I don't understand? Concordia Portland asked to be independent?

[Harry Edmon]

From BJS (http://steadfastlutherans.org/2017/06/concordia-university-portland-news/) from Pastor Joshua Scheer:


A recent announcement by the Board of Regents of Concordia University Portland has drawn some attention.  Apparently there are discussions about the University becoming independent, separate from the LCMS.  Upon this announcement I found some folks on Facebook immediately take to accusation and suspicion that there is a power play at work and that Team Harrison is up to no good.  This is no surprise as the recent zombie-resurrection of Jesus First as “Congregations Matter” has signaled that many liberals in the Synod are not interested in truth or charitable interpretations of situations, but instead upon politically crafted attacks upon the Harrison administration.  Despite huge agreement in measures passed at the 2016 Convention, these folks want to be a vocal and radical minority hiding under a supposed concern for congregations.  No doubt the same old voices will raise the same old uncharitable interpretations of the Harrison administration.  They will also likely blast away at groups like the United List that simply lends its faithful record and approval to candidates for offices. The will of congregations was made known in 2016 as they through their delegations elected the folks we have now.  An attack upon the delegates decisions is not supporting congregations but is actively fighting against them.  We don’t have the United List running the LCMS but the folks duly elected by the Synod Convention (representing all the congregations of the Synod).  Don’t mistake “sour grapes” and class warfare (power politics) for actual concern here folks.

One of our writers here at Steadfast wrote about the strategic importance of these kind of potential changes in the Concordia University System last Fall.  Thank you to Mr. Tim Wood for his insight and vision to help open up some out of the box thinking with his post.  These laymen we have here at Steadfast are great guys, loving the true confession of the Faith in both their congregations and also their synod.  Thanks be to God for such gifts.

I asked the communications department of the LCMS for a statement and they graciously provided one to me (available to anyone that asks) and I print it below:

COMMUNICATION AND RESPONSE TO RECENT STATEMENTS MADE BY CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY- PORTLAND
No decision, proposal or recommendation has been made by Concordia University System or by The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod regarding any significant changes at Concordia University – Portland.
Under Synod Bylaws, Concordia University System’s Board of Directors (CUS) would have to make a recommendation to the LCMS Board of Directors concerning certain types of major changes, such as a divestiture or sale, before any changes could occur. If such a recommendation were to be made by CUS, no action would be taken unless both the LCMS Board of Directors and one of either the Concordia University Portland (CUP) Board of Regents or the Council of Presidents voted to accept the recommendation.
The recent CUP Facebook posting and other communications sent out by CUP’s Board of Regents concerning possible changes in ownership and governance reflect the fact that CUS President, Rev. Dr. Dean Wenthe, and CUP President, Dr. Charles Schlimpert, recently met to discuss how they might work together to meet complex challenges that are facing campuses like CUP in this turbulent environment that currently characterizes university education. Rev. Dr. Wenthe invited Dr. Schlimpert to meet with him in St. Louis to discuss these challenges, particularly in the area of ongoing capitalization. They discussed a variety of ideas on how they might explore potential solutions that would benefit both CUP and the LCMS, but no definite proposals were made. However, CUS President Rev. Dr. Wenthe and CUS Board Chairman Dr. Gerhard Mundinger supported Dr. Schlimpert’s suggestion that he would be willing to postpone his retirement in light of the potentially significant changes that could occur with respect to CUP.

I think this is a good time to let the folks of Concordia Portland and the Concordia University System work this one out for the good of everyone involved.  It’s also time to stop interpreting everything in the most uncharitable way to the Harrison administration.  The 2016 Convention did some great things, including electing good folks who care about faithfulness throughout the Synod (that most certainly includes congregations!).

[Mbecker]

Please, tell me what you think my "ideology" is? And can you provide a brief summary of Valpo's "institutional orthodoxy," things not to be said, questioned, or perhaps thought? Apparently you know Valpo and me better than I do, so please enlighten me and free me from my blindness....

