Reformed groups within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have joined forces to battle what they call the “liberal take-over” of a church they say has lost sound theological teaching and direction.

“We’re going to be working together in every possible way to bring about change,” said Mark Chavez, director of the conservative Word Alone Network. “Basically our goal is to change the course of the denomination and change the leadership.”

Some 250 representatives from over a dozen reformed groups within the ELCA gathered in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota from Nov. 6-8 to “come to an understanding on working together for the common good.”

Conservatives in historic mainline denominations have long grumbled against what they call a “liberal take-over” of the churches’ leadership since the early 20th century.

According to statistics, in the ELCA, the United Methodist Church and the Presbyterian Church U.S.A. – America’s largest Lutheran, Methodist, and Presbyterian denominations respectively – the people at the pews are notably more conservative than those serving in leadership positions.

The issue of homosexual ordinations is a case in point. Polls taken in all three churches show that compared to pastors or theologians, a larger majority of laymen believe the homosexual lifestyle is incompatible to the gospel.

But beyond the obvious scuffles over sexuality, conservatives say there are deeper, theological problems at the core. “It’s about the centrality of Christ and the authority of Scripture,” said Chavez. “That’s where it all starts.”

At that end, Chavez said the Coalition for Reform will rally around larger issues on interpreting scripture and maintaining a missions-oriented mindset. They will also address the possible adoption of a new gender-neutral worship book that removes references to God in the male form.

“The renaming of God is just a direct assault on the orthodox faith and the church,” he added.

This new coalition will be bounded by a common confession of faith, and marks the first time reformed leaders officially joined together to bring about wide-scale, fundamental changes.

“This is definitely the first time,” said Chavez. “I know in mainline denominations, it’s been hard to pull these reformed groups together, and I’m really encouraged and hopeful that we got a good beginning at this conference.”

Differences still remain within the conservative circle on “non essentials,” such as understanding ecclesiology (the make-up of the church), the role of bishops and the importance of ecumenical relations.

But as for now, the coalition will focus on “the essential matters that threaten the ELCA” and plan how to literally “take over the leadership.”

“One by one we will get people that are more faithful to the orthodox faith of the church to get elected and appointed,” said Chavez. “We’re kind of limited and we look at this as a long term project, but its comforting to know that we’re in this together.”

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>>Conservative Lutherans Prepare Large-Scale ‘Coalition for Reform’ (Christian Post, 051104)

WASHINGTON – Conservatives in the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination may set aside minor doctrinal differences and form a coalition for large-scale reform within a church they say has lost sound theological understanding.

The Word Alone Network, a grouping of more than 200 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) congregations and 70 regional chapters, will be meeting with other orthodox fellowships next week to “come to an understanding on working together for the common good.”

“We’re going to see if we’re able to work together to change the denomination and turn it around,” said Jaynan Clark Egland, president of Word Alone.

The “Coalition for Reform,” as it is unofficially called, will be meeting in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota from Nov. 6-8, and will draw representatives from organizations such as Solid Rock Lutherans and Lutherans Reform! – a regional group based in Pennsylvania.

This will not be the first time confessing Lutherans would be working together for a common goal. Solid Rock Lutherans, for example, was specifically created by various groups and individuals who sought to prevent changes to the current standards on sexuality and ordination in the ELCA; the church prohibits the ordination of active homosexuals and forbids the blessing of same-sex marriages.

However, it may mark the first time the groups agree on adopting an official statement of creed and faith.

“This will be a prototype breaching across different groups on the basis of a common confession of the Word Alone Network,” Egland said. “These are the main points of orthodox Lutheran Christian belief.”

In the past century, liberal and moderate leaders have piloted America’s historic mainline denominations, leading everything from mission agencies to theological seminaries. Pockets of conservative believers have always existed within these churches, but it wasn’t until about 30 years ago that official renewal groups began taking form.

Conservative Coup d’état

In some instances, such as the “conservative resurgence” of the Southern Baptist Convention 25 years ago, these confessing Christians succeeded in launching a coup d’état that overthrew liberal leadership in nearly all branches of ministry.

Still, others have not been as successful.

“It’s not possible to generalize all mainline churches,” explained Mark Tooley, a director at the Institute for Religion and Democracy and vocal critic of liberalism. “If you look at the Episcopal Church, for example, conservatives obviously lost and they are now trying to formulate a new communion.”

However, Tooley said there is one thing that can be generalized: “liberalism within mainline churches has been declining in influence and authority for the last 40 years.”

This may be true at least in Tooley’s denomination, the United Methodist Church (UMC). The top court of the UMC – which trails the Southern Baptists as the second largest US-based denomination – just last week handed down a series of verdicts related to homosexuality and the rights of gays and lesbians in the church.

The Council members sided with conservatives in all these cases, including a case involving a Virginia pastor who was forced to take a leave of absence for refusing membership to a homosexual man. The court reinstated the pastor, Ed Johnson, on the basis that pastors do have the right to choose who can be a member of the local church.

Down the Wrong Road?

According to Jim Winkler, the General Secretary of the UMC General Board of Church and Society, this ruling sends the denomination “down the wrong road.” [comments by Kwing Hung: someone due for harsh judgment from God]

“We will be on the road down to the take-over of our denomination similar to that of the Southern Baptist Convention 30 years ago,” said Winkler, whose group advocates for the full inclusion of gays and lesbians into the UMC.

Tooley does not believe such a sudden “take-over” will occur in his church. However, he said, “In another 20 years or so, it may be realized.”

Overcoming Internal Differences

As for the ELCA, renewal groups still have some bumps to work out before seeing significant changes. According to Egland, there are still many disagreements among conservatives over the understanding ecclesiology (the make-up of the church), the role of bishops and the importance of ecumenical relations.

“These are all differences that existed within Lutheranism for quite some time,” said Egland. “We have our disagreements, but it’s a matter of coming to understand that we actually have more in common with each other than those differences.”

The main commonalities are a high regard for the Bible and a desire to maintain Scriptural authority — points, they agree, that are currently missing in the ELCA leadership.

“There is a line that connects all the problems the church has,” said Egland. “Once you start going lukewarm and selling out on Jesus, it changes everything.”

Such changes range from “the way you worship” to the “way you understand marriage and homosexuality,” she said. “It even affects the way you make your decisions on a day-to-day basis.”

Ultimately, Egland said, the goal of the proposed “Coalition for Reform” is to change the church from its leadership and bring it “back to its roots.”

“Do I think it’s possible?” she asked. “Yes, I’m hopeful.

“I think if we can just decide to join in what we have in common instead of nipping over our differences, we can get the ELCA back on track to being faithful.”

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>>ELCA Allows Gay Unions, Rejects Gay Clergy (Christian Post, 050813)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America voted Friday to allow the blessing of same-sex unions under certain circumstances but rejected a recommendation to ordain non-celibate gay clergy.

After hours of heated debate and discussion over the wording of the two controversial recommendations, members of the ELCA Churchwide Assembly voted 670-323 to approve the measure on same-sex unions.

The recommendation does not officially change the denomination’s stance on gay marriage. Instead, it urges members to abide by a 1993 statement that prohibits same-sex unions and allows “pastoral care” to same-sex couples. The vague wording of this statement has been interpreted as allowing for exceptions to the prohibition.

“The blessings door has been swinging back and forth in the ELCA, perhaps since 1993. This assembly has propped the door open firmly. By what authority can the ELCA bless homosexual relationships? Scripture clearly doesn’t authorize sex outside of marriage,” said Rev. Jaynan Clark Egland, president of the conservative WordAlone network, in a press statement.

Both opponents and proponents of blessing same-sex unions tried and failed to get the resolution more specific. And after several hours of votes, assembly adopted one slight change that made the wording even more ambiguous; the amended recommendation dropped the reference to giving pastoral care to “same-sex couples” and in its place included “all to whom [pastors] minister.”

Egland said this amendment does not change the recommendation’s openness to same-sex blessings.

Later in the day, the assembly voted 490 to 503 against a resolution that would give exceptions to the no non-celibate gay clergy rule. It would’ve taken a two-thirds majority to pass.

Conservatives applauded the vote.

“Thankfully, at least the assembly didn’t disregard the authority of God’s Word concerning the standards for church leaders,” said Egland.

However, pro-gay members, wearing rainbow sashes and white T-shirts, filed to the front of the ballroom and stood in front of the podium in protest.

Both proposals came out of recommendations from a Studies on Sexuality task force that was assigned four years ago to find out the role of homosexuality in the church. The third recommendation that called for unity in the church despite differences passed nearly unanimously at 851 to 127.

The debates on homosexuality were the most anticipated at the ELCA churchwide assembly, which is meeting in Orlando, Fla., from Aug. 8-14. Proponents of homosexuality hoped the church would follow in the direction of more liberal counterparts, such as the United Church of Christ that last month adopted a policy statement equating gay marriage to traditional marriage. Conservatives hoped the church would turn back to the traditional understanding of scripture that views homosexuality as sin.

However, in essence, the votes made no real change in ELCA policy. Current policy expects ministers – both homosexual and heterosexual - to refrain from sexual relations outside marriage, which it defines as “a lifelong covenant of faithfulness between a man and a woman.”

At a news conference after the voting, Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson said he knew “however the vote turned out, some would be disappointed.” But he added that he “hopes that those disappointed in the votes would not sever their relationship with the church or step back” from their involvement.

I hope that “everyone hears it clearly — all week as we have discussed publicly and clearly — that gay and lesbian persons are welcome in this church,” he said.

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>>ELCA Recommendations on Homosexuality: A Dangerous Prescription for a Slow and Painful Death (Christian Post, 050811)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America may become the next church to allow the ordination of self-affirming homosexuals and the blessing of same-sex unions, pending the upcoming votes at the denomination’s church-wide assembly this Friday.

