Are These Articles Valid, Part 5: The invalid amendments from 2007 to 2009

We continue in this post to examine the details of the decision by the Board of Directors of the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod to sell the campus ministries in Mankato and Minneapolis.  Previous posts have given the source documents to establish that the last valid Articles of Incorporation for the Minnesota South District are from 1966.  In this post we examine the changes from the two questionable filings of their Articles of Incorporation from 2007 and 2009.

While the filings for both years fail the corporations own standard and process for amending articles given in Article IV, it is instructive to see what changes were proposed in 2009.  Here are the amendments from each year:

2009 Article III Section 3d:

2007 Article III Section 3d:

And the 1966 Article III Section 3d:

Now for the second amendment:

2009 Article III Section 3d Subsection 3:

2007 Article III Section 3d Subsection 3:

And the last valid Articles of Incorporation, the 1966 Article III Section 3d Subsection 3:

And there is the rub.  The 1966 wording contradicts the later readings of the same Article, Section and Subsection in 2007 and 2009.

Confused?  You should be.

The reasons for this may be varied, but there is an explanation for one aspect.  Handbook committees dutifully recorded changes to the Handbook after each convention, including amendments to the articles.  But those same amendments never made it to completion.  The presiding officers failed to "certify" them, and the secretaries of the corporation failed to "verify" them, and all of the officers failed to file them "with the secretary of the State of Minnesota, according to law" for over 40 years, from 1966 to 2007.  That tradition continues to this day, because the efforts to file the amendments in 2007 and 2009 also share the same failures as explained in previous posts.

We gain some clarity by seeing the 1966 Article III Section 3d Subsections 3 and 4 together:

This had to be a mystery to anyone who carefully read the Handbook of the corporation from 1974 until 2007.  The deletion of Subsection 3 above was proposed in 1974, but failed because it was never verified by the presiding officer, certified by the secretary, or filed (as pointed out in the previous posts).  But the Handbook Committee marched on in spite of this and changed the Handbook to delete the section, so here is how the Handbook would have read, from sections 2 to the new section 3:

...
2. To administer legacies and trust funds for the uses and purposes for which they are designated or specified.
3. The Board shall have authority to mortgage, sell, encumber, lease or dispose of any other real estate without authorization by its voting members.
...

We've emphasized the word "other", because while it is non-sensical, it is still the correct reading.  That's because section 3 is the old section 4.  But without the original section 3 in the Handbook, to what "real estate" would "other" have referred?  The Handbook Committee in 1974 proposed to delete Subsection 3 but did not propose to change the wording of Subsection 4.  That makes the resulting wording odd, to say the least.  Perhaps that is why no vote totals are recorded for the amendments proposed in 1974, and why the "reading" was sent back to committee.  It's possible someone caught this error, pointed it out, and the proposed amendment did not receive 2/3's vote (as noted in a previous post).

So who was aware of this?  Why would they try to "correct" this language in 2007 and 2009 without bringing it to the attention of the voting members in convention?  Did they notify anyone else - say, the directors of the corporation - of the problems with the Articles of Incorporation?  And why would they change the phrase "without authorization by its voting members" (present in the valid 1966 articles and repeated in the invalid 2007 articles) to "without a specific vote by the corporation's voting members" in the invalid 2009 articles?

If the officers of the corporation were contemplating the sale of ULC ("1101 University Avenue SE, Minneapolis, Minnesota") without the approval of their voting members as early as the 2006 convention, why would they not openly and honestly ask to correct these problems with the Articles of Incorporation to allow them to do so?  Why file what appear to be cosmetic amendments to the articles in 2009, when they could have explained the problems to the voting members at that year's convention and asked them to correct them?  And why file an entire set of "restated and amended articles" in 2007 without presenting them before or after to the voting members in convention in 2006 or 2009?

Are These Articles Valid, Part 4: How do you "restate" something never stated?

