Some area Lutheran congregations are withholding financial support to the national Evangelical Lutheran Church in America while they explore their future in the ELCA.

Christ the King Lutheran Church in Newcastle, Wyo., quit sending money to ELCA headquarters in Chicago in September. Earlier this year, the small eastern Wyoming congregation voted to financially support the reform group, Lutheran Coalition for Renewal, which plans to reconfigure Lutheranism in North America because of the ELCA's recent vote to approve of homosexual clergy in committed same-sex relationships.

"In some ways we're a little bit ahead of the curve on this," said the Rev. John Hopper, pastor of Christ the King, a 300-member church that belongs to the South Dakota synod. After its members studied a draft of the Human Sexuality statement last year, Christ the King voted unanimously in January to align itself with Lutheran Coalition for Renewal - commonly called CORE - an umbrella group that formed in opposition to the proposed changes to ELCA policies and church teaching. In August, the ELCA churchwide assembly voted to change its rules regarding the ordination of gay church leaders. CORE condemned the ELCA vote as "heresy" that ignores scriptural truth and church teaching on homosexuality and marriage.

Immanuel Lutheran Church in Whitewood also stopped contributing to national church headquarters, and to the South Dakota ELCA synod, as well.

Immanuel's pastor, the Rev. David Baer, serves as a media specialist for CORE. Immanuel will hold those funds it would have sent to the synod and churchwide assembly in a separate account until the congregation can meet to decide how to handle its remaining mission funds for 2009, Baer said.

"It's a way for us to stay in the ELCA for now and yet be in protest of the August vote," Hopper explained.

Hoppper knows his church will be accused of being anti-gay but said for them, it is a question of being faithful to Scripture, not opposing homosexuals.

"Is Scripture the truth or not? For us, it's blessing that which is a sin," he said of the ELCA vote. "Sexual intimacy, as we see it, is scripturally between a man and a woman."

Hopper, three members of his church and about 40 other Lutherans from South Dakota were among the 1,200 Lutherans who attended CORE's meeting in suburban Indianapolis on Sept. 25 and 26. The convocation adopted a constitution and changed the group's name from Coalition for Reform to Coalition for Renewal. But its leaders stopped short of calling for congregations and individuals to immediately leave the ELCA.

Baer and the Rev. Wilbur Holz, pastor of Trinity Lutheran in Rapid City, attended the Indianapolis convocation. Baer said the action taken in Indianapolis is "leading to something new," but exactly what that is or what it will look like isn't known yet.

The Rev. Paull Spring, chairman of Lutheran CORE, describes it as a "free-standing synod for all faithful Lutherans" that would begin to do things which synods typically do, such as developing new congregations and providing resources for congregational life and theological education for pastors.

Bishop David Zellmer, the leader of the state's 250 ELCA congregations and their 122,000 members, characterized the Indianapolis convocation as taking a "wait-and-see attitude" that stopped well short of calling for a mass exodus from the ELCA. He called that a good sign for the synod.

No ELCA congregations in South Dakota have left the synod to date, but Zellmer expects there may be several who will eventually vote to do that. A Lutheran church in Canton recently took a vote on the issue, but the congregation, by a two-thirds vote, opted to stay with the ELCA denomination.

Zellmer, who is personally opposed to changes in the vote to change the ELCA's policy about homosexual clergy, was in Rapid City recently for the Bear Butte Conference pastors retreat, where there was "good conversation" about the changes to come.

"Are there going to be congregations that leave? Are there people who have left? Absolutely," Zellmer said. "We have people that are upset. I think that's very clear.

"But we have congregations that are actually excited about this vote," he said. "Not very many, but some. I still have to be bishop to all of them."

In Rapid City, Calvary Lutheran Church has not changed what it gives to the national church or the state synod, a spokesperson said. At South Canyon Lutheran Church, the church council passed a resolution allowing individuals to indicate that their tithes won't go to the churchwide assembly or the synod, or both. A small number of church members there are taking advantage of that option and their donations go into a separate fund that is directed to global missions or other programs, according to the Rev. Bruce Thalacker.

Zellmer has appealed to ELCA members to be faithful to the denomination while it develops new policies and rules in the coming months. That may happen as early as April 2010, when the Council of Bishops reviews new rules for ordination and blessing of same-sex unions to allow gay clergy to be in lifelong, recognized relationships.

Baer said some people were disappointed that CORE didn't move faster in Indianapolis to form a new church entity for them to transfer to. Instead, CORE leadership called another convocation for September 2010 and said it will "initiate conversations among the congregations and reform movements in Lutheran CORE and with Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ and other compatible churchly organizations, leading toward a possible reconfiguration of North American Lutheranism."

"A lot of people are looking for a way out," Baer said. "A lot of us are lost and stumbling in the dark."

He counts himself and his congregation among them but said he hasn't yet decided what he'll do. All Baer knows for sure is that "God is calling me" to work with CORE, but it still isn't clear whether or not CORE will become a church home for disaffected ELCA members like him.

"My leadership is sensing that we want to move away from the ELCA and out of it," Baer said.

Hopper said the mood in Indianapolis was mixed. Some people said "We're leaving; Is CORE the place to go?" Others were unresolved: "We don't know what we'll do yet."

His congregation is among the latter. "At least for now, we'll continue to stay with ELCA. We continue to look at it."

For Hopper and his flock at Christ the King, it's not as simple as joining another established Lutheran denomination, such as the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod or the Wisconsin Synod.

"That's not an option for us. We're not willing to go back in time," he said, references to women's ordination, which isn't allowed in those synods, and to the ELCA's long-standing welcoming of gays and lesbians as church members, if not rostered clergy.

"We have an open-door policy in our church," he said.

Neither does he want to see numerous new Lutheran denominations created as a result of CORE.

"We don't want 10 new denominations; that would be foolish," Hopper said.

Lutheran pastors that support CORE are still clergy in good standing with the ELCA, Zellmer said.

"I am in no way, shape or form upset with Dave Baer," Zellmer said.

But neither has Zellmer encouraged him to stay, Baer said.

"The bishop has seemed to say, if you want to leave, here's how to do it," Baer said. "I haven't had anyone strongly encourage me to stay."

Lutheran CORE will move ahead with its plans, regardless of what new policies the ELCA establishes in 2010, Baer said.

"The reality is that CORE is moving ahead, regardless of what the ELCA does," he said.

Contact Mary Garrigan at 394-8424 or mary.garrigan@rapidcityjournal.com