, heals weariness, preserves health. Through it man becomes more gentle under reproof, more patient under labor, more ardent for love, wiser for caution, more ready to obey, more devoted to giving of thanks."
Martin Chemnitz, Examination of the Council of Trent, trans., Fred Kramer, St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1986, II, p. 234.

Luther - On Baptism and Faith

"How beautifully the apostle in these strong words extols the grace of God bestowed in baptism! He refers to baptism as a washing, whereby not our feet only, not our hands, but our whole bodies are cleansed. Baptism perfectly and instantaneously cleanses and saves. For the vital part of salvation and its inheritance, nothing more is necessary than this faith in the grace of God. Truly, then, are we saved by grace alone, without works or other merit."
Sermons of Martin Luther, 8 vols., ed., John Nicholaus Lenker, Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983, VI, p. 154. Early Christmas Morning. Titus 3:5.

His Mother's ELCA Congregation Could Not Get a Straight Interim Pastor

ALPB Forum

I do know that earlier this year when it came to appointing an Interim Pastor in my mother's congregation, each of pastors suggested by the Synod for the congregation's consideration is gay and partnered -- although one of them (who supplied, but was not chosen as interim) wasn't identified as such until he was ordained last month.

Throwing Gausewitz Under the Bus:UOJ Reveals Its Ugly Fruit

When WELS taught the Gospel, justification by faith, through the Gausewitz catechism, the fruit of the Spirit was evident.

Outsiders find this as bizarre as I do - the UOJ fanatics are nasty, devious, and dishonest. Their coven is located at LutherQueasy, where they have often bragged about how obnoxious they are.

They have no sense of humor. When I called them SpenerQuest, I was rebuked and told the name of the discussion board was "Lutherquest."

When I proved how deceptive they were, the participants covered up the evidence with tons of posts.

When some friends of mine produced a blizzard of posts opposing their methods, they had the vapors and installed a check-in system.

UOJ wants to be full of grace and the Gospel, so they say everyone is born already justified. The essence of UOJ is universal absolution, however it may be expressed. They declare every single person forgiven of sin, without and before the Gospel Word, without the Means of Grace, and (most of all) without faith.

The UOJ Stormtroopers mock justification by faith by calling traditional Lutherans "faithians." They declare, with great pomp and ignorance, "Your faith is in faith, not in the Gospel." Or, "You regard faith as a work, as a virtue in man, as merit." These Stormtroopers have more straw men than a collection of Oz books.

UOJ has been the dogma behind Church Growth in WELS, Missouri, and the Little Sect on the Prairie. The misbegotten CLC (sic) loves UOJ and CG too.

WELS and Missouri work so well with ELCA because they share the same dogma. ELCA calls it all grace. The Syn Conference calls it God's universal verdict of forgiveness. Neither side bothers with Biblical exegesis, which contradicts their propaganda.

But - do not get in the way of their all grace or universal verdict of forgiveness. They will make you feel like Gausewitz, as you feel the bus tires run over your face.

So much Gospel in the Big Four (I am flattering the Little Sect) should yield fantastic results over time. The Big Four combined UOJ with the Church Growth Movement, which should be like Miracle Gro.

Even with excessive pump priming from Thrivent, the foundations, and rich adulterers, the Big Four are broke, shrinking, and polarized. Their clergy are largely ignorant of the Scriptures and the Confessions.

The pastors do not visit their own members! They visit the gym instead.

UOJ is not the Pearl of Great Price. UOJ is not the Gospel. Knapp's message is the anti-Gospel, the heart of mainline Protestant apostasy, the lazy man's Gospel, as Medium Rare wrote.

"No DWIs in my district. Not on my watch."

One Eponymous Archon Apologizes for WELS and Missouri

One Eponymous Archon (https://me.yahoo.com/oneeponymousarchon) has left a new comment on your post "Comments from 29a, Who Is So Secretive That He Doe...":

Dear Dr. Jackson, and in this case your dear wife also -

On behalf of all WELS members, and LCMS members, I wish to apologize for the totally unwarranted, mean-spirited, and loathsome attack upon you, using the nasty tactic of your children, now assuredly in heaven, by grace, through faith. This was lower than low. Rev. McCain should hang his head in complete shame.