For those who are new to this blog, this is not a philosophical question.  We're going through, in several posts, the "nuts and bolts" of the decision of the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod to sell the campus ministry properties in Mankato and Minneapolis.  Our focus has been on the Minnesota South District's own Articles of Incorporation which question if the officers of the corporation (Directors, President, and others) have ignored, violated - or even fabricated - the corporation's own governing documents.  This post concentrates on the "Amended and Restated Articles of Incorporation" filed by the District President in 2007.

Earlier posts have pointed out how the 2007 and 2009 amendments to the articles fail to meet the corporation's own standards and process for amendment, spelled out in Article IV.  But in 2007 we see the condition of invalidity brought to an even greater level (or depth, in this instance).

So the short answer to the question is, "You can't.  You have to state the thing first."

So how do you do this?

This is from page 1 of the 2007 articles filed for record with the Secretary of the State of Minnesota.  Then follow all the proposed article changes going back to the last valid Articles of Incorporation filed for record in 1966.  Among the many other problems with this document we can add the word "RESTATED".  It is impossible to "restate" articles that have never been "stated" with the secretary previously.  As demonstrated in an earlier post, the corporation filed no changes in their articles from 1966 until this interesting attempt in 2007.  Only articles that have already been validly and properly filed can be "restated", and that is done to aggregate several different sets of amendments into one document with the state government.

At the very least, this creates a mess.  The only articles that can be restated are the ones that were correctly filed in 1963 and correctly amended and filed in 1966.  Any proposed article changes from 1966 to 2007 cannot be restated, because they were never stated (filed for record).  The only valid amendments that could be filed would be those approved "by two-thirds majority of the delegates voting on said amendment, certified by the presiding officer, verified by the secretary of the corporation and recorded with the secretary of the State of Minnesota, according to law."

The problems multiply, because there are, logically, a limited number of options:

1. The only articles that can be restated are those already stated in 1963 and 1966.

2. The only amendments that can be filed for record are the those certified by the presiding officer.

3. The only amendments that this District President can verify are those after 1991, when he became the presiding officer.

4. The District President claims in his sworn affidavit in 2007, and again in 2009, that he has "the authority to sign this document on behalf of the corporation".

5. The only authority the District President can have in this case is from the Articles of Incorporation themselves when he is the "presiding officer" at a meeting to certify the amendment ("certified by the presiding officer", Article IV).

6. Unless he can demonstrate otherwise from the articles or some action by the voting members, his sworn affidavit is, at best, incorrect.

7. The last amendments "verified by the secretary of the corporation" were in 1966, which verification is lacking from the attempted filings for record in 2007 and 2009.

And, of course, all the other defects pointed out in previous posts.

Are These Articles Valid, Part 3: 1974 and Other Disasters

In the previous posts we examined the various difficulties with the Articles of Incorporation for the Minnesota South District filed for record in 2007 and 2009, and why the Articles previously filed in 1966 may be the only valid articles for the corporation to date.  In this post, we consider why many changes to their Articles of Incorporation made over 40 years were never "recorded with the Secretary of State of Minnesota, according to law", which is a requirement of Article IV, and why the articles filed for record in 2007 and 2009 also fail to meet the corporations own standard for validity.

Let's start with the obvious: the documented and bizarre fact that for over 40 years, 3 (or possibly 4) District Presidents of the corporation did not file a single change in amendments with the Secretary of the State of Minnesota.  So why was this?

One possible explanation is that during this period of four decades, changes in Articles that were approved by the voting members in Convention appear to be recorded in the corporation's own Handbook.  The officers of the corporation, including the District President, may have assumed that since the changes in Articles were included (incorrectly) in the Handbook, they had already been certified, verified, and correctly filed for record with the Secretary of State.

If so, the next question would be why this was overlooked for some 40 years, especially since Article IV is clear on the necessity of certification being done by the "presiding officer" at the convention(s) which made the changes in articles?