Statistics show most members of the ELCA, like most American Christians in general, oppose both openly gay priests and gay unions. But sadly, the denomination as a whole may officially give its stamp of approval to such acts.

There is much to be said regarding “the issue” that has nearly split the Anglican Church, the Presbyterian Church U.S.A., and the United Methodist Church, to name a few.

However, in the case of the Lutherans, the most frustrating thing is not the moral repercussions of gay sex for the church’s supposed pulpit protectors. Rather, it’s that most ELCA members – including many who will be voting this Friday – will not even know what they are backing, since the wording and intent of those resolutions are so contradictory and vague.

In essence, the first recommendation on “the issue” urges the church to stick together despite difference. The second one says the church should abide by a 1993 Bishops Statement that tells its members to not endorse homosexual unions. However, at the same time, the recommendation leaves a crack open for ultra-liberal interpreters of the statement to bless gay lovers under the guise of “pastoral care and responsibility.”

The third – and most confusing – recommendation keeps intact the church’s ban on self-affirming, sexually active priests. But in cases where the candidate is faithful to his or her lover, exceptions will be made, since homosexuality, after all, is only bad when it involves many lovers – or so the argument goes. In addition, there will be no policing going on in the ELCA and Bishops won’t carry around big sticks to make sure the candidate really is faithful to just one partner.

The point is, the recommendations are so confusing, neither activists on the left nor right are supporting it. Even Judy Biffle of Houston, a member of the church council that approved the recommendations, admitted the statements are “ambiguous somewhat intentionally,” and Margaret Payne, who led the sexuality task force, said the whole issue became “are we going to work it out together or split?”

In other words, the recommendations are nothing more than a watered-down, middle-way attempt to sacrifice Scripture and clarity for unity. But what good is unity if everyone is blind, fighting, and unaware?

When the recommendations come up to the floor this week, voting members of the Lutheran Church should tell the denominational heads to address the issue, face-front. The recommendations must be amended to say one thing or another – is the ELCA in favor of gay marriages and ordinations or in support of the Scriptures? If it is that the church will follow the doomed path of the United Church of Christ or the United Church of Canada, there is nothing more to be said that has not already been spoken.

Contrary to what the leadership is thinking, the middle ground is not a safe place to be. When waves come, you should either head for land or for the ocean – not waddle in the sand, waiting to die, slowly and painfully. Therefore, voting members must demand of their leaders greater clarity in thought and wording and amend the middle-way recommendations before the historic ELCA finds itself stuck in the sand.

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>>The Lutheran Sexuality Report—Denominational Disaster (Christian Post, 050418)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America [ELCA] Church Council released its recommendations to the denomination’s Churchwide Assembly on issues related to sexuality on April 11, 2005, setting the stage for what promises to be one of the most acrimonious debates ever conducted by a denominational organization.

The recommendations came on the heels of two reports issued by theologians on both sides of the controversy. In the end, the Church Council went in another direction entirely, rejecting the recommendations from its “Task Force for Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Studies on Sexuality,” released in January. That report called for the church to adopt what amounts to a “local option” policy, permitting local churches to violate the church’s standards for ministers without penalty. In essence, this recommendation amounted to an acknowledgement that the ELCA is so polarized on the issue of homosexuality that an honest compromise is impossible. Honesty and integrity would have required the denomination to take official action, either to allow the ordination of practicing homosexuals or to exclude practicing homosexuals from the ministry. After years of study, the church’s task force recommended that the church maintain its policy explicitly prohibiting the ordination of practicing homosexuals, but allow churches to disobey and violate the policy without penalty or disciplinary procedures. In other words, this mainline Lutheran denomination attempted to adopt a ministerial form of the Pentagon’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

On March 1, seventeen ELCA theologians issued “A Statement of Pastoral and Theological Concerns,” calling on the church to reject the recommendations from the task force. “We urge that all three recommendations of the task force be rejected since, if adopted, they would alter fundamentally the ecclesiology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and that, in turn, would threaten not only the unity and stability of this church but, as a consequence, its ability to proclaim the truth of the gospel.”

These seventeen theologians, including well-known figures such as Carl Braaten, Robert W. Jenson, Hans J. Hillebrand, and Jean Bethke Elshtain, saw the task force’s recommendations as calling for the church to adopt a position of compromise that lacked all integrity. Specifically, they warned that the recommendation that the church ignore clear violations of its ministerial standards “threatens to destabilize the unity and constitution, as well as the historical, biblical, and confessional teachings and practice of this church.” Furthermore, the theologians argued that the third recommendation, taken seriously, nullified the integrity of the entire report. They identified the report’s recommendation of “no change in policy” while it suggested what amounted to a major shift in policy, was “the most conspicuous logical inconsistency.”

These seventeen theologians accused the task force of recommending that the denomination should substantially surrender its authority in establishing credentials for ministers, thus abdicating “its theological and moral constitutional responsibility.” The theologians also protested the task force’s understanding of conscience, asserting that the task force understood conscience only in a subjective sense. This subjective understanding of “conscience” is in direct violation of what Scripture and Martin Luther taught, “thus misrepresenting both.” As the theologians’ statement clarified: “For Luther, the holy and righteous conscience of the Christian must agree with God’s Word; an erring conscience, separated from Scripture, can react only in accordance with selfish desires resulting from weakness in faith.” That strong statement should be heard by all those who cite “conscience” as license for rejecting or violating the clear teachings of Scripture. These theologians are absolutely correct in their insistence that conscience must be, as Luther clearly understood, bound by the Word of God.

Similarly, the theologians insisted that the term “pastor” is always associated with “the standard of sound teaching” in Scripture. The teaching of every pastor must be tested by Scripture, and “pastoral concern” must be based upon the faithful application of scriptural teaching.

Finally, “For the reasons given we urge that all three recommendations of the Task Force be rejected since, if adopted, they would alter fundamentally the ecclesiology of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and that, in turn, would threaten not only the unity and stability of this church but, as a consequence, its ability to proclaim the truth of the Gospel.”

On April 6, a group of more liberal theologians responded with a call for the task force’s recommendations to be adopted. According to this statement, the theologians “represent a variety of perspectives and methodologies in our approaches to the questions of sexuality, ethics, theology, and ecclesiology.” These theologians acknowledged that some “would have wished for greater welcome of gays and lesbians while others are more cautious.” In the end, this more liberal group urged the denomination to adopt the task force report as “a much-needed and faithful compromise in the life of our church.”

Within days, 85 theologians had signed the liberal statement, arguing that disagreements over sexuality “do not threaten the unity of the gospel.” These theologians urged their denomination to accept the compromise proposed by the task force in order to allow the church further time to consider the question of homosexuality. Of course, this would mean the ordination and acceptance of some active homosexuals as ministers of the church, meaning that, in all reality, the denomination had made a decision to accept homosexual ministers, while lacking the courage to do so in a straightforward manner.

The ELCA Church Council, meeting April 9-11, chose to propose a very different form of compromise to the denomination. The group forwarded a report recommending “a limited process for exceptions to the normative policies of this church regarding the rostering of gay and lesbian people in committed, same-sex relationships.” The group claimed that its proposal “holds the promise of enabling this church to continue to journey together faithfully for the sake of the mission of this church.”

In substance, the recommendation calls upon the church to allow “exceptions” to its policy against the ordination of practicing homosexuals. In its description of the process, the Church Council stated that persons considered for such an exemption must meet all other policies of the church, “except for being in a committed, same-sex relationship.” The recommended policy would call for “a reasonable assumption or confirmation that a congregation or other ministry will extend or continue a call to the person being continued for an exception,” and would require the local bishop, if in support of such an exception, to seek endorsement by the “Synod Council.” That group, if responding positively to the exception, would then make a request to the denomination’s Conference of Bishops. The minister granted such an exception is also protected from any future discipline “by a subsequent bishop and/or council making a decision on the same set of facts.”

The Church Council’s reasoning, set forth in its report, makes for fascinating reading. At the onset, the group attempts to claim that both sides in the controversy share “a commitment to the authority of Scripture.” In other words, the group asserts that those who would subvert or reject the clear teachings of Scripture are nevertheless to be understood as being committed to the authority of the Bible. In the typical language of denominational bureaucracy, the group also urged the church “to concentrate on finding ways to live together faithfully in the midst of disagreements, recognizing the God-given mission and communion that we share as members of the body of Christ.”

The group established two different positions on this issue of homosexuality—one seeing homosexuality “as sin and brokenness” and the other starting with the assumption that homosexuality is a “condition, not choice.” In response to the first position, the Church Council called for compromise on the issue of homosexuality, even as it explicitly acknowledged that the understanding that Scripture consistently condemns homosexuality “has been held virtually unanimously by the Christian community throughout 2,000 years of history and continues to be the view held by most Christian church bodies around the world today.”

In arguing for the compromise, the Church Council pointed to the denomination’s earlier decision to ordain divorced and remarried pastors, recognizing that this is “a condition specifically condemned in Scripture by Jesus.” Citing the change in policy for divorced and remarried pastors as precedent is tantamount to arguing that, since the church found a way around that biblical prohibition years ago, it should follow a similar path of compromising biblical teaching in dealing with homosexuality.

To those who hold the second position, believing the church should remove all strictures on homosexual persons, the group commended its compromise because it would create “an avenue by which gay and lesbian persons in committed relationships may be called into the ministry of this church.” Furthermore, “just as it took the Church and the world many years to understand other critical issues, such as the re-marriage of divorced people, this process provides the opportunity for continued discernment of where the Holy Spirit is leading this church.”