I am no longer a member of either church body, though I was for many years, first in Missouri, then in Wisconsin. Here in CA, there are very few true Lutherans left. Still, I feel humiliated by McCain's feeble attempt to discredit you. What has American Lutheranism come to that such a man holds a position of responsibility? Truly sad and disgusting. But then again, I'm only -

One Eponymous Archon

***

GJ - That is very kind of you, OEA.

I feature McCain's eructations because synod officials treat everyone that way, if they feel the urge. They get away with it because they do it on the sly and hide their tracks. One LCMS District Pope screamed at one of his pastors for fighting against a known child molester going back into the ministry. The DP slammed his briefcase on the pastor's desk to make his point. On the way out of the pastor's office, he stopped a member of the congregation and said, "Your pastor is one of the finest men we have."

How is that for crazy-making behavior, for unethical and anti-Christian thuggery?

I could repeat many stories like that, pastors who have phoned me for hours trying to get past the way they have been treated. And the wives and children? No one wants to repeat things out in the open, because it opens old wounds.

I am happy that I can work independently and provide a safe forum where people can express themselves.

Why Did They Kick This Charmer Off the ALPB Discussion Forum?

I'm too sexy for my tie, too sexy for my tie, too sexy.

Paul T. McCain (Ptmccain) Member Username: Ptmccain Post Number: 104 Registered: 4-2009

Posted on Tuesday, June 07, 2011 - 8:31 pm:    Unfortunately, Tim, Jackson is entirely responsible for any scrutiny or comments his actions merit. I do not believe him, for a second, that the name Bethany was not chosen quite purposefully for his fake church. Further, the fact that he is so agitated about any criticism, just goes to show how insecure he is and how desperately he wants attention. Like I've said before, Jackson had never had a good, solid Lutheran theological education and hence he has no solid grounding in the doctrine he claims to defend. He is a great example of how a person can hold to the inerrancy of the Bible but get its central message wrong. I'm amused that he has nothing but lies to fall back on. I vividly recall the day he called my office in St. Louis and sounded quite desperate to meet with me, not telling me what it was about. He showed up and I was expecting him to ask me about getting some help theologically. This was just about twenty years ago, mind you. I think he had been booted out of the WELS, or maybe it was before he went to the WELS, but at any rate, what did he show to up to talk about? Life insurance. He wanted to peddle Northwestern Life Insurance to me. Sad and pathetic.

***

GJ - Paul T. McCain is a needy nerd. Anyone who wastes his time posting on LutherQueasy is saying, "I'm a loser, but at least not as bad as my fellow losers."

I began using the ALPB Discussion Forum for the latest Lutheran news. As readers can tell, that is my source for the exits from ELCA and a few other items. I was struck by the thousands of posts from Paul T. McCain (Pope Paul the Unlearned). He seemed to have many posts on each thread.

Secondly, I was impressed by how often he picked fights with people, demanding answers to suit his contentious mood. The ALPB forum is quite polite overall. A few get touchy here and there. McCain was a stand-out performer, a drama queen. Everyone got tired of his rude and puerile behavior, so they gave him a time-out.

There is even a thread for reducing his time-out penalty. That went on for a long time.

He disappeared, then re-appeared as Amsdorf.

Finally he was kicked out for good, from what I can see. His hoof-prints all over the ALPB Forum, so anyone can check it out as a lurker. Here is the link. You can even search on his name and on Amsdorf.

The McCain-Barry-Otten administration prepared the way for Kieschnick, who really drove the stake into Missouri. However, good ol' Jerry would not have been elected without the 9 years of preparation wrought by McCain and Barry. They followed the familiar pattern of using people and throwing them away, demanding loyalty from the conservatives they abused while kissing up to the Left.

I realize most people would not read LQ unless I mentioned it. As LI said, "When does LQ ever come up among Lutherans? Does anyone care?"

