Everything But Faith - Statistics, Analysis, Anecdotes, Wry Commentary - Just No Faith!

 

ELCA bishops also partner in ministry with Thrivent.

 

 This actual ELCA ordination photo suggests many new roles for pastors, growth in recruitment.

The pickle-faced pundits of the American Lutheran Publicity Bureau Online Forum finally grabbed my attention.

Seminary enrollment figures are sinking faster than Jakarta, Indonesia. The copy and paste below is from the ALPB Online Forum on the topic of church workers in decline.

LCMS -

In the past 14 years church worker recruitment has declined:

1. Our 2 seminaries have experienced a combined decrease of 55% of those

enrolled in the Master of Divinity degree.

2. There has been a 59% decrease in our pre-seminary Concordia University

System enrollment.

3. There has been a 61% decrease  in our Lutheran teaching program enrollment.

To counteract these trends the LCMS National Convention in 2019 embarked on an

aggressive , comprehensive Church Worker Recruitment Initiative. 

[GJ - Aggressive - that will reel them in!]

ELCA 

In 2008, the ELCA seminaries graduated 271 with M.Div. Degrees.

In 2016, the ELCA seminaries graduated 173 with M.Div. Degrees.

https://www.livinglutheran.org/2017/02/seminary-status-check/

Several ELCA schools are already making major changes. Gettysburg Seminary, the oldest of the ELCA theological schools, is merging with the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia—a union contemplated as long as 50 years. This year the two schools will become United Lutheran Theological Seminary, with campuses in Philadelphia and Gettysburg.

• Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus, Ohio, is merging with nearby Capital University, an ELCA school, in a union that will be completed this year.
• Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, Calif., merged with the ELCA’s California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks. The seminary will sell its aging and expensive-to-maintain campus and is moving downtown near Berkeley City College and the University of California.
• Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Columbia, S.C., is now affiliated with Lenoir-Rhyne University in Hickory, N.C.
• School officials see these moves as not only cost-saving but also as ways to expand the seminary experience.
• “For some time, many seminaries had become monastic in nature,” said Wayne Powell, president of Lenoir-Rhyne. Today, he said, “seminaries are becoming more interactive with the real world, which, of course, provides the students with a more practical education.”
• Cooper-White said the Gettysburg union with the Philadelphia school was not just a “merger, but a new approach to formation and leadership development.”

From the ELCA pastor Journalist -

"On almost all statistical measurements, the ELCA and LC-MS have been in parallel, that is, almost equal decline in recent decades. My former synod has closed or put in hospice care almost 20 percent of its congregations in the last 20 years."

+++

Jon Alan Schmidt, LCMS Layman

"We believe, teach and confess that by conserving the distinction between Law and Gospel as an especially glorious light

with great diligence in the Church, the Word of God is rightly divided according to the admonition of St. Paul." (FC Ep V.2)

***

GJ - The Formula of Concord statement (above) was left alone, perhaps because no one wants to deal with the apostasy of ELCA-LCMS-WELS-ELS. They are at war against Luther, Justification by Faith, the divinity of Christ, and the King James Version of the Bible. Their hymnals are dreadful and getting worse.

No Faith - High Church

The great escape for these dolts is worship. This can be found in equal doses of stench in the Episcopalians, smells-and-bells Lutherans, mainline ministers, and their most excellent models the Roman and Orthodox priests. They can talk all day long about the nuances of worship, incense, robes, miters, copes, and church calendars - all a substitute for faith in Christ.

Ft. Wayne is a great example, following the model of No Faith - High Church. David Scaer rails against Justification by Faith but walks down the aisle in a trance for Holy Communion. Magicians do the same thing, but admit it - misdirection of the eyes.