Schaaf’s Kopf: Help For Debt…yeah right!
I recently read in our Lutheran Reporter and through an e-mail that the LCMS is now going to give aide to those church workers who are in debt. The e-mail subject said “Help for debt available”. I thought “Gee, maybe the LCMS is going to offer its church workers a little bit of funding to help retire some of their student-loan debts they recieved by going to a Synodical school in order to work for the church!” But then again I remembered its the LCMS…FAT CHANCE! All we are given is some gobbleygook that the Synod will now help counsel and aide church workers who are in debt (many up to their eyeballs). They are stressing the fact that they are graciously offering financial planning for the debt you racked up while studying to work for the church.
How did this debt come to be? Well, if you went to a Concordia University and didn’t have a scholarship you piled up the student debt there, and then if you decided that you wanted to preach the Word of God and administer the sacraments by going to seminary you piled the debt even higher. I know of some pastors out there with student loans in the $40-50,000 range and they are serving in small parishes who pay way below the standards. Of course they make a remark in this e-mail that “Its simply not about not gettting paid enough, its about planning out your finances accordingly”.
So if you arent’ getting paid enough as a pastor or school teacher at your church (something I am very grateful to not be faced with) then thats just tough luck, you need to budget out everything to accomodate the student loan debt you have incurred.
They are even talking about requiring seminarians to take a financial responsibility class as a requisite…”Nevermind taking that class on Hebrews or Systematics, you need to learn how to balance your checkbook this quarter first!” The article stated “We have recruited church workers with the observation that the money issues will take care of themselves. This approach can be harmful if it is not balanced with basic principles of financial literacy.”
Once again, the Synod passes the buck in my mind. The Synod was founded to simply start churches and seminaries and to support the training of pastors. But there again we are told by our great presidnet that “This isn’t your grandfather’s Synod anymore” and with this context nothing could be truer. The last I checked the Synod wants nothing to do with supporting seminary education.
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$30,000 and counting! Boy those synodical schools are great!