You yourself lay out some things your ideology, whatever it might be, will not countenance:

As to the rest of your hypothetical scenario, I can't imagine why a faculty member at VU would feel the need to publicly and forcefully deny the validity of gay marriage or the benevolence of #blacklivesmatter, declare Islam a false and destructive religion, or promote what you describe as "the idea of male/female as a binary per Genesis and not a spectrum." The one so denying, declaring, and promoting would likely be acting contrary to central values of our academic community and would come in for strong criticism on those grounds.

I could guess to what other items and areas would also fall into this fenced-off region, but there's no way to be sure unless one is part of the Valpo community, which I am not. All that is addressed here is what you yourself have claimed falls within Valpo’s no-man's land. What we have been given are some of the contours of the ideology to which you’re blind; not enough of the whole has been revealed to properly categorize it. I’m in no place to figure out just which ideolog(y)(ies) hold you captive; perhaps listening to a few of Žižek’s lectures would aid self-diagnosis.

None of us can escape being perspectival. You can't jump over your own shadow. Your comments, too, would be opened to careful analysis/criticism, if shared in a Valpo classroom.

Well, yeah. No claim for an aperspectival position here, and of course my comments, if shared in a Valpo classroom, would be “opened to careful analysis/criticsm.” Who would think or want otherwise? What was claimed, however, is that there is nothing special about a particular perspective or particular person's perspective, other than it exists and influences how things are read or seen, and then accounted for adequately (thus, "perspectives are merely another piece of data"). That someone else has another perspective than mine, however, doesn't make theirs or mine special because they are perspectives; recognizing differing perspectives simply points out how we come at the problem from alternate directions, and help us round out the data we have to work with — what we know, what we’ve missed, what we may still have yet to determine. Recognizing perspectives is merely a tool in sussing out the truth of things.

I wrote that I couldn't imagine why a faculty member would "forcefully" argue in public for the positions Peter identified, not that a faculty member couldn't do so. Again, nothing is fenced off on Valpo's campus, as far as I know, no "no-man's land," as far as topics go. We do, however, get concerned when people act uncivilly and contrary to accepted canons of behavior in an academic community.

Didn't my list of student-chosen debate topics from recent semesters put to rest the notion that there are "fenced-off topics" on Valpo's campus? Or that students wouldn't be exposed to contrary arguments about those topics?

I agree with your observations about perspectives and am glad to know that you recognize that your views are just that, a perspective--as are mine.

M. Becker

[Dave Benke]

From BJS (http://steadfastlutherans.org/2017/06/concordia-university-portland-news/) from Pastor Joshua Scheer:


A recent announcement by the Board of Regents of Concordia University Portland has drawn some attention.  Apparently there are discussions about the University becoming independent, separate from the LCMS.  Upon this announcement I found some folks on Facebook immediately take to accusation and suspicion that there is a power play at work and that Team Harrison is up to no good.  This is no surprise as the recent zombie-resurrection of Jesus First as “Congregations Matter” has signaled that many liberals in the Synod are not interested in truth or charitable interpretations of situations, but instead upon politically crafted attacks upon the Harrison administration.  Despite huge agreement in measures passed at the 2016 Convention, these folks want to be a vocal and radical minority hiding under a supposed concern for congregations.  No doubt the same old voices will raise the same old uncharitable interpretations of the Harrison administration.  They will also likely blast away at groups like the United List that simply lends its faithful record and approval to candidates for offices. The will of congregations was made known in 2016 as they through their delegations elected the folks we have now.  An attack upon the delegates decisions is not supporting congregations but is actively fighting against them.  We don’t have the United List running the LCMS but the folks duly elected by the Synod Convention (representing all the congregations of the Synod).  Don’t mistake “sour grapes” and class warfare (power politics) for actual concern here folks.

One of our writers here at Steadfast wrote about the strategic importance of these kind of potential changes in the Concordia University System last Fall.  Thank you to Mr. Tim Wood for his insight and vision to help open up some out of the box thinking with his post.  These laymen we have here at Steadfast are great guys, loving the true confession of the Faith in both their congregations and also their synod.  Thanks be to God for such gifts.

