wfn.org | Emerging Ethical Issues Seem Overwhelming in a Rapidly Changing

["Frank Imhoff" <Frank_Imhoff@elca.org>]

Emerging Ethical Issues Seem Overwhelming in a Rapidly Changing World 
LWF Study Team Considers Lutheran "Grammar" to Engage Current Ethical
Topics

NUREMBERG, Germany/GENEVA, 30 July 2004 (LWI)  - Emerging ethical
issues are disrupting what had been considered stable ways of life,
according to Asian and African Lutherans who recently shared their
concerns with the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Department for
Theology and Studies (DTS) study team on intercultural ethical
deliberation. In their local contexts, they say, the issues create a
sense of being overwhelmed by what is occurring in a rapidly changing
world.

Members of the DTS study team on intercultural ethical deliberation,
who convened for their second international meeting 19-24 July in
Nuremberg, Germany, met one evening with members of Asian and African
LWF member churches participating in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
Bavaria Division for World Mission summer school. Rev. Sivin Kit from
Malaysia expressed their great interest in the study process and
anticipated results. 

Acknowledging that moral life is lived out through deliberation with
others, the study team, comprising ethicists from Brazil, China (Hong
Kong), Germany, Hungary, South Africa, Sweden and the United States,
welcomed the opportunity to discuss emerging ethical issues with the
intercultural group. 

In other study sessions papers presented by the team members, as
expected, provoked intense deliberation. "How topics such as democracy,
property, genetically-modified foods, education, or sexuality are viewed
from African, Central Eastern European, or Asian cultural perspectives
can be quite diverse," observed Rev. Dr Karen Bloomquist, DTS director
and responsible for the study, "yet interesting convergences also began
to emerge at this meeting."

Noting diverse perspectives, Dr Yuen Waiman, professor at Lutheran
Theological Seminary in Hong Kong, observed, "What might be seen by a
German as provocative is for a Chinese Christian a matter of realistic
survival." Convergence was suggested when Dr Andras Csepregi of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Hungary asked, "How can freedom and
community coexist in places such as Hungary, or Hong Kong?" 

In its deliberations, the study team considered how pre-modern, modern
and late modern perspectives on ethical matters come together in complex
ways in today's globalized world, so that it seems that we are living
"in many worlds." "Nevertheless, it is God's one world," insisted Bishop
Dr Moeahabo Phillip Moila of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Southern
Africa.

To engage current ethical topics and challenges emerging in differing
contexts, the study team considered a so-called Lutheran "grammar,"
which includes familiar emphases, such as vocation, but also new
emphases, such as global citizenship. The need to correct what have been
misuses of the Lutheran tradition, was expressed by Professor Dr Hans G.
Ulrich of Erlangen University, Germany, and Rev. Dr Wanda Deifelt of the
Evangelical Church of the Lutheran Confession in Brazil.

The study team's final meeting is scheduled for March 2005 in South
Africa. The working title for the anticipated publication presenting the
study's results is, "Ethics at the Intersections of God's World." (489
words) 

[The LWF is a global communion of Christian churches in the Lutheran
tradition. Founded in 1947 in Lund (Sweden), the LWF now has 136 member
churches in 76 countries representing 62.3 million of the almost 66
million Lutherans worldwide. The LWF acts on behalf of its member
churches in areas of common interest such as ecumenical and inter-faith
relations, theology, humanitarian assistance, human rights,
communication, and the various aspects of mission and development work.
Its secretariat is located in Geneva, Switzerland.)

[Lutheran World Information (LWI) is the LWF's information service.
Unless specifically noted, material presented does not represent
positions or opinions of the LWF or of its various units. Where the
dateline of an article contains the notation (LWI), the material may be
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