The Spirit and conventions Recently, you published a letter in which a pastor lamented the use of various election lists at the Synod convention (“Letters,” April ’04).  He asked why we cannot simply trust the Holy Spirit to guide us.  He…

Dr. Samuel I. Goltermann, president of Concordia College (now University), Austin, Texas, from 1960 to 1963, and a former Synod staff member, died of an apparent heart attack April 24 at his home in St. Louis.   The funeral service was April …

A three-student team from Concordia College, Bronxville, N.Y., finished in the top 11 percent among 599 teams participating in the 2004 Mathematical Contest in Modeling. The international competition is sponsored by the National Security Agency and the National Science Foundation.…

In a rematch of last year’s title game, the men from Concordia University, Irvine, Calif., relinquished the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics Division I basketball championship March 30 in Kansas City.  Mountain State University, Beckley, W.Va., edged Irvine 74-70 in…

Reporter and The Lutheran Witness, the Synod’s magazine, each won a first-place award and Reporter an “Honorable Mention” in this year’s Associated Church Press (ACP) competition for work done in 2003. The awards were presented April 20 in Toronto.  ACP is…

The Convention Workbook 2004 and three supplemental books, all with the theme of “One Mission Ablaze,” were mailed the last week of April to convention delegates and to all rostered church workers in the Synod. Synod Secretary Raymond Hartwig said that…

Lutheran Disaster Response (LDR) and local Lutherans are helping those affected by a cluster of 19 tornadoes that ripped through northern Illinois April 21, killing eight people in Utica, about 90 miles southeast of Chicago. LDR is a cooperative program of the…

It was no April Fools joke when the university president sent an April 1 e-mail saying that President George W. Bush had accepted an invitation to deliver the spring commencement address May 14 at Concordia University Wisconsin, Mequon. “We are delighted…

By Joe Isenhower Jr.  The Synod’s Board of Directors the week after Easter sent to every LCMS congregation a mailing that responds to letters from three attorneys who disagree with outside legal opinions obtained by the Board last year. The mailing…

By David L. Mahsman “Guidelines for Participation in Civic Events,” the product of an assignment sparked by questions raised following a post-9/11 event in New York’s Yankee Stadium, was completed and adopted last month by the Commission on Theology and Church…

By David L. Mahsman The Praesidium of The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod is recommending to this year’s Synod convention that current LCMS working relationships with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America be continued. At the same time, the Praesidium — the Synod’s…

By Joe Isenhower Jr. The Synod’s Commission on Constitutional Matters (CCM) March 22 reaffirmed its eight opinions that the Board of Directors last year said are “of no effect.”  The commission added that the resolutions by which the Board made…

Dr. Gus Melde, a one-time president of the International Lutheran Laymen’s League (Int’l LLL) and member of the Synod Board of Directors, died April 4 at a Dallas hospital, from heart failure and an acute infection resulting from diabetes. A memorial…

By Paula Schlueter Ross The case of Audrey Seiler, the University of Wisconsin sophomore who faked her own abduction in late March, is just one example of the deep emotional pain a number of students are experiencing on today’s college…

Dr. Robert Rosin, chairman of the historical theology department at Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, has accepted a part-time assignment with LCMS World Mission, beginning this summer. While Rosin, 53, will continue teaching at the seminary half time, he also will…

Lutheran Blind Mission is moving out from under the auspices of LCMS World Mission and becoming an independent mission society May 1.  Although it will continue to receive partial funding from the mission board for two years, Lutheran Blind Mission…