It becomes more puzzling because on at least one occasion, the corporation filed a change of registered address with the Secretary of State:

President Cloeter and Secretary Bailey did exactly what good officers of a corporation should do: they asked their board to move, pass and approve an authorization to file for record with the Secretary of State a change in address.  They do not act on their own authority, or arrogate to themselves an authority they do not have, or fictitiously create an authority to "sign this document on behalf of the corporation".  They ask the board of directors of the corporation.

This is followed by the a notarized change of address:

And finally it is recorded by the Department of State:

This does not explain why the amendments to articles were not validly made over a 40 year period, but it does demonstrate that the corporation was at least aware that some kind of filing was required with the Secretary of State ("Department" here).

Another explanation may come from the conventions themselves, and in particular, the convention from 1974.  The Convention Manual for 1974 proposed 36 changes to the Handbook on pages 65-75.  Two of these were proposed changes to the Articles of Incorporation.  The first proposed reading was to Article III, Section 3. Duties of Officers, d), 6.:

The second proposed change to the Articles of Incorporation was reading 25 on page 71:

This is the "restrictive article" from the 1966 Articles of Incorporation that reserves to the voting members the authority to sell "1101 University Avenue S.E.", or ULC.

So we can be assured this amendment, reading 25, was (1) presented correctly and in a timely manner, (2) passed with the requisite vote, (3) was properly certified by the presiding officer of the 1974 Convention, (4) verified by the secretary of the corporation, and (5) filed according to law with the Secretary of the State of Minnesota.

Except we can't.  Earlier posts have demonstrated that 3, 4 and 5 did not occur.  And from the 1974 Convention Proceedings, it is difficult to determine with confidence if 1 and 2 happened.  Here's how the Convention Proceedings from 1974 records the action taken on these 36 proposed changes to the Handbook for the first reading on page 21:

Other proposed changes are listed by recording an action of the convention, for example on page 22 with two proposed deletions to the bylaws:

This continues until page 24, when we find this:

Unlike the other deletions, the convention action is not explicitly stated for the "restrictive article" which requires the voting members to authorize the sale of ULC.  The deletion possibly did pass, but it is strange that no convention action is explicitly recorded, or even the past tense, "deleted".

Finally we come to the end of the proposed readings where we find this on page 26:

The last sentence is problematic, because the beginning of the section on Handbook changes reads:

"Rev. Bernard Johnson, Chairman of the Handbook Committee, presented the proposed Handbook changes to the Convention.  The following changes were adopted:" (see above)

But at the end of the section, listing all 36 readings, we have this sentence:

"After some discussion this proposed reading was referred back to the Handbook Committee." 

So what was "referred back" to the Handbook Committee?  Was it the entire reading of all the changes, or just the change proposed in reading 36?  To add further ambiguity, there are no vote totals recorded.  If the phrase "two-thirds" majority in Article IV means that changes to articles requires two-thirds, then it is possible that the by-law changes passed by a required simple majority, but reading 25 failed to receive the required two-thirds majority.

Given this confusion, the presiding officer (President Lieske) and the secretary may have been unable to verify, certify and then file these two changes to the articles with the Secretary of State.  Or the Handbook Committee needed more time to rework the Handbook because the items had been "referred back" to them, and by the time they finished their work, no one bothered to file the two articles of incorporation that had been amended.

Or all of these changes passed with the required majority, and the presiding officer (or the secretary of the corporation) simply decided not to certify, verify and file these changes with the Secretary of State.

Whatever the reason, the result is the same: these two changes to the Articles of Incorporation were never "certified by the presiding officer, verified by the secretary of the corporation. and recorded with the Secretary of the State of Minnesota according to law."