I asked the communications department of the LCMS for a statement and they graciously provided one to me (available to anyone that asks) and I print it below:

COMMUNICATION AND RESPONSE TO RECENT STATEMENTS MADE BY CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY- PORTLAND
No decision, proposal or recommendation has been made by Concordia University System or by The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod regarding any significant changes at Concordia University – Portland.
Under Synod Bylaws, Concordia University System’s Board of Directors (CUS) would have to make a recommendation to the LCMS Board of Directors concerning certain types of major changes, such as a divestiture or sale, before any changes could occur. If such a recommendation were to be made by CUS, no action would be taken unless both the LCMS Board of Directors and one of either the Concordia University Portland (CUP) Board of Regents or the Council of Presidents voted to accept the recommendation.
The recent CUP Facebook posting and other communications sent out by CUP’s Board of Regents concerning possible changes in ownership and governance reflect the fact that CUS President, Rev. Dr. Dean Wenthe, and CUP President, Dr. Charles Schlimpert, recently met to discuss how they might work together to meet complex challenges that are facing campuses like CUP in this turbulent environment that currently characterizes university education. Rev. Dr. Wenthe invited Dr. Schlimpert to meet with him in St. Louis to discuss these challenges, particularly in the area of ongoing capitalization. They discussed a variety of ideas on how they might explore potential solutions that would benefit both CUP and the LCMS, but no definite proposals were made. However, CUS President Rev. Dr. Wenthe and CUS Board Chairman Dr. Gerhard Mundinger supported Dr. Schlimpert’s suggestion that he would be willing to postpone his retirement in light of the potentially significant changes that could occur with respect to CUP.

I think this is a good time to let the folks of Concordia Portland and the Concordia University System work this one out for the good of everyone involved.  It’s also time to stop interpreting everything in the most uncharitable way to the Harrison administration.  The 2016 Convention did some great things, including electing good folks who care about faithfulness throughout the Synod (that most certainly includes congregations!).

I don't think there's been any chirping about Matt Harrison on this board, Harry, when it comes to what's going on at Concordia Portland.  Having been involved in congregation, school and camp closings in the Atlantic District over a quarter century of time, what happens when difficult decisions get made is that the arrows are aimed at the leader even when there are all kinds of other issues and personalities in play.  Recognizing that is part of taking the leadership vocation, and I believe Matt understands that fully. 

Dave Benke

[peter_speckhard]

From BJS (http://steadfastlutherans.org/2017/06/concordia-university-portland-news/) from Pastor Joshua Scheer:


A recent announcement by the Board of Regents of Concordia University Portland has drawn some attention.  Apparently there are discussions about the University becoming independent, separate from the LCMS.  Upon this announcement I found some folks on Facebook immediately take to accusation and suspicion that there is a power play at work and that Team Harrison is up to no good.  This is no surprise as the recent zombie-resurrection of Jesus First as “Congregations Matter” has signaled that many liberals in the Synod are not interested in truth or charitable interpretations of situations, but instead upon politically crafted attacks upon the Harrison administration.  Despite huge agreement in measures passed at the 2016 Convention, these folks want to be a vocal and radical minority hiding under a supposed concern for congregations.  No doubt the same old voices will raise the same old uncharitable interpretations of the Harrison administration.  They will also likely blast away at groups like the United List that simply lends its faithful record and approval to candidates for offices. The will of congregations was made known in 2016 as they through their delegations elected the folks we have now.  An attack upon the delegates decisions is not supporting congregations but is actively fighting against them.  We don’t have the United List running the LCMS but the folks duly elected by the Synod Convention (representing all the congregations of the Synod).  Don’t mistake “sour grapes” and class warfare (power politics) for actual concern here folks.