Interestingly, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod [LCMS], a far more conservative Lutheran body, responded to the ELCA Task Force’s recommendations as representatives from the two bodies met for the “Committee on Lutheran Cooperation” in St. Louis on March 29-30. The LCMS, committed to biblical inerrancy, responded to the ELCA with “a word of Christian concern about the recommendations of this report and the rationale for those recommendations.” The report from the LCMS pointed directly to the authority of Scripture as the fundamental issue: “As the LCMS has wrestled with the sensitive issue of homosexuality, it has had to return time and again to the more fundamental question of how we go about addressing these questions in the first place: namely, on the basis of the Holy Scriptures as God’s inspired and inerrant Word. There is widespread agreement among Biblical scholars of varying theological persuasions and positions that the Bible itself clearly identifies homosexual behavior as sinful.” The LCMS statement went on to emphasize “the foundational issue of the authority of Scripture,” arguing that the church must “say without qualification that the Holy Scriptures are, in their entirety, the inspired and inerrant Word of God.”

The LCMS is entirely correct, identifying biblical authority as the “foundational and presuppositional issue” at stake in this controversy. The ELCA Church Council’s recommendations are premised on the claim that the Bible can be respected and obeyed even by those who explicitly and self-consciously reject its teachings. The report’s recommendation that “exceptions” be allowed in the ordination of active homosexuals to the ministry means that those opposed to the normalization of homosexuality in the ELCA will simply lose the argument. The exceptions will soon become the rule, and the acknowledgement and acceptance of practicing homosexuals in the ministry, even in what are recognized as exceptional cases, will inevitably lead to the full acceptance of homosexual ministers in the denomination.

The ELCA recommendations will be presented to the denomination’s Churchwide Assembly later this year. We must pray and hope that this denomination will return to the courage and conviction of Martin Luther, who lashed his conscience to the Word of God, and to the Word of God alone.

R. Albert Mohler, Jr. is president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.

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**Lutheran Denominations Band Together Despite Opposing Views (Christian Post, 051114)

The conservative Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and the progressive Evangelical Lutheran Church in America hold near opposite opinions on theological issues ranging from the role of women in the church to homosexuality. However, leaders of both churches focused on things they do agree on – such as hurricane relief, ecumenical relations with the Roman Catholic Church and the welfare of refugees – during their semiannual meeting in Baltimore.

During their four-hour meeting, top leaders from the ELCA and LCMS “Committee on Lutheran Cooperation” discussed several issues regarding international relief and development. Along with leaders from the Lutheran World Relief – an overseas relief and development agency based in Baltimore – the representatives said a strong “biblical and reformation heritage” draws Lutherans together to engage in social services.

LWR provides a “place of interaction between the church and public sphere,” said Kathryn F. Wolford, LWR president. “We do ask the church to go into places that ... may be uncomfortable for the church,” she said.

Such instances include the devastating tsunami in southern Asia last year, the humanitarian concerns in Niger and Sudan this year, and the severe earthquake in Asia last month.

Denominational heads said that in light of such crises, Lutherans must set aside their differences to work together in serving where they are most needed.

“I am absolutely convinced that Lutheran theology has the potential to impact the world in a huge way,” said The Rev. Gerald B. Kieschnick, LCMS president. “I also grieve that internal struggles of our church bodies weaken us.

The LCMS and ELCA have struggled in the past to overcome doctrinal differences and have failed to agree on a pulpit-and-altar fellowship that would allow pastors from either denomination to preach at one another’s pulpits.

While such differences were not overcome, the leaders agreed that the division should not bar the two churches from achieving common goals.

“We cannot let internal issues divide us when it comes to providing food and housing. Only in our collective capacity can we take on the massive responsibility of ending hunger in the world,” said the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, ELCA presiding Bishop.

The two churches together represent nearly eight million Lutherans across the nation (the ELCA has about 5 million while the LCMS has about 3 million members).

In other business, members of the LCMS agreed to join in a new round of Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogues. Two members of the LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations will participate in a new round of Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogue- traditionally held with the RCC and the ELCA – beginning December. That 11th round of ecumenical dialogues is dubbed “Hope for Eternal Life.”

The semi-annual Lutheran gathering was held on Oct. 28 at the Lutheran Center at Christ Church in Baltimore. The next Lutheran Committee meeting is slated for April 7, 2006, in Chicago.

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**LCMS Youth Poll: Majority Pro-Life, Pro-Traditional Marriage, Pro-Abstinence (041206)

According to a denomination-wide poll in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, the majority of its youth believe in abstinence before marriage, relying on God for advice, the wrongness of homosexuality, and the sacredness of unborn life

According to a denomination-wide youth poll in the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS), “young people are still spending relatively less time in Bible study or devotions while they consider themselves active in church.”

The results, according to the Rev. Terry Dittmer, director of LCMS Youth Ministry, are “noteworthy for the fact that nothing changed much from the last poll taken three years ago.”

“What that means, is that — just as the 2001 poll results indicated — young people in the Synod are still spending relatively less time in Bible study or devotions while they consider themselves active in church, and pretty much agree with the Synod’s strong stands against abortion and sex outside of marriage, as well as against homosexual behavior,” added Dittmer.

The largest difference between the 2004 and 2001 results, according to Dittmer, was the number of youth partaking in the study.

“This was by far the largest sample ever drawn,” Dittmer said. In 2001, there were 1,870 respondents; there were 2,493 respondents in 2004.

In general, 17 percent of those polled in 2004 – as compared to 25 percent polled in 2001 – said premarital sex is fine as long as two people love one another; 65 percent of youth in 2004 – as compared to 68.7 percent in 2001 – said they have never engaged in sexual intercourse; and 9 percent – as compared to 9.6 percent in 2001 – said they have had sexual intercourse, but now abstain.

In faith based involvement issues, the study found that 78 percent of 2004 LCMS youth consider themselves active or very active in their congregations; 91 percent said they sometimes or always rely on God to help make decisions; and 46 percent said they engage in “almost no personal Bible study or devotion.”

Regarding homosexual behavior, 70 percent of LCMS youth said it is wrong to practice homosexuality, 18 percent said it is nobody’s business, and 63 percent said marriage is for one man and one woman only.

On the question regarding women pastors, only 14 percent of the youth said women should be ordained while 41 percent said they should not.

In pro-life issues, 75 percent of those polled said they are pro-life and 13 percent said they are pro-choice. 43 percent of youth also said they favor death penalty.

Upon analyzing the data, Dittmer took note that the poll “helps us in LCMS Youth Ministry evaluate the needs for resources that are effective for congregations as it gives us a feel for who the young people in the LCMS are.”

“The fact that youth cite their own faith as their top concern suggests a strong need for the church to continue focusing on faith development for its junior- and senior-high youth,” Dittmer said.

“This year’s poll also points to the need for the church to continue sharing its position on significant issues like church fellowship, human sexuality, abortion and women’s ordination,” he said. “And the fact that a sizeable portion of our youth feel the way they do about using abusive substances is a matter of concern that the church needs to address.”

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Lutheran Church Stripped of Spiritual Status for Hiring Lesbian Pastor (Christian Post, 041210)

Taking one of the harshest disciplinary acts possible against a member church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) stripped an urban ministry center in Los Angeles of its congregational status because it broke church laws by hiring an openly lesbian associate pastor.

Central City Lutheran Mission (CCLM), according to the Los Angeles Times, said it knew it broke church laws while installing the Rev. Jennifer Mason – a pastor who is not on the official ELCA clergy roster because of her sexually active lesbian lifestyle. In fact, according to the ELCA news, the members of the CCLM board met with Pacifica synod leaders before Mason was installed to discuss the situation.

Pacifica Synod’s Bishop Finck explained that during the meeting, the synod leaders urged CCLM not to install Mason.

“We asked them to reconsider,” said Finck, to the ELCA news, Dec. 9. “We asked them not to install her. We asked that they let us converse with them and then work to resolve this.”

However, the board declined to change its position, despite the council’s request to reconsider three times.

Therefore, after failed talks and measures, the synod decided on Oct. 29 to remove the CCLM ministry from the denomination’s congregational roster, and ended its call to Rev. David Kalke as CCLM’s pastor. The CCLM’s board subsequently adopted two resolutions urging the council to rescind its Oct. 29 decision.

At a meeting Dec. 4, the council declined CCLM’s requests to place the ministry back on the roster, but did approve Kalke’s request to remain on the clergy roster and be placed on leave from call.

In a statement to the LA Times, Kalke criticized the decision as a case of “conservatism” raising its “ugly head.”

“This is the first time in 14 years that any congregation or any pastor has been dealt with this harshly. We thought those days were over,” said Kalke. “It appears conservatism has raised its ugly head here in Southern California, much to our surprise.”

However Finck explained that the synod’s decision was not about conservatism or an attack on Mason’s sexual orientation.

“The issue as we see it had nothing to do with this person’s orientation,” Finck said to the Times. “That wasn’t our issue in this synod. Our issue was that we are obligated to abide by our governing documents that say only people who are on the roster of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America are to be called into the pastoral world and sacrament ministry.”

“What we have said to the [CCLM] board is that [Mason’s orientation] may be the central issue for you, but it is not the central issue for us,” Finck said to the ELCA news.

Finck added that he finds “no victory” in the ultimate decision, which was made “out of compliance with the constitutions, provisions and policies” of the church.

“There’s a lot of sadness in our synod, but there’s been a lot of support,” Finck said, Dec. 9. “Many congregations, pastors and people in our synod have indicated they stand behind the council’s difficult decision.”

Meanwhile, the CCLM wrote in a release that it believed the synod council action was “completely out of line” with what other ELCA synods have done in similar situations. Since 1990, there were no incidences where congregations were stripped of recognition for installing gay clergy. Bishops often sent letters of reprimand and urged the congregations to change its decision.

However, according to ELCA secretary Rev Lowell G Almen, the decision is in line with what had long been the action of synod councils across the nation.

