Q&A

Q&A with LCMS Chief Administrative Officer Felix Loc

Loc brings years of business experience and a love for his church to the position.

Story by Megan K. Mertz | Photography by Frank Kohn and Erik M. Lunsford | Winter 2024

Felix Loc

Felix Loc had a successful career in defined benefits — working for companies like Fidelity Investments, Willis Towers Watson and October Three Consulting — when he heard about a very different kind of job opening at The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS). With the upcoming retirement of Frank Simek, the LCMS was looking for its next chief administrative officer (CAO). Loc was intrigued. The position would allow him to combine his skills and experience in business with his love for his church. After a rigorous interview process, the LCMS Board of Directors offered Loc the position, and he moved from Keller, Texas, to St. Louis in July 2023.

How did you come into the LCMS?

A: I was born in Lima, Peru, and moved to Southern California when I was 5 years old. We were Roman Catholic, and my family later became big-box evangelical. When I graduated high school, I went to Baylor University in Waco, Texas, where I met my wife, Jessica. There, we found a Reformed pastor. That’s really where I started to engage in the real theological questions. A few years later, we moved to Albuquerque and found Grace Lutheran Church. Pastor Warren Graff was gracious and up to the task of answering our difficult questions.

Why were you interested in the CAO position?

A: In 2017, I was appointed to the Board of Regents of Concordia University Chicago. It gave me another perspective on serving the church and kickstarted my interest in finding more ways to serve. When I read the job description [for CAO], I thought it made sense for me.

What does the CAO do?

A: Everybody knows what the chief financial officer does, and many people have an idea about the chief mission officer. I fill in everywhere else in the left-hand kingdom. I’m the point of contact for anything legal, Synod-owned property and real estate, and any contractual engagements. I’m also convention manager, the liaison for the Synod’s Board of Directors, and I sit on various boards according to the Bylaws. It’s a very broad brush.

From your perspective, what is the role of corporate Synod?

A: I’ve always understood the concept to be fairly simple: to support the work needed to preach the Word and administer the Sacraments rightly. The way this naturally happens is through the family where kids grow up in a Lutheran church and are saved through their Baptism as an infant. The church as an institution is how one is sustained in the faith, and that builds outward. The Synod is the support system that unites the congregations to do this work. The word Synod means “walking together,” and I think the general consensus is that we’re also better together. As congregations have their own councils and boards to do the work locally, the Synod does the same thing at a broader level.

Do you have a favorite Bible verse?

A: It’s 2 Peter 1:16–21, especially verses 16 and 19: “We were eyewitnesses … and we have the prophetic word more fully confirmed, to which you will do well to pay attention as to a lamp shining in a dark place.” I’m not big on emotive experiences, and Peter, who probably had the greatest mountaintop experience ever [at the Transfiguration], says you can look to the Scripture. Whether at home, at church or here in the CAO’s office, that sureness is my compass.

Megan K. Mertz

Managing editor of Lutherans Engage the World and chief copy editor for LCMS Communications.