But their tantrums are good for readership here, so I am obliged to return the favor. I reckon that people benefit from coming over to read about UOJ, pancake legalism, and Blank verse.

Drama queen

Stan Hauerwas Was Disgusted by the Willow Creek CG Takeover of His Methodist Congregation. CG Encouraged by the Denominational Leaders

My ethics professor and dissertation advisor, Stan Hauerwas, wrote Hannah's Child, A Theologian's Memoir.

Stan Hauerwas is not a Lutheran and does not understand Lutheran doctrine, as witnessed by his memoir. He grew up Methodist, attended Catholic mass at Notre Dame, where he communed, and married a Methodist minister after his first wife died. However, he is the most theological of the modern theologians.

His response to Church Growth in Methodism is instructive. He and his wife loved the previous woman minister, Susan, at their Methodist church at Duke, Aldersgate, an almost Lutheran name. Susan retired due to Altzheimer's Disease.

The new minister, Paula, was fresh from Duke Divinity School. She was a drama major in college.

"The outreach and pastor-staff committees were called together to hear her plan for the future. She had been to a church-growth seminar. She told us she knew how to make the church grow.. First, we needed two services. We woudl have a contemporary service at nine and a more traditional service at eleven. Second, we would have a phone-a-thon, during which we would call 20,000 people at random. That would ensure that the church would attract two hundred new members. Sociologists had confirmed such a result." (p. 258)

"Most new people would be attracted to the church because of the activities and pastoral services the church could provide, not because of a sense of belonging to a community." (p. 258) [GJ - Kelm's "felt needs?"]

Stan went on to say:

"I was stunned by her plan for the church. I said little at the meeting, other than blurting out 'over my dead body' when she said that she was going to lead a delegation of our members to Willow Creek Church in Chicago to see how a church that utilized these methods works. The pastor at Willow Creek is said to have once declared that there is no cross in the church because 'it gets in the way of the gospel.' I could not believe this was happening. Everything I detested about mainline Protestantism in both its liberal and conservative modes had come to roost in the church I loved." (p. 258f.)

The proper thing to do is meet with the person, and Stan did that. To put this in Lutheran terms, this was like Robert Preus making an appointment to see the new pastor. Hauerwas is world-famous among the mainline denominations, the Catholics, and the medical ethicists.

"I waited a few days and made an appointment with the pastor. I told her that what she was proposing was against everything I was about. She accused me of being against evangelization. Surely I wanted to bring people to Jesus. I hate that kind of pious language. But I told her the problem was not that she wanted to bring people to Jesus, but that she wanted to do so with means shaped by economic modes of life incompatible with the gospel. She asked me how I could be so critical of what she was trying to do. She had, after all, graduated from Duke Divinity School. I told her that I found it profoundly embarrassing that she was a graduate of Duke Divinity School. What in the world were we doing to produce people who did not seem to have a theological clue about what they were ordained to do?" (p. 259)

***

GJ - Does this sound familiar, WELSians? Missourians? Little Sect on the Prairians?

1. The denomination decided the parish should be bigger.
2. The brand-new pastor knew that the right methods would produce the desired results.
3. This Phone's For You, widely used by WELS, was proposed as the way to gain 200 new members at once.
4. The pastor would take a bunch to Willow Creek, just as Don Patterson took a bunch to Exponential. WELS, Missouri, and the Little Sect also sent their leaders to Fuller, Willow Creek, and heaven-only-knows.
5. Opposing this is the same as being against evangelism.
6. Meeting with a Shrinker is like meeting with a terrorist, except you can negotiate with a terrorist.

Stan summarized WELS in Columbus in the 1980s, although he would have been appalled that DP Mueller and VP Kuske had a notorious ex-pastor, Floyd Luther Stolzenburg, take charge of the effort.

Moreover, the Fuller/Willow Creek false teachers of WELS had themselves promoted to ever-higher levels of leadership, one man scratching the other man's back.

But this happened only because the laity and pastors did nothing, said nothing, and went along with the racket. Stan and his wife openly opposed all these moves and told the minister why. Mrs. Hauerwas would not participate in turning Holy Week worship into chancel drama. The couple left the congregation when discussions failed. Stan wrote about it too, rather than keeping quiet to be the company man.