One of our writers here at Steadfast wrote about the strategic importance of these kind of potential changes in the Concordia University System last Fall.  Thank you to Mr. Tim Wood for his insight and vision to help open up some out of the box thinking with his post.  These laymen we have here at Steadfast are great guys, loving the true confession of the Faith in both their congregations and also their synod.  Thanks be to God for such gifts.

I asked the communications department of the LCMS for a statement and they graciously provided one to me (available to anyone that asks) and I print it below:

COMMUNICATION AND RESPONSE TO RECENT STATEMENTS MADE BY CONCORDIA UNIVERSITY- PORTLAND
No decision, proposal or recommendation has been made by Concordia University System or by The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod regarding any significant changes at Concordia University – Portland.
Under Synod Bylaws, Concordia University System’s Board of Directors (CUS) would have to make a recommendation to the LCMS Board of Directors concerning certain types of major changes, such as a divestiture or sale, before any changes could occur. If such a recommendation were to be made by CUS, no action would be taken unless both the LCMS Board of Directors and one of either the Concordia University Portland (CUP) Board of Regents or the Council of Presidents voted to accept the recommendation.
The recent CUP Facebook posting and other communications sent out by CUP’s Board of Regents concerning possible changes in ownership and governance reflect the fact that CUS President, Rev. Dr. Dean Wenthe, and CUP President, Dr. Charles Schlimpert, recently met to discuss how they might work together to meet complex challenges that are facing campuses like CUP in this turbulent environment that currently characterizes university education. Rev. Dr. Wenthe invited Dr. Schlimpert to meet with him in St. Louis to discuss these challenges, particularly in the area of ongoing capitalization. They discussed a variety of ideas on how they might explore potential solutions that would benefit both CUP and the LCMS, but no definite proposals were made. However, CUS President Rev. Dr. Wenthe and CUS Board Chairman Dr. Gerhard Mundinger supported Dr. Schlimpert’s suggestion that he would be willing to postpone his retirement in light of the potentially significant changes that could occur with respect to CUP.

I think this is a good time to let the folks of Concordia Portland and the Concordia University System work this one out for the good of everyone involved.  It’s also time to stop interpreting everything in the most uncharitable way to the Harrison administration.  The 2016 Convention did some great things, including electing good folks who care about faithfulness throughout the Synod (that most certainly includes congregations!).

I don't think there's been any chirping about Matt Harrison on this board, Harry, when it comes to what's going on at Concordia Portland.  Having been involved in congregation, school and camp closings in the Atlantic District over a quarter century of time, what happens when difficult decisions get made is that the arrows are aimed at the leader even when there are all kinds of other issues and personalities in play.  Recognizing that is part of taking the leadership vocation, and I believe Matt understands that fully. 

Dave Benke

I think Harry was talking about Facebook, not this board. But it is nice to have the official line. I didn't see anything on Facebook except reactions to reactions, but the whole topic brings up some good discussion points regarding larger issues regardless of the actual details of the Portland goings-on.

[RevG]

Bishop,

I don't think that Mark was advocating disengaging from those in the area and he explicitly said there can be no running and hiding: "You will be made to care." I honestly don't know who any of these pastors are who advocate disengagement. To move back to the monastic movement again, it is utterly falsification of history to portray it as retreat from society to keep one's self from being untouched by impurity. The great monastics, particularly of the West, were above all evangelists. They sought to spread the Gospel and actively went forward to do so. They just knew that it couldn't be done outside of that community gathered around the wells of the Coming Kingdom. They literally lived from the Mass and the Office, and drew strength from brothers (or sisters) who joined them in planting bits of order into the midst of the chaos. The order being, above all, a taste of the future kingdom itself to which they were inviting and summoning the world into which they went, knowing that it was a world that would often hate them, seek to wipe them out, and ideologically never welcome them. It was okay. They lived from the end and to the end they invited, they engaged, if you will.

P.S. Said another way, they weren't into building bridges. They offered folks the ride of their life in a divine transporter to the age to come. Beam me up, Scotty! Or rather, come with us to where the future kingdom is beamed down to us!!!