So did the attempt to file amended and restated articles in 2007 and 2009 "fix" this?  Since both of these filings are failed and invalid in their own right, it is difficult to imagine how this could be.  Neither of these filings were "verified by the secretary of the corporation".  They were both filed with a sworn affidavit that incorrectly states that the District President has "the authority to sign this document on behalf of the corporation", which he does not.  And both lack the certification "by the presiding officer", which President Seitz could have done only for those article changes after 1991, and not for amendments to articles done earlier, such as these two in 1974.

How could this have been avoided?  The most obvious way would have been for the presiding officers at the conventions from 1969 to 1991 to have simply followed Article IV's requirements for amendments.  For some unknown reason, they did not.

Another option would have been for the presiding officer of the 2006 convention to have presented the restated and amended articles to that convention in their entirety and ask for them to be approved, as was done in 1963 and 1966.  The failure to do this is particularly odd, because presumably the 2006 convention would also have had a Handbook Committee.

The next option would have been for the presiding officer of the 2009 convention to do the above instead of presenting two changes to the articles which appeared to be cosmetic.  This is also odd, again, because there were other changes to articles that were presented to the convention.

Are These Articles Valid, Part 2: 1966 to 2007

In the previous post, we discussed the reasons why the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod may have filed for record invalid Articles of Incorporation with the Secretary of State.  We demonstrated from the publicly filed documents that it was impossible for the  officer of the corporation to be the presiding officer of meetings before 1990, and therefore impossible for him to certify the article changes to which he swore in 2007.  So what happens when an officer of a corporation gives the Secretary of State a sworn affidavit that is not true, valid, or correct?  In some cases, nothing.  The error (or in some cases incompetence or perjury) makes no practical difference.  If the corporation takes no action based on the invalid articles, or if their actions are permitted from the valid articles filed previously, then the error may never come to light.  Some diligent Secretary of State, or Attorney General or county prosecutor may see it differently, in which case bad things might happen.  But they usually don't have a lot of incentive to do this, especially when it comes to a non profit corporation.

But when the corporation does take action based on invalid articles, and the valid articles filed on record previously prohibit what they have done, then very, very bad things can happen.  And that is what appears to have happened when the Board of Directors of the Minnesota South District voted to sell University Lutheran Chapel in Minneapolis.

It's better to let you, the reader, see for yourself why this is so.  This is from page 4 of the Articles of Incorporation for the Minnesota South District from 1966:

Like the 1939 amended articles from the Minnesota District, their predecessor corporation, this appears to have the necessary elements described in Article IV "Amendments".  It could be more correct by including the phrase "presiding officer" (which Article IV requires) and the secretary could verify that he has examined the documents and has them in his possession.  But it would be fairly easy to determine that President Stahlke was the presiding officer, and Secretary Michael was also present, examined the documents, and has them in his possession.  And the published convention proceedings might determine all of the above (but not always; more on that in a later post).

And, of course, we have that last essential and necessary step mandated in Article IV: "and recorded with the Secretary of State of Minnesota, according to law".

So close enough; these Articles of Incorporation appear to be valid, legal and correct.  The 2007 articles... not so much, as demonstrated in the last post.

Why is this important (or, if you prefer, "What does this mean?"):

Here's why:

This is Article III, Section 3 "Duties of Officers", paragraph d 3 of the same 1966 Articles of Incorporation.  "[T]he Board shall have no authority to mortgage, encumber, sell or dispose of the Lutheran Student Center and Chapel, located at 1101 University Avenue SE, Minneapolis, Minnesota"... "Unless authorized by the voting members so to do".

In voting to sell University Lutheran Chapel, the Board of Directors of the Minnesota South District  acted on Articles of Incorporation that fail to meet the corporations own standard for validity, and which may have violated the law when filed for record.  To make the situation worse, the action they took violated the corporations valid articles previously filed for record in 1966.

They did this in September of 2011 after being asked repeatedly over several years by members of their own synod, pastoral conferences and sister district conventions to do exactly what their own articles required: to seek the authorization of the voting members in a district convention.