Missouri, WELS, and the Little Sect have thrown away their Lutheran heritage while boasting about their greatness.

More Enthusiasm

CEF Grants

The Board for Home Missions (BHM) Executive Committee has selected six mission congregations from a list of 20 requests to receive part of a $1 million grant to help with purchasing land or constructing a worship facility. The BHM received this one-time grant from the WELS Church Extension Fund in February.

The congregations include Peace in Jesus Vietnamese, Boise, Idaho; Spirit of Life, Caledonia, Mich.; Christ, Denver, Colo.; Amazing Love, New Lenox, Ill.; and Trinity, Woodbridge, Va. All these congregations currently worship in either a storefront or a rented facility.

“This gift helps these churches get to a point in their ministry more quickly than if they had to raise all the funds themselves,” says Rev. Keith Free, BHM administrator.

The recently approved mission in Moncks Corner, S.C., will receive assistance with the purchase of land and payments on the construction of a worship facility.  “Moncks Corner is a mission church that will have land and a worship facility much sooner than the typical mission,” Free says. “While we know only the Holy Spirit builds the Church, we give thanks this new mission will have the opportunity almost from the get go to share the name of Jesus Christ from its own church rather than from a storefront.”

For more information on how you can be a part of the ministry of WELS Church Extension Fund, go to its Web site: www.cef.wels.net.

***

GJ - I always smell a skunk when a WELSian starts with "while we know...." That is a good indication that the opposite thought will be expressed. Free is sufficiently ambiguous to keep us from discerning what he really meant.

It would be Biblical, Lutheran, and confessional to say, "Only the Word builds the church." I do not think there is room to say that the Word is enhanced by money and a building from the get-go.

WELS has been baptizing the Church Growth Movement for 34+ years by adding "through the Holy Spirit" or "the Holy Spirit in the Word." The main emphasis is the core thought, which is - "These congregations will grow faster by having buildings."

Given the brick and mortar spree funded by Schwan, the ELS and WELS should be bursting with new members at this point. In fact, the multiple-millions spent on congregational buildings, urged by Church and Change, pimped by Cornerstone, should have done the same for those parishes. In fact, they are choking on their debt.

Comments from 29a, Who Is So Secretive That He Does Even Use a Name

These guys attacking your daughter are sickos. These guys cannot, if you will, justify UOJ so they go after these girls. How low can they go. Remember they ask the pope or emperor if he wanted to dig up Luther's body and one of these guys said his fight was with the living not the dead.

Tell Mrs. Ichabod I do not have an answer for her as to why they are doing this other than to say my mother always said people like these would someday answer for their actions.

You both carry a heavy cross for standing up for word. I sometimes wonder how you do it but you show me and many others what true confessional or orthodox Lutheranism is all about.

29a

***

GJ - Mrs. Ichabod said, "Those UOJ people have the same confession of faith as the atheists and Unitarians - there is no Hell."

Not only is their behavior appalling, but their fellow bloggers have no problem with what they say.

More Exits from ELCA.Insights about Synodical Bullying

Synod road-kill in ELCA looks like synod road-kill in the Wisconsin Sect.


ALPB Forum

Back to the thread topic, which is not "All Charles All the Time!"

From David Barnhart's blog:

4. Cross of Christ Lutheran Church, Concord, NC passed second vote to leave the ELCA and afffiliate with the NALC 113-50.
5. St. Mark Lutheran Church, Cherryville, NC failed to pass first vote to leave the ELCA, 39-31.
6. Peace Lutheran Church, St. Joseph, MI passed second vote to leave the ELCA, 105-4 and voted unanimously.
7. Samhold Lutheran Church,Gonvick, MN, voted June 5 to join NALC. They had previously passed second vote to leave the ELCA.
8. Pleasant Union Lutheran Church, Kittanning (Rural Valley) PA passed second vote to leave the ELCA and join NALC, 26-0.