P.S.S. If we thought like the monastics we'd realize that the task of evangelism and the task of planting communities nurtured in the Mass and Office are one in the same. Evangelism is the invitation to feast on this life that is pouring in through them. Without that community at the core you're only inviting folks into a "go out and get some more club" which I have termed missiolatry.

I appreciate your articulation here. So true.

To your last paragraph I like that word "missiolatry".  What you describe has been bothering me for a while and the light bulb went on a few months ago when I was at a presentation given in that vein.  It's a confusion of discipleship with missiology.  It equates discipleship with making more disciples.  It thins discipleship out and makes it one dimensional.

[Voelker]

Please, tell me what you think my "ideology" is? And can you provide a brief summary of Valpo's "institutional orthodoxy," things not to be said, questioned, or perhaps thought? Apparently you know Valpo and me better than I do, so please enlighten me and free me from my blindness....

You yourself lay out some things your ideology, whatever it might be, will not countenance:

As to the rest of your hypothetical scenario, I can't imagine why a faculty member at VU would feel the need to publicly and forcefully deny the validity of gay marriage or the benevolence of #blacklivesmatter, declare Islam a false and destructive religion, or promote what you describe as "the idea of male/female as a binary per Genesis and not a spectrum." The one so denying, declaring, and promoting would likely be acting contrary to central values of our academic community and would come in for strong criticism on those grounds.

I could guess to what other items and areas would also fall into this fenced-off region, but there's no way to be sure unless one is part of the Valpo community, which I am not. All that is addressed here is what you yourself have claimed falls within Valpo’s no-man's land. What we have been given are some of the contours of the ideology to which you’re blind; not enough of the whole has been revealed to properly categorize it. I’m in no place to figure out just which ideolog(y)(ies) hold you captive; perhaps listening to a few of Žižek’s lectures would aid self-diagnosis.

None of us can escape being perspectival. You can't jump over your own shadow. Your comments, too, would be opened to careful analysis/criticism, if shared in a Valpo classroom.

Well, yeah. No claim for an aperspectival position here, and of course my comments, if shared in a Valpo classroom, would be “opened to careful analysis/criticsm.” Who would think or want otherwise? What was claimed, however, is that there is nothing special about a particular perspective or particular person's perspective, other than it exists and influences how things are read or seen, and then accounted for adequately (thus, "perspectives are merely another piece of data"). That someone else has another perspective than mine, however, doesn't make theirs or mine special because they are perspectives; recognizing differing perspectives simply points out how we come at the problem from alternate directions, and help us round out the data we have to work with — what we know, what we’ve missed, what we may still have yet to determine. Recognizing perspectives is merely a tool in sussing out the truth of things.

I wrote that I couldn't imagine why a faculty member would "forcefully" argue in public for the positions Peter identified, not that a faculty member couldn't do so. Again, nothing is fenced off on Valpo's campus, as far as I know, no "no-man's land," as far as topics go. We do, however, get concerned when people act uncivilly and contrary to accepted canons of behavior in an academic community.

Didn't my list of student-chosen debate topics from recent semesters put to rest the notion that there are "fenced-off topics" on Valpo's campus? Or that students wouldn't be exposed to contrary arguments about those topics?

I agree with your observations about perspectives and am glad to know that you recognize that your views are just that, a perspective--as are mine.

M. Becker

Thank you. I'd ask you to consider, though, that for someone to "act uncivilly" could well include, in what you have described, merely taking a stand on one of the issues you mentioned that is in contradiction to what is accepted. For that to be uncivil, or against codes of behavior, is to, intentionally or not, force suppression of those who do believe or think in those ways, as they will, more often than not, avoid causing trouble for themselves.

[Harry Edmon]

I don't think there's been any chirping about Matt Harrison on this board, Harry, when it comes to what's going on at Concordia Portland.  Having been involved in congregation, school and camp closings in the Atlantic District over a quarter century of time, what happens when difficult decisions get made is that the arrows are aimed at the leader even when there are all kinds of other issues and personalities in play.  Recognizing that is part of taking the leadership vocation, and I believe Matt understands that fully. 

