This is the second of three posts examining the article "My Journey Home" by a former LCMS pastor named Ezekiel who converted to Orthodoxy a few years ago.
In reading the early church fathers and church history, I find a different view of the Priesthood and of Mary than what one finds in the LCMS today.
Many LCMS churches view the pastor as simply a man they hired. The voter's are "in charge" of the congregation and can remove a pastor whenever they see fit. Adding to this problem are the LCMS pastors who have stopped dressing like Priests and now wear jeans, shorts or Hawaiian shirts during "service".
In regards to Mary, I read a different view of her in the Lutheran Confessions and the ancient church. The Theotokos simply does not have a place of honor in the majority of LCMS congregations.
Ezekiel comments:
“Our prayers and study continued, amidst the crumbling Lutherans. All of us were very much concerned that the Office of the Holy Ministry (the Priesthood) was more often than not not seen as ordained by Christ and given to His Church. Pastors were defined as those selected to carry out things given to every Christian to do. They were literally hired and fired. All of us were very much in the minority in our church body regarding the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Theotokos. Most treated her ever virginity as a “pious opinion, ‘ in spite of the fact that the Church East and West confessed and taught this from the apostolic times.”
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1 comment:
"...in spite of the fact that the Church East and West confessed and taught this from the apostolic times.”
Including Martin Luther. Lack of adherence to even the Lutheran confessions as laid out by Luther, Chemnitz and Melanchthon, let alone to the historical Church is what finally put the nail in the coffin of my time in the LCMS. Too much cherry-picking of doctrine in my opinion.
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