Peace in the Lord Jesus Christ!
Rob Buechler

The figure is 200 ELCA congregations willing and wanting to call such persons as their pastors.  Such was reported by Bishop Ullestad (NE Iowa) at a congregational consultation; he had asked Bp. Rimbo of MNYS “How many congregations in the ELCA will call a pastor in a publicly accountable lifelong monogamous same-gendered relationship?”  Bp Rimbo said “I’ll get back to you.”  After he had checked with others, he got back to Bishop Ullestad and told him: “About 200.”  [The upshot to that story is that when Bp Ullestad shared this with  the two congregations he was jointly consulting, he seemed to think that this would calm the waters, underscoring his point that “this won’t affect your congregations”; the general response was “for 200 congregations the ELCA has inflicted this conflict on itself—while losing over 500 congregations already and many more that will be leaving.”  ]

Ken Kimball

Someone picked a nit, and missed the point. There is an almost total lack of respect or concern among the revisionists of the ELCA and an unwillingness to listen to the theological objections of the traditionalists. When it comes to respecting our beliefs, the revisionists show us none. However, the revisionists do respect our "feelings". They respect them by saying, "We share your burdens". They respect them by saying, "We respect your bound conscience". The problem is that we traditionalists demand that our deeply held beliefs be respected, and instead, all that the revisionists offer is some vague sort of lip-service "respect" for our feelings. 


George Erdner

In Loving Kindness, We Extend the Left Boot of Fellowship

Monday, June 6, 2011

Excommunication - An Open Letter to the Members of Holy Word Lutheran Church

Dear Members of Holy Word,

As Lutherans, we believe that the Holy Spirit is never separated from the Word or the Means of Grace.  It is mentioned throughout Scripture and in the Lutheran Confessions in the explanation of the Third Article of the Apostles Creed.  Note that the forgiveness of sins is here and not in the Second Article; it is a work of the Holy Spirit:

"I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to Him; but the Holy Ghost has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with His gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith; even as He calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith; in which Christian Church He forgives daily and richly all sins to me and all believers, and at the last day will raise up me and all the dead, and will give to me and to all believers in Christ everlasting life. This is most certainly true."

As Lutherans we also believe this statement to be true and the hallmark of our faith:

"The sinner is justified by grace for Christ’s sake through faith."

You can not separate that sentence in any way shape or form or you end up teaching falsely.

And this from The Apology IV, 57; it talks of the object of our justification and the remission of sins through faith alone:

"57] And throughout the prophets and the psalms this worship, this latreiva, is highly praised, although the Law does not teach the gratuitous remission of sins. But the Fathers knew the promise concerning Christ, that God for Christ's sake wished to remit sins. Therefore, since they understood that Christ would be the price for our sins, they knew that our works are not a price for so great a matter [could not pay so great a debt]. Accordingly, they received gratuitous mercy and remission of sins by faith, just as the saints in the New Testament.

More on justification hence forgiveness through faith alone.  Apology XII, 53 &54:

53] For the two chief works of God in men are these, to terrify, and to justify and quicken those who have been terrified. Into these two works all Scripture has been distributed. The one part is the Law, which shows, reproves, and condemns sins. The other part is the Gospel, i.e., the promise of grace bestowed in Christ, and this promise is constantly repeated in the whole of Scripture, first having been delivered to Adam [I will put enmity, etc., Gen. 3:15, afterwards to the patriarchs; then, still more clearly proclaimed by the prophets; lastly, preached and set forth among the Jews by Christ, and disseminated over the entire world by the apostles. 54] For all the saints were justified by faith in this promise, and not by their own attrition or contrition.

Nowhere in Scripture or the Confessions does it say that the forgiveness of sins/justification is imputed to anyone before they were born as Pastor Patterson preaches and teaches.  The work of the Holy Spirit is working faith and the forgiveness of sins.   We know that faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.  (Rom 10:17)  If we are not yet born, how do we hear it?

Since you are entrusting your spiritual welfare to the leadership at Holy Word, you are culpable to their actions on your behalf.  I have stood on Biblical truth and the Book of Concord, your profession of faith.

