wfn.org | Lutheran Seminarians Address Plans for Full Communion

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ELCA NEWS SERVICE

June 25, 1999

LUTHERAN SEMINARIANS ADDRESS PLANS FOR FULL COMMUNION
99-163-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Seminarians at one school voted in favor; others
circulated a tract opposing a current proposal.  Students at the eight
seminaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) have
been studying two proposals for full communion which the ELCA Churchwide
Assembly will consider this August in Denver.
     The ELCA assembly will vote on "Called to Common Mission: A
Lutheran Proposal for a Revision of the Concordat of Agreement (CCM),"
which would establish a relationship of full communion with The
Episcopal Church.  The other proposal, "Following Our Shepherd to Full
Communion," would affirm full communion with the Moravian Church in
America.
     Full communion is a common confessing of the Christian faith; a
mutual recognition of Baptism and a sharing of the Lord's Supper,
allowing for joint worship and an exchangeability of members; a mutual
recognition and availability of ordained ministers to the service of all
members of churches in full communion, subject only but always to the
disciplinary regulations of the other churches; a common commitment to
evangelism, witness and service; a means of common decision making on
critical common issues of faith and life; and a mutual lifting of any
condemnations that exist between churches.
     Each ELCA seminary sponsored educational events for students to
examine and discuss the contents and implications of the ecumenical
proposals.
     "We wish to state our support for entering into full communion
with these church bodies," students at Lutheran Theological Southern
Seminary, Columbia, S.C., said in "United in Mind and Purpose," a
statement adopted 46 to 1 at an April 22 student body meeting.
     The Northern and Southern Provinces of the Moravian Church
approved full communion with the ELCA in separate votes in 1998.
     A round of Lutheran-Episcopal dialogues that began in 1983
developed a proposal for full communion between the two churches, "The
Concordat of Agreement," and issued it in 1991.
     A convention of the Episcopal Church approved the Concordat in
1997.  The proposal failed to win a two-thirds majority of the ELCA
assembly that year by six votes.  The assembly asked that the Concordat
be revised, taking its debate into account and clarifying the technical
language of the dialogue.  CCM was issued in November 1998 as that
revision.
     Lutherans and Episcopalians agree on the doctrine of "apostolic
succession," an ongoing faithful proclamation of Christ.  Episcopalians
bring to the relationship the "historic episcopate," a succession of
bishops as a sign of unity back to the earliest days of the Christian
church.
     Critics of CCM oppose the idea that the ELCA would incorporate the
historic episcopate.  The students at Southern Seminary said Lutherans
of the 16th century rejected the episcopate only because "in their day
the office of bishop was corrupt and an institution in need of reform."
     "The reformers would have kept the office if the bishops had been
faithful to their vows," the seminarians said.  "We do not believe that
bishops rage against the church any longer, and so we believe there is
merit to be found with the episcopacy."
     The students at Southern Seminary called on all ELCA members to
"pray that the invisible unity we already enjoy by virtue of our baptism
might become a visible unity at the table of our Lord."  They said the
divisions of the church contradict the gospel it preaches.
     "We wish for such unity and yet oppose Called to Common Mission
(CCM)," read a tract, "Three Honest Objections," circulated among
students at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minn.  Stephan K. Turnbull, a
member of Messiah Lutheran Church, Fairview Park, Ohio, finishing the
second of four years of seminary education, was the tract's primary
author with writing help of some fellow students.
  Turnbull said the tract did not attempt to represent the views of
the student body but did intend to give voice to those seminarians
opposed to the current proposal.  He said the tract received mixed but
mostly favorable attention.
  "We would like to take this opportunity to articulate three key
reasons why we simply cannot accept CCM as the means by which we achieve
full communion with the Episcopal Church," said the tract.  The search
for Christian unity has already been achieved in the gospel and
Sacraments, such unity leaves no need for bishops, and Lutherans should
not bind themselves to one permanent form of church governance, it said.
  Turnbull said students at Luther Seminary were not asked to sign
or vote on the tract.  The tract was distributed in campus mailboxes and
displayed with information about CCM's opposition.  Turnbull said he
also gave interested students information on supporting arguments for
CCM.

EDITORS: The full text of "Called to Common Mission" is located at
http://www.elca.org/ea/proposal/text.html
The full text of  "Following Our Shepherd to Full Communion" is located
at http://www.elca.org/ea/fostoc.html

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://listserv.elca.org/archives/elcanews.html