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Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod Headquarters Library to Close

Budget woes will force the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod’s estimated 40,000-volume International Center library, used by 500 staff members at the church’s St. Louis headquarters, to close June 30. The position of librarian, currently held by Wendi Adams, will also be eliminated.

According to LCMS Director of Public Affairs David Strand, the closing means some 5,000 curriculum-collection items, such as Sunday School or vacation Bible-school materials, approximately 2,000 special-collection items, and 125,000 back issues of periodicals, will be redistributed to the church’s two seminaries in St. Louis and Fort Wayne, Indiana, and to the 10 church-operated college and university libraries. He told American Libraries April 25 that other parts of the collection will be transferred to the historical archives and some private collections will be returned to the original owners or their heirs.

“[The library] was deemed, apparently, more expendable at this time than some other key ministries of the operation,” Strand explained. He said staffers are “going to have to get adept at doing their research on the Internet and finding alternative means of finding information, which will not be as speedy or convenient.”

The April issue of the church’s newsletter, the Reporter, said that the amount of unrestricted International Center funding has dropped each year for more than a decade, and is expected to be smaller in the upcoming fiscal year.

Posted April 28, 2003.

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