This from the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod website concerning excommunication:

"Congregations must excommunicate members who have sinned and refuse to repent even though their fellow Christians have warned them according to the steps described in Matthew 18:15-18. An excommunicated person cannot attend the Lord's Supper or exercise any rights of membership in the congregation.

A member can be excommunicated only if his (or her) action is clearly against God's law, if it is proven that he is guilty of sin, and if he has refused warnings to repent. Scripture says an impenitent person has no forgiveness of sins. Excommunication, therefore, does not simply exclude an individual from membership in the congregation, but declares that the offender has excluded himself from eternal life since no impenitent person has forgiveness of sins and no unforgiven person can enter heaven.

The congregation excommunicates a person in the hope that this drastic step will lead the sinner to come to his senses and repent. The excommunicated person will then be welcomed back to the congregation.

Excommunication, therefore, is an act of love for sinners, aimed at saving them from the eternal consequences of impenitence.

When the case has not yet proceeded to the point of excommunication, a pastor who knows that a person is impenitent should warn him or her not to come to communion, since it offers forgiveness only to the repentant. Those who come without repentance bring harm upon themselves by misuse of the sacrament. Exclusion from the Lord's Supper has the same evangelical purpose as excommunication: to bring the sinner to repentance. The pastor can take such action only if the guilt and impenitence of the person are clearly established but the congregation has not yet had an opportunity to act on the case."

Where have we broken God's Law?

We pray you realize the graveness in all of this.

In His Grace,
Joe and Lisa

Can LutherQueasy Be Read As Pure Comedy?Sure!

Considerable thought goes into each LutherQueasy post.
Spelling and grammar do not count.

Timothy Blank (Timothyblank) Intermediate Member Username: Timothyblank Post Number: 428 Registered: 11-2004

Posted on Tuesday, June 07, 2011 - 12:58 am:    Mike, Indeed, I too hope he realizes his error. Jackson is a very intelligent man with so much potential for good, but he refuses (sic) read Scripture, Luther, the Confessions, and our Lutheran fathers in their clear testimony concerning Christ's objective work on the cross. Pastor McCain, I have agreed with the substance of what you have said, but I think you would be well to refrain from making mention of Jackson's deceased daughter. Whatever the reason for his naming his internet congregation "Bethany," I think we must stick to calling him out for his doctrinal deviations.

***

GJ - Since Thy Strong Word is available free on Lulu.com, Blank has no excuse for his silliness.

TSW is the only book where all the UOJ quotations are gathered together, as well as the clear refutations of that Pietistic pratfall. Studying both sides of the issues, plus the Biblical texts in Hebrew and Greek - that is called research.

This is top secret--shhh--a Preus is using TSW in his effort to prove UOJ is in the Book of Concord. Why would a Preus use my book? Because no one else has spent years gathering everything into a database and printing it so conveniently - with all the citation material.

I think I had 1500 quotations, so many that I had to number them as I used them, to keep from repeating myself.

I published Blank's odious essay, because I am not afraid of doctrinal error brought out into the open.

The UOJ Stormtroopers argue their side of the issue, with their talking points endlessly repeated, never dealing with the material that obliterates their fantasies.

Notice how they present opposition to their error? They put everything into quotation marks. Robert Preus' repudiation of UOJ is clear in Justification and Rome, so they put repudiation in quotation marks without supporting their contention.

I like calling attention to LQ fulminations, because laity have to deal with similar efforts in various synods. See Joe Krohn's experience. He raised some issues and found himself excommunicated by the District VP, Don Patterson, a man groomed for years to be the District Doctrinal Pussycat.

Notice the content of Blank's advice. "Whatever the reason" suggests that my own description of the naming of Bethany Lutheran Church may be questionable. McCain was not there and he clearly lied, then called his version "sick."

McCain is the one who lied about his associations with Herman Otten. He denied up and down that he covertly sent Otten the materials from Barry, so they would appear like magic in Christian News the moment they came out in Iowa. Otten has the correspondence between Pope Paul the Unlearned and his tabloid. Perhaps it is time to examine what was said and when.