“By action of synod councils, certain congregations in various synods have been removed from the roster of the ELCA for calling persons as pastors who are not on the roster of ordained ministers, or who have resigned or been removed from the [clergy] roster,” said the Rev. Lowell G. Almen, ELCA secretary.

“While local circumstances may differ, the Central City Lutheran Mission decision of the Pacifica Synod Council is not unique,” he said.

The CCLM was formed in 1996 by five congregations in the San Bernardino area. Dubbed a “forming congregation,” the ministry was meant to serve people living in poverty. The social service ministry offers education, health and housing benefits to those in need, and tends to the homeless and people living with AIDS.

When asked by the ELCA News why the CCLM would choose to consciously defy church order by hiring someone off the clergy roster, Kalke said it was because the ministry needed someone who was “culturally competent.” “We called her because we needed an associate pastor. We needed a person who was culturally competent,” Kalke said. Kalke also said the synod did not provide any pastors to fill the slot; Finck said the synod offered the CCLM two candidates, but both were turned down by the CCLM.

In lieu of the misunderstandings and confusion, Finck said “the Pacifica Synod Council and the bishop will pray for and seek ways to rebuild the relationship between CCLM and the synod, and extend invitations for further dialogue and understanding, healing and reconciliation.”

Finck also explained that the CCLM can continue its ministry as a social service – just not a spiritual service.

However, Kalke said to the LA Times that he plans to lead CCLM as an independent Lutheran congregation anyways.

“I’m going to continue to celebrate Mass,” he said. “These people have a right not only for a place to sleep and a bowl of soup but also a right to worship.”

In a larger context, the CCLM/Pacifica Synod conflict came amid the development of a ELCA-wide study on sexuality issues. The study, which is due for review early next year, will make recommendations to keep or amend the church’s policy on blessing same-gender relationships – same-sex unions may not be celebrated nor encouraged within ELCA church walls. The report will also make recommendations on gay clergy; while the church has no set policy on ordaining gay clergy, the ELCA bishops advised the church refrain from ordaining both heterosexual and homosexual people who are sexually active outside of marriage. The ELCA defines “marriage as a lifelong covenant of faithfulness between a man and a woman” in its message “Sexuality: Some Common Convictions,” adopted in 1996 by the ELCA Church.

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Preliminary Talks Begin within German Protestant Churches (Christian Post, 041211)

The three largest umbrella church bodies began preliminary agreements for cooperation. The three groups, United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Germany (VELKD), Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) and the Union of Evangelical Churches in the EKD (UEK), represent dozens of protestant churches with a total of over 36 million German Christian members.

According to the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), structural debate to strengthen cooperation between the EKD member churches has been going on for the past two years.

“Strong unanimity marked the negotiation process by the three high-ranking commissions that elaborated the draft agreements on the future relations between the EKD, UEK and VELKD,” the LWF reported, December 11.

The three “high ranking” commissioners were: VELKD Presiding Bishop, Dr Hans-Christian Knuth (Schleswig), UEK General Conference Chairperson, Bishop Dr Ulrich Fischer (Baden) and EKD Council Vice-Chairperson, Bishop Dr Christoph Kähler (Thuringia),

The VELKD and the UEK submitted for approval reforms that aim at achieving the highest level of cooperation within EKD member churches.

Under the new reforms, the UEK and VELKD offices will be set up in the EKD Church Office in Hanover, and the tasks of individual bodies will take place within that office so duplication of structures can be reduced. The UEK and VELKD will maintain authority over the policy decisions and initiatives – especially in regards to theological beliefs. In this way, the UEK and VELKD will be able retain its legal authorities while being a part of the EKD.

Preliminary approval for the reforms mean individual church bodies and synods are able to consider the agreement and make constitutional amendments. Member churches within the UEK, VELKD and EKD must approve the reform during the 2006 meeting, in order for the agreements to take effect by January 2007.

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Lutherans Call for Life Sunday (Christian Post, 041221)

Gerald B. Kieschnick, the head of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS), made a case for “life” in a statement released on Dec. 21, 2004. In making his case, Kieschnick urged Christians to take part in “Life Sunday,” a day dedicated to respecting human life as an endowment from God.

“Traditionally observed in the United States as “Life Sunday”, January 23, 2005, is fast approaching on our calendars. I ask you, dear brothers, to encourage the people of your congregation to remember on this—and every other day—that human life is not an achievement, but an endowment from God. Every individual, at every stage of development and every state of consciousness, is known and loved by God,” he said.

Kieschnick also noted that the LCMS “has a well-earned reputation in the world for being an actively pro-life church.”

“Strong resolutions supporting life and opposing abortion, infanticide, euthanasia, and other threats to human life continue to be regular agenda items for our national and district conventions,” he said.

“The church has a responsibility to speak the clear word of truth with a clear voice—to our world and especially for the sake of our members. The church must speak directly and forcefully in those clear and limited circumstances when fundamental moral principals are at stake,” he added.

Taking note that Life Sunday looks deeply at the rising rate of abortion in the nation, Kieschnick said abortion “has resulted in a coarsened society that is desensitized to death.”

“While abortion has led to the shocking loss of 40 million lives since 1973, it has also resulted in a coarsened society that is desensitized to death and disloyal to life,” he said. “But respect for life is not just an intellectual or moral belief. It is a personal commitment that recognizes our best witness is given when our commitment is evidenced in actions. Acts of compassion to the unprotected innocent, the poor, the aged, and handicapped will provide a compelling alternative to a culture of death.”

In light of such cultures, Kieschnick said the LCMS “affirms the truth that no one is worthless whom God has created and for whom Christ died.”

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Lutheran decision splits on gay clergy (Washington Times, 050114)

A Lutheran task force handed a victory to homosexual rights groups yesterday by recommending that although the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America should not change its policy against ordaining homosexual clergy, it should not censure churches that break the rule.

But “those who feel conscience-bound to call people [as pastors] in committed same-sex unions should refrain from making the call a media event either as an act of defiance or with the presumption of being prophetic,” the task force warned.

The 14-member task force pronounced itself conflicted and unable to agree about how the ELCA should proceed.

What emerged in their report — released at church headquarters in Chicago — was a compromise in which congregations could hire homosexual clergy without making this the official policy in the 4.9-million-member denomination.

The compromise came as three recommendations:

•That Lutherans “learn to live together faithfully,” while disagreeing, thus avoiding the splits over homosexuality that have dominated the Episcopal Church, which has shared sacraments, clergy and ministry with the ELCA since 2001.

•That the ELCA continue to have no official policy on same-sex unions, but “respect” a 1993 ELCA bishops’ statement that does not approve such ceremonies as official church acts;

•That the denomination not discipline churches that hire homosexual clergy, nor the clergy themselves. At least 14 openly homosexual seminarians or clergy serve in ELCA churches, according to the San Francisco-based Lutheran Lesbian and Gay Ministries.

Several ELCA bishops raised red flags about the report, which will be debated and voted on in August at the ELCA’s Churchwide Assembly in Orlando, Fla.

Bishop H. Gerard Knoche of the Delaware-Maryland Synod called it “a policy change even though it claims not to be” from current ELCA policy that allows people with homosexual attractions to be ordained, but expects that they remain celibate.

Bishop James Mauney of ELCA’s Virginia Synod said he did not see “a basis for affirming homosexual behavior within Scripture or our Lutheran confessions.”

He added, “Nowhere do I see in the Scriptures where Jesus condones the practice of the tax collectors or the woman caught in adultery or the life of the rich young ruler, though we are told he loves him in the Gospel of Mark.”

The report follows the general drift of other mainline Protestant denominations to loosen their policies on homosexual clergy and same-sex unions.

The Episcopal Church already has ordained a practicing homosexual bishop and allows same-sex ceremonies in several dioceses, and the Presbyterian Church USA is deferring a final decision on such issues until 2006.

Those two churches have lost more than 1.5 million members combined in recent decades. The ELCA has lost 300,000 members since 1999.

Among Lutherans, “we found no consensus in the church on this matter,” said New England Synod Bishop Margaret Payne, chairman of the Task Force for ELCA Studies on Sexuality.

She cited a 2004 poll of 28,000 Lutherans, in which 38 percent opposed the blessing of same-sex unions and hiring homosexual clergy; 18 percent approved it; 14 percent said homosexuals should be welcomed as parishioners, but not hired as clergy nor should their unions be blessed; 12 percent were undecided; and the others gave mixed responses.

Thus, she added, the task force decided to treat ordination of homosexual pastors as valid dissent.

“It acknowledges the validity of conscientious objection and honors that,” she said. “Because of that, discipline will not be enforced. It’s a new dimension of respect ... based on individual conscience.”

The task force cited Martin Luther, the founder of the denomination, as the paragon of individual conscience because of his statement at the Diet of Worms in 1521. The church reformer told the Diet — a church court — that he was bound in conscience to the Bible and that “it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience.”

However, yesterday’s report did not go far enough for the Lutheran Alliance for Full Participation, a consortium of six homosexual groups.

Although one spokesman for the alliance privately conceded that the report “leaves a lot of wiggle room,” its official statement expressed “dismay and deep sadness” at remaining strictures within the 32-page report.

“We remain committed to the removal of discriminatory policies that violate our calls to ministry and marginalize our relationships,” spokeswoman Emily Eastwood said.

Bishop Theodore F. Schneider of the ELCA’s Metropolitan Washington Synod said the report “raises many more questions and problems than it answers.

“I am not quite sure how the churchwide assembly can be asked to affirm the constitution, bylaws, policies and practices of this church and not expect that they be applied fairly and evenly,” he added.

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Reformed Leaders Say ELCA Study on Sexuality Misleading (Christian Post, 050113)

Reformed leaders within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) called the denomination’s January 13 report on homosexuality “duplicitous” and “disingenuous,” and criticized it as nothing more than an “attempt to avoid an outright schism” in a theologically split denomination.

