The split between WELS and the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod in 1961 was a difficult—but pivotal—time for the Wisconsin Synod.

Armin Schuetze was called to be pastor of Calvary, Thiensville, Wis., in 1938, a professor at Mobridge in 1948, and then a professor at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary in 1958. Now retired, he lives in Watertown, Wisconsin. What is his perspective on the split between the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS) and the Wisconsin Synod?

A long history

The differences between the two synods did not develop overnight. There was a long history of tension. Wisconsin Synod conventions during the 1940s and '50s were always marked with tension over the direction of the Missouri Synod. Some defended the LCMS, and others expressed concern. Of course, there were some within the LCMS that objected to the direction of their own synod and favored the objections raised by the Wisconsin Synod.

Schuetze remembers that the tension extended to the relationship between congregations of the two synods at least in the Milwaukee area. Earlier, pastors of LCMS congregations would be invited to Wisconsin Synod churches to preach, and Wisconsin Synod pastors were invited to LCMS congregations. Such pulpit exchanges became rare in the early 1950s.

At the 1955 Wisconsin Synod convention, Schuetze was on the floor committee that was to prepare a resolution for the synod to discuss. Committee members spent almost all of their time in committee meetings while the convention was in session. Finally they prepared a resolution that included a preamble and two resolutions. The preamble outlined the situation that existed between the two synods and stated that the time was right to suspend fellowship. The first resolution then suspended fellowship with the LCMS. But the second resolution proposed that the synod not vote on the first resolution until a recessed convention in the following year, 1956.

Because the LCMS held its conventions every three years and the Wisconsin Synod every two years, Schuetze explained that the reason for the committee's dual resolution was to give the LCMS an opportunity to respond. However, some on the 1955 committee were not in favor of the second resolution.

As it turned out, the synod accepted the report of the floor committee that meant a delay on the vote to suspend fellowship. Sadly, Schuetze remembers, Prof. E. Reim for the first time offered to resign his position as president and professor of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary because he felt that the synod had repudiated his leadership. Yet he was encouraged to wait.