Dave Benke

I agree with you about this forum and Matt Harrision on this topic.  For this forum I thought the interesting part was the quote from the communications department of Synod.  It gave some more background on how the whole topic got started.   I quoted the whole BJS article so everything was presented in context.

[Dave Benke]

I don't think there's been any chirping about Matt Harrison on this board, Harry, when it comes to what's going on at Concordia Portland.  Having been involved in congregation, school and camp closings in the Atlantic District over a quarter century of time, what happens when difficult decisions get made is that the arrows are aimed at the leader even when there are all kinds of other issues and personalities in play.  Recognizing that is part of taking the leadership vocation, and I believe Matt understands that fully. 

Dave Benke

I agree with you about this forum and Matt Harrision on this topic.  For this forum I thought the interesting part was the quote from the communications department of Synod.  It gave some more background on how the whole topic got started.   I quoted the whole BJS article so everything was presented in context.

Got it.  The last sentence carries some freight:  However, CUS President Rev. Dr. Wenthe and CUS Board Chairman Dr. Gerhard Mundinger supported Dr. Schlimpert’s suggestion that he would be willing to postpone his retirement in light of the potentially significant changes that could occur with respect to CUP.  Any time the leadership transition process is derailed, there's something going on, and for the various parties that would have to be involved in "significant changes" having already met is a sign that there will be some more chapters to this story in the nearish future.

Dave Benke

[scott9]

Our Doc Yak teaches there. Ask him.

As an update, I just received word that I am approved to be a (full) Professor of Theology at Concordia University in Ann Arbor. We will be moving there in July.  We will miss the students, faculty, and staff at CU-Portland but very much look forward to serving at CU-Ann Arbor.

[revjagow]

Our Doc Yak teaches there. Ask him.

As an update, I just received word that I am approved to be a (full) Professor of Theology at Concordia University in Ann Arbor. We will be moving there in July.  We will miss the students, faculty, and staff at CU-Portland but very much look forward to serving at CU-Ann Arbor.

May God bless you richly in your call and give you peace in this time of transition.

[Michael Slusser]

Our Doc Yak teaches there. Ask him.

As an update, I just received word that I am approved to be a (full) Professor of Theology at Concordia University in Ann Arbor. We will be moving there in July.  We will miss the students, faculty, and staff at CU-Portland but very much look forward to serving at CU-Ann Arbor.

Felicitations! I'm glad they realized what an asset you would be to them.

Peace,
Michael

[Dave Likeness]

Congratulations to Dr.Yak.   It is my understanding that Concordia University Ann Arbor
is still under the Presidency of Dr. Patrick Ferry of Concordia University Wisconsin.  He
has done amazing work with both of these campuses.   He is one of the outstanding
leaders in our Concordia University System.

[Jim Butler]

Our Doc Yak teaches there. Ask him.

As an update, I just received word that I am approved to be a (full) Professor of Theology at Concordia University in Ann Arbor. We will be moving there in July.  We will miss the students, faculty, and staff at CU-Portland but very much look forward to serving at CU-Ann Arbor.

As an alumnus of CUAA (although it was CCAA in my day), I congratulate you on your new position! I'm sure you will be tremendous blessing to the students and your colleagues on the faculty.

[scott9]

Thanks, guys.  I appreciate it and look forward to the new opportunities at CUAA.

[James_Gale]

Our Doc Yak teaches there. Ask him.

As an update, I just received word that I am approved to be a (full) Professor of Theology at Concordia University in Ann Arbor. We will be moving there in July.  We will miss the students, faculty, and staff at CU-Portland but very much look forward to serving at CU-Ann Arbor.

First, congratulations!


Second, and much more importantly, any truth to the rumor (which I am starting here) that the teaching position is secondary to a new position (Lutheran chaplain, perhaps?) with the Michigan football team?