They persist in their refusal to stop and reverse themselves even after being made fully aware of all of this by University Lutheran Chapel's litigation.

And all of this was entirely avoidable.  More on that in the next post.

Are these Articles of Incorporation Valid? (Part 1)

Since this site is called "Friends of ULC", we do what we can to help ULC, that is, University Lutheran Chapel of Minneapolis.  In the last few weeks that means following the litigation begun by ULC against the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod.  In Minnesota, this is surprisingly easy to do.  There is an excellent website from which you can order all the documents filed by any corporation registered in Minnesota with the Secretary of State.  It's a bit more of an effort to get documents from civil actions, but that too can be easily done with the MNCIS system and a trip to the Court Administrator (in this case, for the 4th Circuit/Hennepin County).  Concordia Saint Paul has most of the convention workbooks and proceedings, and Concordia Historical Institute has all kinds of historical records and documentation.  And all of it is available to the public.

The Secretary of State has filings (which are usually for Articles of Incorporation, Amendments to Articles, and change in official address) for the Minnesota District for 1903, 1909, 1929, and 1939.  For the two successor districts, the Secretary has filings dated 1963 and 1966 for both Minnesota North and South, 1984 (Minnesota North) 2007 and 2009 (Minnesota South).  There are other filings for change in registered address, filings at the county level, but these cover the changes in Articles of Incorporation.

From 1903 to 2006, all three districts (the predecessor Minnesota District up to 1963, and Minnesota North and South from 1963) follow the same standard set out in their Articles as to how to amend them.  Here's an example from 1939:

This is the certification by the presiding officer of the regular meeting (convention): "I, J. C. Meyer, President of the District Synod of the Minnesota District of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio and other States, do hereby certify that I was the presiding officer of said body at the annual meeting of the said Synod held at the City of St. Paul, in the State of Minnesota on the 16th day of June, 1937, and that at said meeting a resolution was duly adopted of which and every part of which the foregoing is a true copy, and that I was the presiding officer at the successive regular session of said body held in said City of St. Paul on the 13th day of June, 1939, and that the identical resolution was re-adopted by said Synod at that time."

This is followed by the verification by the Secretary of the Corporation (in this case, the Minnesota District Synod):

"A. R. Streufert, being first duly sworn, deposes and says that he was the secretary of the District Synod of the Minnesota District of the Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Missouri, Ohio and other states at its regular meeting held at the city of St. Paul, Minnesota on the 16th day of June, 1937, and that he was also the secretary of said body at its successive regular meeting held on June 13th, 1939, in said city of St. Paul and as such secretary he entered and now has in his custody the record and minutes of the proceedings of said Synod, that the foregoing instrument is a copy of a resolution adopted by said Synod at the first meeting above referred to and readopted at the second meeting above referred to and entered into said record and minutes, that he has compared said copy with the original resolution and of the whole thereof, and the same conforms with said original entries."

Then comes the last step of the process to amend the articles of incorporation: The Secretary of State receives the examined resolution, certification and affidavit (in this case by the Attorney General) and completes the process by filing it for record:

The process over the years has become slightly modified from this, but these steps remain the same up until the present day: amendments to articles are presented in the proper amount of time (i.e, in the Convention Manual), they are voted on and the results are recorded (the Convention Proceedings), then the presiding officer at the meetings certifies, the secretary at the meetings verifies, and their affidavit is taken and examined and placed filed for record with the Secretary of State.

Minnesota North and Minnesota South still require this process, and the wording of their "amending" article remains very similar (North still requires two successive meetings for amendments to articles, South requires one).

Now consider the changes to the Articles of Incorporation in 2007 and 2009 made for the Minnesota South District:

Several things are striking about this document:

1. There is apparently no certification by the presiding officer and no verification by the Secretary.  There is only the sworn affidavit by the District President that "the foregoing is true and accurate and I have the authority to sign this document on behalf of the Corporation".

