St. Louis (SNS) --- A new alignment of conservative American Lutherans is taking shape. Outraged by pastors leaving the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (LCMS), otherwise known as the True Visible Church On Earth!(tm), for other denominations, a highly placed clergyperson of the biblically-based midwestern denomination has allegedly taken the decisive step to break away from the 2.5 million member church founded in 1848 by a Lutheran minister named Chuck Walters.
Rev. Paul McCain, a well-respected minister of the denomination and executive at the denomination's publishing company, has had enough.
"Pastor after pastor has left the LCMS to become papists and garlic-breath incense swingers - and the synod isn't doing one darn thing!" McCain railed, a vein visibly bulging over his left temple. When asked what synodical officials should do to pastors who have left their control, McCain stammered, "Well, I don't know. Maybe they should be excommunicated or something." When told that such people are no longer in communion with the LCMS upon their departure, McCain relaxed a bit and said: "Well, I'm glad somebody is finally doing something about it."
And McCain is finally doing something about it himself.
In response to a plethora of "hyper-ritualists" in the LCMS, men who care more about wearing lacy vestments and keeping their fingers out of their noses while officiating at the altar than they do lending support to his company's sales of bobble head dolls and socks with the symbol of the Lutheran Church sewn on them, McCain has taken the drastic step of severing his ties. Literally. The necktie that is his clerical trademark has been rent in twain.
"Here I snip!" the well-known minister said, as he gravely clipped his crevatte. "And," he added dramatically, pulling out a "holy card" of Pope Benedict XVI, "I'm also a Sinead O'Connor fan!", slicing the picture of the Roman pontiff in half. "And in the words of Stryper" he continued, "to hell with the devil! Here I stand! Here I stand!"
SNS researchers are currently trying to identify "Stryper" as well as the apocryphal quotation attributed to him.
McCain has severed his ties with the LCMS, and declared a New True Visible Church on Earth!(tm), known as the Lutheran Church - McCain Synod (LCMcS). President McCain, who added: "You people need to get used to the sound of that," is currently the church's only member and lone clergyman. "I have finally found a way for the church to have complete doctrinal agreement, and to be right on every matter. It's wholly my way, or the holy highway!"
The new denomination is currently listed as the 16,243rd largest denomination in the United States, and is, in fact, the second largest Lutheran denomination headquartered in St. Louis.
For McCain, many of the problems besetting the LCMS have been solved, such as, closed communion. Although McCain does have one major glitch: the church does not currently have any communion services at all, since the confessions of the Lutheran Church forbid "private Masses." And since President McCain is the lone member of the denomination, he is unable to take holy communion with himself, his complete doctrinal agreement with himself notwithstanding.
The LCMcS does, however, have an aggressive evangelism and outreach program that is expected to quickly double the size of the church. "We're reaching out to other disaffected Lutherans, who have likewise had enough with the hyper-ritualism and crypto-papism crawling around the LCMS like maggots in a pile of dung," McCain explained, speaking in the same earthy colloquial manner as Martin Luther, whom many Lutherans believe to be the founder of the Lutheran Church resulting from his rebellion against the Roman Catholic Church in 1517 over a "diet of worms."
The LCMcS is currently in high-level negotiations with the Vehse Evangelical Lutheran Democratic Republic (VELDR), a lay-led congregational denomination the same size as the LCMcS. The VELDR's president is a Texas doctor named Rick Strickert, who prefers the term "The Vehse" as his title instead of "President." Vehse Strickert is the sole member of the VELDR, and though he views President McCain with some suspicion, being a "clerical type with a cemetery, excuse me, seminary degree," he does see much common ground between the VELDR and the LCMcS.
"We're working out the kinks," said Strickert, "aside from the minor issue of the so-called office of the ministry, we just about got it licked. Then, we figure, we can go guns Ablazing!(tm) after the 'hyper euros,'" said The Vehse, winking at his clever appropriation of the LCMS's corporate slogan.
McCain is likewise optimistic. "Although I am no fan of ecumenical dialogue, I do believe full altar and pulpit fellowship can be achieved, just as long as Vehse Strickert accepts the LCMcS's doctrine and bylaw of the Infallibility of the McCain Synod President."
A joint convention between the two church bodies is being scheduled for some time next year.
When asked for a comment on the matter, LCMS President Gerald Kieschnick would only say: "I'm all for McCain for president. I got an e-mail the other day saying that O'Bama fella is a Muslimite. And you don't want that camel stickin' his nose in the tent!"
Scuttlebutt News Service, copyright 2008. This report may not be reproduced in any form without without the following disclaimer: "Support Pirate Christian Radio! Christ's Church IS my grandfather's Church!"