“The taskforce report is an apparent attempt to avoid an outright schism within the ELCA by calling for no official change in policy, but then caters radicals by asking bishops to refuse to enforce these very same policies in regard to the blessing of same sex unions and the ordination of clergy openly involved in same sex behavior,” explained the Rev. Christopher Hershman, President of the Evangelical Lutheran Confessing Fellowship.

“Such maneuvers appear to be the last gasps of a dying church body. How can any church body be united in mission if it can’t be united in theology, practice and biblical interpretation? How can an authentic expression of the Christian church allow for open departures from basic Christian teaching?” he added.

The report, entitled the ELCA Studies on Sexuality, essentially called on the church members to maintain the denomination’s policies opposing the ordination of homosexuals and blessing of homosexual unions, but at the same time encouraged ministers to tend to homosexual couples in “committed long term relationship” and called on bishops to refrain from disciplining those who violate those policies.

“In effect this means that the taskforce is actually recommending what is known as “local option,” meaning that any bishop or congregation can do whatever they want on such issues, no matter how widely a practice may conflict with Christian teaching. Local option is not acceptable to traditional Christians because it creates chaos, confusion and division in the church by subverting genuine Christian teachings,” explained Rev. Hershman.

“While the ELCA Sexuality Task Force may say it isn’t suggesting change in the ELCA standards for ordination, the recommendations in its report will bring about de facto change because they suggest that the standards not be enforced,” said Pastor Jaynan Clark Egland, president of WordAlone, the largest reform and renewal movement within the ELCA.

“Looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, quacks like a duck, must be a duck. How stupid do they think we are?” said WordAlone director Pastor Mark Chavez.

Chavez said he regretted the committee’s decision to not answer the fundamental question that should have been addressed: “Are homosexual sexual practices sinful?”

Meanwhile, Bishop Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the ELCA, said he was thankful for the work of the task force, but did not comment on his opinions about the content itself.

“On behalf of a grateful Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), I express my appreciation to the director, staff, and members ELCA Studies on Sexuality Task Force for their commitment to an important assignment on behalf of this church,” said Hanson.

Hanson also reminded ELCA members that the “work is not done.” The recommendations in no way represent the official policy of the ELCA.

“It is vital for the members of this church to remember our work is not done, nor have decisions been made. Rather the task force report and recommendations give focus to our continuing conversations moving toward decisions at the 2005 Churchwide Assembly in Orlando, Florida,” he said.

To view the entire text of the Report and Recommendations of the ELCA Studies on Sexuality Task Force, visit: www.elca.org/faithfuljourney

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Lutheran Membership Increases Internationally, Decreases Domestically (Christian Post, 050215)

The Lutheran World Federation (LWF) reported an increase of 3.63 million members over the last year, bringing the total number of LWF members to nearly 6.6 million. The rise in LWF membership is also reflective of the overall increase among Lutheran churches – including those that are not part of the LWF – which grew by 5.4 percent (3.57 million) over the last year.

According to the statistical figures released in February, most of the increase in LWF membership came from the admission of two new multi-million member denominations to the Federation.

“Membership among LWF member churches rose to 38,594,553 people. This is largely due to the PCN admission in the LWF last year. Between 2001 and 2003, a 1.75 percent decrease pushed down Lutheran membership to 36 million Christians,” the LWF reported.

Some churches, including the Church of Sweden – the largest Lutheran church worldwide – there was a natural increase in membership. However, in most parts of Europe, church membership declined over the 2003-2004 period. [Kwing Hung: only 2% of professed Christians in Sweden attend church, this according to a Doctor of Divinity Prof. Fischer who teaches pastors.]

Lutheran churches in Africa, meanwhile, recorded a natural membership increase of almost 1.1 million – a rise of 8.2 percent.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Mozambique registered the largest increase, with an almost fivefold rise in membership from 1,250 to 5,987. With 500,000 new members, representing a 20 percent increase, the Malagasy Lutheran Church and Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania now each have 3 million members.

However, several churches in South Africa recorded decreasing membership. One such church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Southern Africa lost almost 180,000 members, a 23.4 percent decline, bringing the new total to 589,502. A slight decrease in membership in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Southern Africa (Cape Church) brings down the total to 4,099 members, whereas the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Southern Africa (N-T) recorded a 10 percent decrease resulting in 9,900 members.

Lutheran churches in Asia reported a one percent increase in membership while Lutheran churches in Latin America and the Caribbean recorded a slight fall of .6 percent.

North America meanwhile recorded a 2.2 percent loss in membership, largely due to the fall of membership in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America – the second largest LWF member church with nearly 5 million members. A 40 percent decline in membership in the Lithuanian Evangelical Lutheran Church in Diaspora (USA) pushed down the membership to 3,000.

The membership statistics are based on information received from the LWF member churches, the recognized congregations and council, as well as from other Lutheran churches, organizations, mission bodies and congregations. The figures recorded for the year ending 2003 were used for churches that did not indicate any change in statistics by the end of January 2005.

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Scholars oppose Lutherans’ gay proposal (WorldNetDaily, 050303)

Seventeen scholars from 12 campuses have released a strong statement against a proposal that the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America officially maintain its stance against same-sex ceremonies and gay clergy while tolerating dissent from that policy.

The protesters say that the measure, put forward by a task force in January, threatens the church’s unity and its “historical, biblical and confessional teachings and practice.”

A churchwide assembly of the 5-million-member ELCA will take up the proposal in August.

The scholars’ group complains that though the task force said it recommends “no change in policy,” it in fact “advocates a fundamental shift in policy” when it asks the church to refrain from disciplining clergy involved in same-sex relationships.

That approach, they say, would “fatally extend the boundaries of diversity in matters of doctrinal and ethical substance” and harm relations with other Christian bodies. The group also contends that the task force’s claimed support from Martin Luther and the Bible misrepresents both.

The Tuesday declaration was sent to the Conference of Bishops, which begins meeting Thursday in Dallas, and the Church Council, an executive body that takes up the issue at the denomination’s Chicago headquarters next month.

A spokesman for the protesters, Smith College religion Professor Karl Donfried, said colleagues who drafted the document during recent weeks made no attempt to recruit any long list of endorsements but hope their statement will “stand on its own logic, integrity and competence.”

Endorsers include Jean Bethke Elshtain of the University of Chicago and other prominent theologians; James Crumley Jr., head of a denomination that merged into the ELCA; Michael Root, dean of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, Columbia, S.C.; William Rusch, the ELCA’s former director of ecumenical affairs; New York’s retired Bishop William Lazareth; and historians George Forell, Hans Hillerbrand and James Nestingen.

Nestingen was second runner-up in 2001 elections for head of the denomination.

The ELCA maintains full fellowship with the Episcopal Church, which has been involved in its own divisive debate over gay issues.

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ELCA Bishops Urged Against ‘Fatal’ Sexuality Report (Christian Post, 050303)

Lutheran scholars across 12 campuses released a strong statement rejecting the newly recommended Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) studies on sexuality report, calling it a threat to the church’s unity and its “historical, biblical and confessional teachings and practice,” on Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2005.

The letter, signed by seventeen scholars ahead of the ELCA Conference of Bishops meeting that begins today in Dallas, urged the denomination’s leaders to modify the report before it is placed for a vote at the 2005 Churchwide Assembly – the ELCA’s highest legislative authority – in August.

The report, which took a 14-member task force team four years to draft, officially maintained its stance against same-sex ceremonies and the ordination of actively gay clergy, but at the same time allowed bishops the leeway to refrain from punishing violators.

Echoing the concerns of “confessional” Lutherans who rejected the third clause of the report, the seventeen scholars took note that the measure claims to make “no change in the policy” but in fact “advocates a fundamental shift in policy” when it asks the church to refrain from disciplining clergy involved in same-sex relationships.

The theologians noted that the approach would “fatally extend the boundaries of diversity in matters of doctrinal and ethical substance” and harm relations with other Christian bodies. They also say the task force’s claimed support from Martin Luther and the Scriptures is misinterpreted.

“Based on our careful review of the report and its recommendations, we maintain that the third and primary recommendation of the task force, contrary to its stated intention, threatens to destabilize the unity and constitution, as well as the historical, biblical, and confessional teachings and practice of this church,” the theologians said.

“Further, this final proposal places the first two, although in principle containing some assertions that are indeed admirable and commendable, into an interpretative context that makes them objectionable as well,” they said.

The ELCA, like most large mainline churches, have struggled over the place of homosexuality in the church. Nearly all churches believe homosexual persons are of sacred worth, but only a few churches claim God condones homosexual behavior. In the case of the ELCA, homosexuals may be ordained but active homosexuals – as well as heterosexuals who are sexually active outside of wedlock – are prohibited from being placed in the clergy roster list.

Over the past several years, the number of churches defying the denomination’s rules against the election of active homosexuals grew exceedingly, placing bishops in the position of having to discipline them.

In the last such case, a California bishop took one of the harshest disciplinary acts possible against the Central City Lutheran Mission for installing a sexually active lesbian last year. Pacifica Synod’s Bishop Finck had several times “asked them not to install her” but the CCLM’s board refused to reconsider their unauthorized decision. Ultimately, CCLM was stripped of its congregational status and took the CCLM’s senior pastor off the official ELCA clergy list; the senior pastor was placed back on the list upon appeal but CCLM has yet to gain back its full congregational status.

In disciplining the defiant church, Bishop Finck did not place any emphasis on theological and biblical reasons why the church should be stripped of its status. Rather, Finck said he was acting out of an obligation to the church’s bylaws and expectations.

“The issue as we see it had nothing to do with this person’s orientation,” Finck said in December, 2004. “That wasn’t our issue in this synod. Our issue was that we are obligated to abide by our governing documents that say only people who are on the roster of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America are to be called into the pastoral world and sacrament ministry.”