2. Prior to this date, the last amendments to the articles for the Minnesota South District recored with the Secretary of State was 1966.  The changes made in the articles over the intervening 41 years were never recorded with the Secretary by the presiding officers of those conventions (Lieske and Cloeter).

3. How could the District President first elected in 1990 be the presiding officer for conventions that occurred from 1967 to 1989?

4. How would that same District President be able to certify those amendments to the articles?

5. Why is there no verification by the Secretary of the Minnesota South District?

6. Why were these amendments filed in a year when there was no district convention (regular meeting)?

Two years later in 2009 we have something very similar:

This has many of the same problems as the 2007 document, and raises a number of additional questions:

1. Why file the Articles of Incorporation in their entirety (as "Amended and Restated" Articles) in 2007, a year in which there was no convention meeting, but in 2009, a year in which the convention did meet, only present to the convention a few cosmetic changes to the articles?

2. Why were only these cosmetic changes presented to the convention instead of asking them to vote on the entirety of the articles that were filed in 2007?  This would have allowed the actual presiding officer of that convention to certify the articles, and the secretary to verify them, two requirements of valid articles of incorporation.

All of which raises the question, are these Articles of Incorporation filed in 2007 and 2009 valid?  If not, then the last valid articles of incorporation are from 1966, and those articles require that the membership of the corporation (the Minnesota South District) must vote on the sale of "1101 University Avenue" (ULC).

More on that in the next post.

The Missions Committee Proposal from 2008 November

After we had suggested that there might be other ways to support campus ministry than by selling the campus ministry properties, we were asked if we were not being unfair.  Surely, we were asked, there must be some good in this proposal?  Fair enough, we thought, so we posted the task force report to let everyone evaluate on the merits.  Here it is below, in 5 .png pictures, one for each page.

A Solution for Funding Missions: Match Donations Dollar for Dollar

The genesis for Friends of ULC began way back in 2008, when the Missions Committee (or a task force thereof) of the The Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod suggested that the campus ministry properties in both Mankato and Minneapolis be sold in order to fund campus ministry.  If that sounds strange to you, you have a lot of company.  We also marveled at some of the other justifications that were offered for this novel approach to funding something by selling it.  "Ministry is not about brick and mortar", we were told.  Because we were cursed with too little imagination and too much memory, this was also puzzling.  You could also say that "Ministry is not about salaries, housing and benefits", but for some reason the committee did not recommend eliminating those things as well.

But instead of quibbling, we thought we would propose something that might work to preserve all of these things: matching donations dollar for dollar.

