Lutheran Church Missouri Synod

The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS) is a traditional, confessional Lutheran denomination in the United States. With 2.3 million members, it is both the eighth largest Protestant denomination and the second-largest Lutheran body in the U.S. after the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The Synodwas founded at Chicago, Illinois, in 1847 by German-American immigrants. The LCMS is headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri.

Approximately half of the LCMS members are located in the Upper Midwest, although it is represented in all 50 U.S. states, and is affiliated with other Lutheran sister churches worldwide. It also has several congregations in Ontario and one in Quebec that remained with the LCMS after most of the Synod’s Canadian congregations formed the autonomous Lutheran Church–Canada in 1988. The LCMS is divided into 35 districts—33 geographic and two (the English and SELC) non-geographic districts. The current president is the Rev. Matthew C. Harrison, who took office on September 1, 2010.