If the newly recommended sexuality laws were to be in place, Bishop Finck would have the flexibility to dismiss the CCLM’s actions.

The report, which was released in January 2005, has several steps to cross before passing as a churchwide law. The boards of the ELCA Division for Church and Society and the ELCA Division for Ministry will meet at the ELCA headquarters in Chicago on March 10-13. The group will review the report and forward them to the Church Council – the ELCA’s board of directors – with additional comments.

The Church Council will then meet in April to review the report and additional comments, and will prepare a resolution for the 2005 Churchwide Assembly – the ELCA’s highest legislative authority – to take action in regards to the recommendations.

In the meantime, ELCA’s 65 synods will meet separately in synod assemblies, during which each synod will discuss the report and produce resolutions called “memorials.”

The churchwide assembly, meeting in Orlando, Fla., on Aug. 8-14, will then receive the report and recommendations, and will consider the church Council’s resolution, synod memorials and other related papers to cast an official vote on the church’s stance on homosexuality.

The Conference of Bishops, whose meeting begins today in Dallas, will also prepare recommendations for the church Council to reconsider at the August meeting.

The letter of protest was sent to both the Conference of Bishops and the Church Council.

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ELCA Bishops Respond to Study on Homosexuality (Christian Post, 050312)

The ambivalent response, similar to the controversial study, found no conclusive voice on the contentious issue that has been testing the unity of the church for years.

The bishops of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) released a statement of response to the denomination’s three-year study on homosexuality, during their four-day meeting in Chicago, March 3-7, 2005. However the response, similar to the controversial study, found no conclusive voice on the contentious issue that has been testing the unity of the church for years.

“As a Conference of Bishops we have not been of one mind on these matters, and we are not of one mind on these matters now,” the page-long response began.

The ELCA Conference of Bishops, which consists of the denomination’s 65 synod bishops, presiding bishop and secretary, is an advisory body of the church and does not have the final say in what recommendations and resolutions are passed. Nonetheless, as some of the highest-ranking members of the church, their voices and views carry significant weight in all issues pertinent to the 5-million-member organization.

In essence, the Conference of Bishops said they agreed with the first two recommendations of the homosexuality study, but were unsure where to stand on the last and most controversial part of the study.

“We urge this church to affirm recommendation one of the task force,” the bishops wrote. “We further ask that with respect to recommendation two, this church affirm for pastoral guidance the 1993 Statement of the Conference of Bishops.”

The first two recommendations of the sexuality study essentially called for no change to the denomination’s overall belief that neither the ordination of active homosexual individuals nor the blessing of homosexual unions should be sanctioned by the church.

Specifically, the two statements recommended the church “continue to respect the pastoral guidance of the 1993 statement of the Conference of Bishops regarding the blessing of homosexual relationships” and “continue under the standards regarding sexual conduct for rostered leaders as set forth in “Visions and Expectations” and “Definitions and Guidelines for Discipline.”

The 1993 statement of the Conference of Bishops states that clergy should not bless homosexual unions within the church since there is a “basis neither in Scripture nor tradition for the establishment of an official ceremony by this church for the blessing of a homosexual relationship.” It also said it did “not approve such a ceremony as an official action of this church’s ministry.”

ELCA “Visions and Expectations” spells out the standards and rules of conduct for denomination’s rostered clergy. One of the clauses in the Visions and Expectations states that clergy – both heterosexual and homosexual – are expected to refrain from extra-marital sexual relationships. Marriage is defined as a union between one man and one woman only, and the standard further explains “ordained and commissioned ministers who are homosexual in their self-understanding are expected to abstain from homosexual sexual relationships.” The Definitions and Guidelines for Discipline explains what forms of punishment is suitable for clergy who step out of the boundaries of the Visions and Expectations

However, in regards to the study’s third – and most controversial – recommendation, the bishops said they are “unable to offer a definitive word of advice.”

Recommendation three essentially says that while the church should follow the first two recommendations, members who violate the laws on homosexuality can be excused from punishment.

“This church may choose to refrain from disciplining those who in good conscience, and for the sake of outreach, ministry and the commitment to continuing dialogue, call or approve partnered gay or lesbian candidates whom they believe to be otherwise in compliance with “Vision and Expectations” and to refrain from disciplining those rostered people so approved and called,” the study, released in January 2005, stated.

The third recommendation has already been rejected by dozens of ELCA scholars, theologians, and leaders. Conservative organizations in the denomination have even called for the flat-out rejection of the entire report because of the third recommendation.

“Looks like a duck, waddles like a duck, quacks like a duck, must be a duck. How stupid do they think we are?” said Pastor Mark Chavez, director of the WordAlone Network – the largest renewal and reformed movement in the denomination.

The bishops, meanwhile, similar to the report itself, were ambivalent on the third point:

“We acknowledge that as a conference we are unable to offer a definitive word of advice on recommendation three,” the bishops’ March 7 statement read. “Some bishops are convinced there should be no change in the practice and policy of our church. Other bishops favor changes both in policy and in practice though there is no consensus as to how such changes should take place.”

Despite the obvious differences and without coming to a clear consensus, the bishops ultimately advised the church to remain in unity.

“Humbly we offer this advice and counsel: Unite in prayer that God would guide us in this time of discernment and decision making; Unite in reading Scripture together; Unite in weekly worship to be nourished by Word and Sacrament; Unite in practicing forgiveness…” the bishops wrote. [Kwing Hung: false unity]

According to ELCA news, the one-page message was intended to advise the boards of the ELCA Division for Church in Society, ELCA Division for Ministry, and the ELCA Church Council, as each considers what to do with the task force report and recommendations on homosexuality. The report and its recommendations, along with proposals on how to consider the issues, will make their way to the 2005 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, Aug. 8-14, in Orlando, Fla., where the decision on whether to accept or reject the study will be made.

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Lutherans Church Council Tackles Homosexuality Debate (Christian Post, 050406)

The top members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) will meet later this week to prepare resolutions on two pivotal questions regarding homosexuality in the church: Should same-sex relationships be blessed? Should the ordination of actively homosexual individuals be allowed?

The Church Council meeting, slated for April 9-11 at the denomination’s Chicago, Ill headquarter, is the penultimate step in a four-year-long effort to clarify the church’s stance on the controversial issue.

“The question on homosexuality has been around forever in one form or another,” explained Frank Imhoff, Associate Director for the ELCA news service. “Or at least since 1988 when the denomination was formed”

According to Imhoff, the specific questions were raised during the ELCA’s 2001 Churchwide Assembly –the highest representative body of the five-million-member denomination – and a 2005 deadline was set for the answers.

Since then, a 14-member task force was elected to study the various opinions regarding the issues and to draft a recommendation of action for the church.

After three years, the task force in January 2005 released their recommendations, which were broken down into three parts. The first called on the church to find ways to live faithfully in the midst of disagreements. The second recommended the church continue to refrain from blessing homosexual relationships. The third recommended the church continue the current standards expecting unmarried ministers – including homosexuals – to abstain from sexual relationships, but added that the ELCA may choose to refrain from disciplining those who break the codes of conduct.

Reactions to the recommendations were mixed across the church, but those at the theological poles rebuffed the resolutions for lacking clarity and sensibility.

Conservatives and liberals especially criticized the third recommendation for its forthright contradictions: the church is calling on clergy to abstain from homosexual relationships but with no enforcements.

Conservatives said the third resolution “looks like a duck and quacks like a duck” while liberals slammed it for not providing sufficient rights for homosexual clergy.

Meanwhile, the synods – or districts – of the nationwide church responded in various ways. According to Imhoff, of the 65 synods of the ELCA, 35 responded with resolutions recommending a wide range of possible courses of actions — from keeping the church’s current standards intact to making changes in the church’s standards beyond the recommendations of the task force.

“I read over the resolutions and what I found was that there is no one direction,” explained Imhoff.

These synod resolutions, as well as the task force recommendations, will be presented to the Church Council when it meets in Chicago. The Church Council will then prepare resolutions that will be placed on the agenda for the ELCA Churchwide Assembly this August.

The Churchwide Assembly is the only body that can adopt or reject any resolution on behalf of the entire church.

“The church council will draft a resolution to be placed before the Assembly,” said Imhoff. “It can use the recommendations or not – it can decide.”

According to Imhoff, once the resolutions are before the Assembly, they can be passed, rejected, appended or amended. Any combination of the four would apply to the resolutions drafted by the Council this week.

“The churchwide assembly can take a number of different approaches. There are three recommendations on the issue, and they can amend one and pass the other. It decides for itself what it wants to pass,” said Imhoff. “The churchwide assembly can do whatever it wants with the recommendations.”

The Church Council is expected to complete their resolutions by Monday.

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S.C. Lutherans Oppose Gay Clergy Ordinations (Christian Post, 050527)

Voting members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s South Carolina synod reaffirmed the denomination’s stance against ordaining non-celibate homosexuals as clergy.

During the synod’s annual assembly in Charleston, which attracted more than 600 clergy and laity, the members voted to approve a resolution that opposed the ordination of non-celibate homosexuals as well as the blessing of same-sex relationships, according to The State newspaper.

“We’re saying to the assembly that we appreciate your compassion for persons in committed gay and lesbian relationships, that we know these persons, love and respect them, but we don’t as a synod wish to make exceptions as to ordination or the blessing of same-sex unions,” said Mel Amundson, assistant to the bishop, The State reported.

The resolutions would stand against a nationwide recommendation released in January that called for exceptions to the non-celibate gay clergy rule.

The national report, which took nearly four years to finalize, recommended the church “refrain from disciplining” ministers with same-sex partners. The denomination is set to vote on the recommendation in August during its biennial national assembly, in Orlando, Fla.

The ELCA has nearly five million total members. The South Carolina Synod has more than 64,000 members and is headquartered in Colombia.