2008 December 9
Dear Friends of ULC,
It has taken us some time to digest the proposal passed by the Mission Committee, which is, apparently, that the buildings and property of the campus ministries at Mankato and Minneapolis be sold, and the proceeds be used to fund campus ministry and missions in the future. We would be eager to know more details about this proposal. In the meantime, we hope that our district might consider a different approach, one that we believe would have a great chance of success, would preserve, encourage and increase the base of support for all the mission and ministries of the district, and would also preserve and increase current and future sources of donations from the campus ministries of the district.
We were not part of the discussion or even the process that resulted in the recommendation of the mission committee, so our knowledge (as the Apostle Paul puts it) is “incomplete”.  We are still waiting for more concrete information, details and facts.  Once we get them, we will try to update and correct our information to you.  Here is what we can piece together: the mission committee has suggested to the Board of Directors of the Minnesota South District of the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod the possibility that they sell the property of two campus ministries, both of which (from the published figures) have weekly attendance at worship at just around 100 individuals each, and one of which generated last year over $100,000 in donations from its members, and possibly a significant amount in donations from the other. There are no mortgages, notes, or monthly payments outstanding on either property. The District derives rental income from at least one of these properties, and may be able to derive rental income from the other. From the publicly available figures we can find, it appears that the direct cost to the district of one campus ministry is somewhere between $150,000 and $200,000 and the other between $18,000 and $42,000.  These figures will be updated when we have more information.
The mission committee proposes to sell both properties, and place that money in a fund for campus ministry and “other missions”. We are unsure as to the nature of this fund. Would money be spent only from the interest and gains, and the principle remain untouched and accumulate over time? Would there be a set target of perhaps 4 or 5 percent spent each year of the balance, and what would be the detailed plan to invest the money? Would this money be restricted to a very specific purpose, or would “other missions” grow to take the largest part?
We would urge all of our friends to consider supporting a different approach, one that many granting agencies, non-profit organizations, and foundations use, and it has proven itself in many environments. It is simple, elegant, efficient and accountable. It is commonly called “matching funds”. The granting organization matches every dollar raised by the groups which it supports. And we in the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod have already been the recipient of a form of this funding, and it still is in use today by Thrivent (formerly AAL). It allows granting organizations to identify effective and viable recipient organizations, and it preserves capital assets.
Our enthusiasm for matching funds does not come from a belief that all missions should be self-supporting, or even “half” supporting. We would be delighted to see the District – and Synod – support an enormous level of outreach in keeping with the Word and the Sacraments as we have historically done, and we would be delighted if missions and ministries that could raise no donations of their own were fully supported by the District. Yet we must reluctantly conclude that, given this extraordinary proposal from the Mission Committee, these must be extraordinary times.
We would propose that the Minnesota South District match every dollar raised by a supported ministry, mission and campus ministry. We believe that this would have many, many advantages over selling the property of viable campus ministries:
Once the property is sold, there is no guarantee that the District would be in a better position to fund itself, much less campus ministry, beyond the first few years following the sale, and there is much evidence to suggest that this would not generate any greater amount of ongoing revenue. Just one example is the District's decision some years ago to reduce its giving to Synod from 60-65% to 50%. From that point on, the district has kept at least 25% more of donations it has received (from 40% to 50%). Yet we can only surmise from the Mission Committee's proposal that even this is not enough money for current levels of spending. If this is not correct, and the District does not need more money for missions and other work, we are at a loss as to why it would wish to sell property.Existing and viable campus ministries and congregations are far better able to generate donations that can match the District dollar for dollar. This can potentially greatly increase the ability of the District to support Word and Sacrament Ministry and outreach.Instead of a pie cut into many pieces, the District would have a “whole pie”, a larger amount of money which could then go to those missions and ministries which have demonstrated their viability.
We would like to assume, given the available information from the other supported missions of the District, that they too are generating a similar level of support as ULC. Given this, it would be necessary to set an upper limit of some kind for matching. Yet even this even this would be a blessing, because it would be further proof of how successful the District has been in its mission work.
University Lutheran Chapel thanks God and is extremely grateful for every penny received from all sources. We also realize that, like every mission of the Church, we exist solely because the faithful who have gone before us donated their time, talent, and treasure so that we might be able to proclaim and administer the Word and the Sacrament according to the doctrine and practice of Our Lord as our Church and Synod have historically proclaimed it through the centuries.
We thank you in advance for your consideration, and we hope you share these ideas with as many of our congregations and members as you can. We would like to do so as well, and we think that this has enormous potential.
God Bless you all, and we look forward to hearing from you soon.

Welcome to FriendsOfULC.blogspot.com!

After using Google Sites for some years, we've come to the conclusion that given the speed of events surrounding University Lutheran Chapel in Minneapolis, the best way to keep up is with a blog.  And so we did.

The title of this particular blog comes from the Collect of the Day, which is rendered in various ways from this basic prayer: "Lord, cause us to love what you have commanded, that we may inherit what You have promised."  You probably have heard, and prayed, better versions but that is the basic idea.

So please bear with us as we set up this site, and transfer over the material from www.FriendsOfULC.org.  At some point we hope to turn on reader comments when we have an acceptable use policy posted, and can check what's been posted before we publish.