As I wrote before, Otten bragged to me that McCain was working secretly with him. McCain boasted to me that he was working secretly with Otten. When McCain got his reward, a high-paying job under Barry, he told me to keep it a secret from Otten. When Otten told me about McCain's job, I said, "I know. He told me. And he told me not to tell you."

Otten actually thought he had an ally working for him at the Purple Palace. I wonder what lies were told him to make him think that.

Missing too from McCain's oh-so-informative posts are such facts as this:
1. He wrote me from his Iowa parish, praising my articles in Christian News.
2. He asked me to review the Marquart book on the Church. When my review appeared in Christian News, which is what McCain wanted. the book sold like hotcakes.
3. McCain also agreed to review my book, Liberalism, which he praised. The review was in Christian News.
4. McCain invited me to visit at the Purple Palace. I believe we also had a lunch together. I brought up insurance once, and he claimed to have $1 million in coverage already. That was the end of discussing the matter. He lied (surprise!) about that too. But why not? He lied to Otten, lied about Otten, and blew a fuse when I said Barry was soft on CG.

My Wife Wonders Why McCain, Glende, and Lindemann Have To Attack Our Daughters

From a reader: "McCain has no competency for biblical scholarship, He has no competency for the pastoral ministry because he never was one, he has no competency as a theologian because he is not one. So of course the little obsequiously fawning pissant has to come up with some slanderous crap like that. It's like the little boy that has been intellectually boxed in a corner by his mommy and for the lack of anything else to say explodes in You Gunky."

My wife asked, "Do you attack McCain's children?" I said, "No."

She wondered, "Why is he attacking our daughters?"

Mrs. Ichabod is going through extensive neurological tests, which means driving three hours to Little Rock, to the University of Arkansas Medical School, where a team is doing tests and gathering a medical history. We have been living in a puzzle, where some of the best neurologists in the world have been unable to come up with a diagnosis for Bethany and Erin Joy.

Part of gathering a complete medical history involves ordering our daughters' autopsy reports to be sent to UAMS. That also stirs up many memories, since certain doctors have been less than helpful. Most have been exceptional. We have outlived three of them already.

Needing an autopsy is not a pleasant experience for a mother. If you think the pain goes away, then you do not know what it means to be a mother...or a father. The vultures at LutherQueasy are still cackling over their great wit and discernment.

McCain has successfully dodged pastoral work his entire adult life. His only nominal call consisted of running Al Barry's campaign for Synod President, via full-time contact with Herman Otten. After that, McCain kept himself in office work.

And yet, McCain calls Bethany Lutheran Church a fake congregation and me a fake pastor. The Waltherians say a call makes a man a pastor, and the size of a congregation makes no difference. Why would McCain expose his ignorance so brashly?

McCain is contemptuous of our tiny operation, and it is small. A donated camera broadcasts 60+ services a year, free, over the Net. Instead of spending a million dollars on a mission start, plus oodles of money on salary and perks, Bethany has a tent-making ministry. There is some precedent for that, I understand.

I am contemptuous of someone who did nothing about St. John, Ellisville, a stone's throw from the Purple Palace, when it was both a Missouri Synod congregation and a member of the Willow Creek Association. I think doctrine is more important than the size of a mortgage. But I never went begging to a known adulterer for the loot to start a vanity journal.

I have an idea for all the Purple Palace drones who dress up in clerics when they are only clerks and bloggers. Starting with the Synod President, they should go out to the small, poor, under-served LCMS congregations in their own area on Sunday. Each Sunday they should preach an original sermon and give generously from their over-stuffed salaries.

Instead of congregating in their rich suburban churches, where they can preen around the coffee urn and play the role of celebrity clergyman, they should be ordinary pastors who lead the liturgy, preach the sermon, and actually visit the members.

Herman Otten, McCain's old political partner, has pointed out how many millions have been spent on huge district offices, the Purple Palace, and exploding staff salaries. Missouri lives off Schwan, Thrivent, and the foundations. The offering money does not go toward spreading the Gospel but feeding the middle-aged spread of the office staff.

When the trotters are in the trough all the time, the lupine start to look porcine.