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Lutheran Head says Gay Struggle Not Central to Church Health (Christian Post, 050727)

The Rev. Mark S. Hanson, Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, told reporters during a conference call that the church’s stance on homosexuality is not what defines its success.

“I don’t look to a tension-free church as the mark of a vital and healthy church in mission,” he said, according to the Associated Press.

The ELCA will be holding its General Assembly in Orlando, Fla., from Aug.8-14. The thorniest debate at the assembly will likely surround three major Lutheran proposals regarding the role of homosexuals in the church. The three resolutions, a fruit of nearly four years of debate, reflection, and labor, address whether active homosexuals should be ordained and if pastors should be allowed to hold same-sex “marriage” ceremonies.

The measures, each to be voted upon separately at the Assembly, would:

— reaffirm the church ban on ordaining non-celibate gays, but allow bishops or church synods to give exceptions for a particular candidate;

— uphold the denomination’s unofficial prohibition of giving same-sex blessings, but give bishops and pastors discretion in deciding how to minister to gay couples - even if it means recognizing homosexual unions;

— call for unity despite differences over what the Bible says about homosexuality.

Most conservative Lutherans criticized the proposals, calling it a “toothless” approach to the issue since it would give exceptions to the current rules. Evangelicals say the issue strikes at the heart of a larger debate over Biblical interpretation and understanding.

Hanson agreed that the tension is a sign of a greater struggle.

“I think as a large church body we have great capacity to be in mission together that is diminished when we are apart,” Hanson said, adding that he hope “we will not take the tensions they create as evidence of a divided church but as a sign that a church is struggling with what it means to be centered in Christ.”

The ELCA, with 5 million members, is one of the largest mainline Protestant denominations in the U.S. Bishop Hanson also serves as the president of the Lutheran World Federation, which serves over 60 million Lutherans worldwide.

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Deliberations on Homosexuality Finally Begin at ELCA Assembly (Christian Post, 050811)

Official deliberations on three controversial recommendations on homosexuality began Wednesday at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s Churchwide Assembly in Orlando, Fla.

The 1,018 voting members of the assembly heard presentations from the sexuality task force that drafted the recommendations after nearly four years of study, and were placed on a track to discuss and potentially vote upon the proposed laws by Friday.

The sexuality recommendations attracted a flurry of attention since they were first released by the task force in January this year. The issue is the largest controversy the church faced in decades, and has deepened the schism between conservative and liberal factions in the ELCA.

With the unity of the church on the line, members of the task force cautiously explained their desires to keep the church together despite differences.

James M. Childs, director of the ELCA Studies on Sexuality said the task force received inspiration from St. Paul’s encouragement to “bear one another’s burdens.” He said “task force members did that, taking on the pains, hopes and fears” of those engaged in the dialogue. Ultimately, he said the task force strove to “draw people in rather than isolate” those in disagreement.

Child’s team has been heavily criticized for doing just that – working to maintain unity without coming to a conclusion on sexuality. The Task Force’s three recommendations, which were formally read to the assembly of voting members urges the ELCA to “find ways to live together faithfully in the midst of disagreements.

The second recommends no policy on the blessing of same sex relationships, but refers to the pastoral guidance of the 1993 statement of the Conference of Bishops calling for continued dialogue with and support for those in ministry with gay and lesbian persons.

The third recommendation would keep the church’s current standards regarding sexual conduct for rostered leaders as set forth in “Vision and Expectations” and “Definitions and Guidelines for Discipline,” but create a process for the sake of outreach, ministry and the commitment to continuing dialogue, which may permit exceptions to the expectations regarding sexual conduct for gay or lesbian candidates and rostered leaders in life-long, committed and faithful same-sex relationships who otherwise are determined to be in compliance” with the conduct the church expects of its ministers.

Conservatives say the recommendations would undermine current ELCA policy against self-affirming homosexual ministers. Liberals complain the recommendations would treat homosexual ministers as “second class.”

Such debates over the wording of the recommendations will likely ensue today and tomorrow, and voting members will be allowed to call for amendments to the resolutions before they are presented for the final vote.

Under the rules governing the action upon these recommendations, which were determined by the assembly itself in a lengthy opening plenary session, the first two recommendations as proposed require a simple majority vote, and the third, involving constitutional changes, would require a two-thirds majority of those present and voting, according to ELCA news.

Meanwhile, the Rev. Margaret G. Payne, bishop of the ELCA New England Synod and chair of the sexuality studies task force, told voting members that she has learned to let down her sword through the process of talking with various people. Payne, who this year steps down from her post, said she used to have an opinion that she used “like a sword,” cutting down others with different views.

However, she said, “When I began my work, I sheathed my sword.” Along the way, she continued, “I took my sword out to take a look at it, and I discovered much to my surprise that the sword had turned into a plow.”

Payne urged voting members to do the same.

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Fences and a “Just Peace” (Weekly Standard, 050815)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America makes a stand against Israel’s security fence and in favor of a “just peace.” (Never mind Palestinian terrorism.)

THE EVANGELICAL LUTHERAN CHURCH IN AMERICA (“ELCA”) is the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination, with nearly 5 million members. The ELCA’s highest legislative body is its Churchwide Assembly, which convenes every two years. The ninth such Churchwide Assembly has just ended. Yesterday, the Assembly adopted a resolution calling upon the ELCA’s members, congregations, and agencies to “participate in the churchwide campaign for peace—Peace Not Walls: Stand for Justice in the Holy Land. . . .”

The elements of the “campaign for peace” are hard to discern from the language of the resolution itself. The resolution calls for “praying for peace with justice between Israel and Palestine,” “learning about the situation there, sharing information, and building networks,” “intensifying advocacy for a just peace in the region,” “stewarding financial resources—both U.S. tax dollars and private funds—in ways that support the quest for a just peace in the Holy Land,” and so on. Such vague provisions no doubt strike many as uncontroversial. Curiously, the only really tangible point of the resolution—opposition to the construction of Israel’s security fence—is nowhere mentioned in the text of the resolution itself.

The resolution’s intent is manifest, however, in the name of the campaign which support it encourages: “Peace Not Walls,” as though the two concepts were in self-evident opposition. (Why not “Peace Through Walls”?) And the real content of the resolution is made explicit in the “Whereas” clauses which introduce it:

Whereas, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL) and the Lutheran World Federation have drawn to the attention of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America not only the extreme hardship brought to Palestinian communities by the continuing Israeli occupation and construction of the separation wall, but also the imminent threat they pose to the future of the ELCJHL and other Christian churches in the Holy Land; and

Whereas, the emerging fragile prospects for a lasting peace between Israel and Palestine require both Israelis and Palestinians to (1) avoid taking any actions that would undermine the peace (e.g., attacks on civilians, confiscation of land) and (2) actively engage in actions that will strengthen the will for peace; and

***

Whereas, in carrying out this mandate, the Church Council in April 2004 joined the Lutheran World Federation, the World Council of Churches, and others seeking peace in the region in calling for an end to the construction of the Israeli separation wall being built on Palestinian land . . .

The Churchwide Assembly’s adoption of the anti-fence resolution came as no surprise; on the contrary, it was a foregone conclusion. The Assembly, which is attended inter alia by lay representatives of the ELCA’s congregations, merely rubber-stamped an initiative that was already in place, adopted over the past two years by the ELCA’s monolithically liberal staff. The Lutheran Office of Governmental Affairs went on record opposing the fence by July 2003, and other church agencies had fallen into line before the denomination’s members had an opportunity to be heard. The fact that the resolution passed by a vote of 668 to 269 suggests that many rank and file church members were rebelling against the national organization’s fait accompli.

The ELCA paved the way for the “Peace Not Walls” resolution with an article in the May 2005 issue of the denomination’s official magazine, the Lutheran. The Lutheran article was permeated by anti-Israel bias and riddled with false allegations against Israel. The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) identified 12 major factual errors, and one overriding omission:

A crucial omission marred the [May 2005] article as a whole. There was not one reference to Palestinian terrorism originating from terrorist strongholds in West Bank cities, the causal factor in Israel’s erecting a protective barrier. The omission is indicative of the striking disregard for Israeli suffering and loss of life that underpins the piece.

The failure even to mention, let alone denounce, Palestinian terrorism is a consistent hallmark of the ELCA’s writings on the Middle East. The “Peace Not Walls” resolution, like the Lutheran article, makes no specific mention of Palestinian terrorism, never acknowledges that Israel is building the fence to keep out mass murderers, not to steal a few acres of land, and gives no hint that the fence has saved many Israeli lives by making it more difficult for terrorists to slip into Israel. Likewise, the ELCA’s Strategy for Engagement In Israel and Palestine singles out the fence as a threat to peace, but is entirely silent with respect to Palestinian terrorism:

This Churchwide Strategy for ELCA Engagement in Israel and Palestine . . . describes the fragile hope for a just and peaceful solution that is growing in the region following the recent Palestinian elections. It also expresses a sense of urgency, calling for strong and concerted action so that: (1) the possibility of secure, contiguous, and viable Israeli and Palestinian states is not eroded by the placement of the separation wall and Israeli settlements in the occupied territories; (2) the witness and diaconic work of the indigenous churches in Israel and Palestine continues; and (3) the future of humanitarian ministries in Jerusalem and the West Bank—in particular those in which the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America participates through the Lutheran World Federation—are not jeopardized by a proposed change in Israeli tax policy.

The ELCA’s pronouncements on the Middle East are so one-sided as to suggest a dissociation from reality. Hamas gunmen brandish firearms as they celebrate Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza and vow to continue their effort to exterminate the Jews; yet the ELCA thinks the chief threat to peace in the region is Israel’s attempt to keep these terrorists out. For that matter, the ELCA seems more worried about Israeli tax policy than Palestinian terrorism.

