ROUGHLY EDITED COPY LUTHERAN PASTORAL THEOLOGY & PRACTICE LPTP-23 Captioning Provided By: Caption First, Inc. P.O. Box 1924 Lombard, IL 60148 800-825-5234 www.captionfirst.com *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. *** >> JOSH: Why are the called pastors of the church most frequently charged with the responsibility to administer the Lord's Supper? Being in Delto, I know that there are exceptions to this in the Missouri synod, but I have the impression that such exceptions are rare. Would you be willing to discuss boning the doctrine and practice of the administration of the Lord's Supper? >> DR. WARNECK: Josh, as you observe, there are different practices in regard to our subject, the administration of the Lord's Supper. But in most of our congregations, the understanding is very clear on this point: The responsibility and the duty for administering the Lord's Supper in this instance is the prerogative of the pastor of the congregation, the ordained master by virtue of his call to that public ministry. That is our common understanding. And then we go from there. And, when we discuss assisting the pastor in that administration, then doors open to a diversity of practice. And perhaps we should reflect on that as well. Our Lutheran Confessions are the norm here. And Augsburg Confession XIV states very concisely that the public preaching of the word and administration of the sacraments is the calling of the Christian pastor, the ordained pastor. That concise statement is underscored and supported by Augsburg Confession XXVIII where the confessors assigned the power of the keys or the "Power of Bishops," as they put it. The command to preach the Gospel and administer the sacraments is assigned to the called pastor of the congregation, the pastoral office. Now we have a situation where many are involved in the assistance to the pastor in that ministry. Lutheran worship has initiated the distinction between presiding ministers and assisting ministers, the presiding minister being the pastor, as we have referenced him in the confessional statements, to which we might add Apology, article 24, paragraph 80. In the area of assisting ministers, there is a lack of clarity accompanying the diversity for the reason that assistance in the administration of the sacrament is an adiaphoron. It is a function that is neither commanded nor forbidden, and there is some latitude in the arrangements that congregations want to make here. But always we want to understand that in the area of adiaphora the church makes its decisions and determines its practice always in reference to the clear teachings of the scriptures. And practice always honors those clear teachings and doctrines of God's word. Now a question arises in the area of assisting in the distribution of the Lord's Supper, particularly. And the question is somewhat paramount, if not acute, in larger congregations where we have large numbers of persons coming to the Lord's Supper in a given service. And we also have multiple communion services in those settings. There the issue of assistance is even more poignant, if you will. And we need to say a word about that. The Formula of Concord, Article 7, is perhaps our strongest source providing principles which I believe ought to govern our decisions in this area of assisting in distribution of the Lord's Supper. There we discover that Kemnitz�-- he was the principal author of Article 7�-- is speaking about the administration of the Lord's Supper as a holistic action. He addresses this matter in paragraph 85 of Article 7 when he speaks about the consecration, the distribution, and the reception of the Lord's Supper as one entire action. We have already said that the responsibility and duty for this holistic action resides with the called pastor of the church. Now, if we bring others to the scene to assist the called pastor in exercising the holistic action, it would seem at least logical that we would not enlist persons to assist who would never be eligible by training and qualifications to be a part of the public pastoral ministry at all. I am leading around to the sensitive issue of the practice of engaging women as assistants at the Lord's table in the distribution of the sacrament to the people. Our concern here is -- well, it does get down somewhat to a gender issue. If women, as our church comprehends�-- I Timothy chapter 2 and the passages I Corinthians 11 and chapter 14�-- are not candidates to be pastors in the church, the question�-- the practical question here is: Should we bring them in to a ministry and part of the action, the single action which is the prerogative of the called pastor of the church any more than we would ask women to preach sermons publicly and exercise that part of the public ministry? Undoubtedly, some of my own subjective evaluation, assessments, and judgments are moving into the discussion here. And, Josh, I want to make that clear. I certainly don't want to impose the personal preferences of one theologian and one practicing pastor on you or anyone else. Except I would urge you to give attention to these sensitivities. I think it is supported by the studies in this area from our church body. The CTCR, for instance, has said that, to avoid confusion regarding the office of the public ministry in this matter of distributing the Lord's Supper and to avoid giving offense to the church, the distribution of the elements and the celebration of Holy Communion should be limited to lay men, that is, the gender male lay Christians, they mean to say. And this opinion of the CTCR in 1989, dependent upon earlier statements in 1985 and going back as far as 1983, is the opinion of the most recent task force committee appointed by the president of the synod following our recent convention in 2004. So the counsel of our theologians and our president's task force committee points us in the direction of being sensitive on this issue and suggesting that those who assist in the Lord's Supper, this action of the public office of the ministry, be reserved for male Christians. Now, that certainly is an opinion. But the issue needs to be addressed. And, wherever you are serving and others are serving, we should be thinking through this issue. And here I have provided just a few guidelines and some things to think about and possibly some subjects to investigate further. *** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. ***