Of course, this willful blindness to Middle Eastern reality is not unique to the ELCA; on the contrary, it afflicts most mainstream Protestant denominations, as reflected, to take just one example, in the anti-Israel posture of the World Council of Churches. What explains the anti-Israel bias of the leaders of most mainstream denominations? There is no possible theological justification for it. There can be no more fundamental Christian doctrine than opposition to mass murder, as practiced by Palestinian terrorists. And there could hardly be deeper grounds for religious affinity than the shared scriptures and intertwined histories and traditions of the Jewish and Christian faiths. So it is no surprise that American Christians, and Americans generally, have overwhelmingly supported Israel in its conflicts with the Palestinians.

Dissociation from Middle Eastern reality exists, not among the laity of the ELCA and other traditional Protestant churches, but among the leaders and professional staffers of these denominations. It is hard to escape the conclusion that those leaders are just one more layer of the liberal elite; for them, support for the Palestinian cause is of a piece with other liberal political positions promoted by their church hierarchies—environmentalism, high taxes, and so on. The fact that the leadership of mainline Protestant churches is dominated by liberals who substitute their own political biases for Christian doctrine and principles is an important factor limiting the growth of those denominations in comparison to the newer, evangelical churches whose leadership is not dominated by political liberalism.

John Hinderaker is a contributing writer to THE DAILY STANDARD, a contributor to the blog Power Line, and a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

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Emotions Run High as Lutherans Discuss Role of Homosexuals (Christian Post, 050810)

Emotions ran high at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s evening gathering in Orlando, Fla., Tuesday, but nothing was resolved regarding what role homosexuals should have in the denomination.

Some 400 delegates and observers gathered into a hotel meeting room yesterday to talk informally about their view on the most critical issue facing the church: homosexual ordinations and same-sex marriage blessings.

While no one advocated the church to completely back gay marriage, some said barriers to gay ordination – whether or not the minister is celibate – should be taken down.

The Rev. Robert Goldstein, a gay minister at Immanuel Evangelical Lutheran Church in Chicago, said delegates should “go beyond the justice of incrementalism” and remove limits to homosexual leadership.

“I’m a gay pastor in this church. I serve faithfully. I love it,” said Goldstein, who wore a rainbow sash around his cleric’s collar. “Our church must go beyond institutionalizing fear.”

Later this week, the denomination will consider passing three recommendations on sexuality that would essentially keep the church’s prohibitions of sexually active gay ministers and blessings of gay marriages, but allow excepts to either case. These slippery exceptions have been widely criticized by conservative and traditional Lutherans, who are planning to call for amendments to clarify what the recommendations are really saying for the 1,018 ELCA voting members there.

On Sunday, the Southwestern Pennsylvania Synod asked the Church Council to spell out what it means in its second recommendation, which says the church should respect a 1993 Bishops’ statement against homosexual marriage blessings. At the end of that statement, there is a cause extending “pastoral care” to homosexuals, and some have used the 1993 statement to justify blessing homosexual partners as a part of “pastoral care.” The Church Council was therefore asked to clarify its recommendation, since people have had different interpretations of it.

However, the Council left the recommendation as-is, saying any further discussion would confuse matters more.

On Tuesday, Judy Biffle of Houston, a member of the church council who led the standing-room-only hearing crowd, acknowledged the recommendation “is ambiguous somewhat intentionally.”

Clear or unclear, some members said clashes with conservative partners overseas will be threatened should the ELCA take an open stance toward actively gay ministers.

The Rev. Carol Custead of Hollidaysburg, Pa. said a Lutheran bishop in Kenya had told her “ties may have to be broken” if the denomination moved toward approving gay relationships.

This would not come as a surprise to many observers. In 2003, the Episcopal Church, USA, consecrated its first openly gay bishop, and months later it was caught in one of the biggest schisms of Anglican history. Now, many of the world’s Anglicans choose not to associate with the Episcopal Church and have called for the American church’s excommunication.

A vote on the resolutions - or amendments or substitutes - is expected Friday.

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ELCA Assembly Acts On Key Sexuality Proposals (ECLA, 050812)

ORLANDO, Fla. (ELCA) — The 2005 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) affirmed pastoral care for all people including people who are gay or lesbian, and continued to encourage the church to welcome gay and lesbian people into its life. In a related action, the assembly rejected a proposal that would have allowed the church, under special circumstances, to ordain gay and lesbian candidates for ministry who are involved in lifelong, committed same-sex relationships.

While the assembly did not create formal rites for blessing couples in same-sex relationships, it entrusted pastoral care to individual pastors and congregations. ELCA church leaders said that the actions affirmed the ELCA’s current standards for ministry and reaffirmed the pastoral guidance of a 1993 pastoral letter issued by the ELCA Conference of Bishops.

The churchwide assembly, the chief legislative authority of the ELCA, is meeting here August 8-14 at the World Center Marriott and Convention Center. About 2,300 people are participating, including 1,018 ELCA voting members. The theme for the biennial assembly is “Marked with the Cross of Christ Forever.”

Voting members devoted virtually all day Aug. 12 to three recommendations related to its Studies on Sexuality. The ELCA assembly actions highlighted pastoral guidance from its Conference of Bishops and restated its trust in its pastoral leaders. The church resolved to “welcome gay and lesbian persons into its life (as stated in Churchwide Assembly resolutions from 1991, 1995, and 1999), and trust pastors and congregations to discern ways to provide faithful pastoral care to all to whom they minister.” The Rev. Carol Hendrix, bishop of the ELCA Lower Susquehanna Synod, initiated an amendment to replace “same-sex couples” with “all to whom they minister” making the guidance match the bishops’ pastoral message.

As the assembly deliberation began, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the ELCA, said that the church has “done this work well. We’ve listened to each other. We’ve learned from each other. We’ve prayed for and with each other. And I believe we’ve journeyed together faithfully” in the ELCA’s three-year study of the questions related to homosexuality.

The debate regarding blessing same-sex relationships focused on many voting members’ discomfort with perceived ambiguity regarding pastoral discretion in ministry with same-sex couples. A number of attempts to amend the resolution to more clearly define whether same-sex blessings were allowed failed. Robert Benne, voting member, ELCA Virginia Synod, was one of those attempting to clarify the resolution. He said the “ambiguity of [recommendation] number two is what many in the ELCA find troubling.” On the other hand, the Rev. Stephen P. Bouman, bishop of the ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod, told voting members that many of their children come to live within the parishes of his synod. He asked for help in creating the “pastoral space to serve the children that we take — so that can we be the church together and create space for that to happen.”

Members of the assembly often disagreed in the debate on the use of the Bible. Many voting members urged the assembly to adhere to the Scriptures as the rule and norm for the life and faith. But a number also agreed with the Rev. Ralph Klein, resource theologian from Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, who reminded the assembly that what the scripture meant in it original context and what it means for today is not always the same thing.

Ultimately, the assembly failed to adopt a policy recommendation that would allow the church to ordain, consecrate and commission candidates for ministry who are in life-long, committed same-sex relationships. The vote fell well short — 490-503 — of the two-thirds required to make the change.

Current ELCA policy expects ministers to refrain from sexual relations outside marriage, which it defines as “a lifelong covenant of faithfulness between a man and a woman.”

At a news conference after the voting, Hanson said that he knew going into the debate that “however the vote turned out some would be disappointed” but he also stated that he “hopes that those disappointed in the votes would not sever their relationship with the church or step back” from their involvement. I hope that “everyone hears it clearly — all week as we have discussed publicly and clearly — that gay and lesbian persons are welcome in this church.”

The Rev. Roy Riley, bishop of the New Jersey Synod and chair of the ELCA Conference of Bishops, said “what impressed me about today was how right the [sexuality studies] task force was.” He said that they “heard out in the church a significant minority that wanted flexibility and space to go in another direction.”

Hanson said that he was pleased by the “respectful tone” of both the voting members and the visitors, referring to a silent protest that took place during the debate. In the early afternoon, some 100 persons wearing rainbow scarves around their necks walked slowly to the front of the podium, spread across the convention area, facing the voting members. Hanson requested the group return to the visitor section, but the group remained in place until the end of the Aug. 12 afternoon session. Once it was understood that the protesters were going to remain, Hanson invited the assembly to continue business.

The Rev. Sue Ericsson, voting member, ELCA Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod, told the bishop, “I am in awe of your ability to lead us through this — if you can do it, we can do it.”

Following the assembly actions today, the Rev. Jodi Wangsness, voting member and a campus pastor from the ELCA Nebraska Synod, said “I’m hearing an improvement. I think [the statement] understands that this is a church that is in dialogue. We’ve been faithful to the conversation with one another.”

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Lutherans reaffirm gay clergy celibacy (Washington Times, 050813)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the country’s largest and most liberal Lutheran denomination, kept in place a ban on active homosexual clergy yesterday at its annual convention, but took a more ambiguous stance on same-sex church “blessings.”

After eight hours of debate, 1,000 delegates meeting in Orlando, Fla., defeated by a vote of 503-490 a resolution that would have allowed bishops and church synods, or districts, to ordain homosexual ministers if they are in a “committed relationship.”

The vote was not as close as it appears, since changes in church law require a two-thirds majority vote.

The vote lets stand current ELCA policy that homosexual clergy must remain celibate.

Still, the presence of about 100 pro-homosexual rights demonstrators wearing rainbow sashes who stationed themselves at the front of the convention hall during the vote and refused to leave, despite pleas from Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, might have influenced some delegates.

“It was a form of intimidation, and it did work on some voters by closing the gap on the vote,” said Jaynan Egland, president of WordAlone, a conservative Lutheran group.

A second resolution, which passed 670-323, reaffirmed a 1993 ban by Lutheran bishops on same-sex church “blessing” ceremonies, but affirmed ministry to homosexuals and “pastoral care” from congregations to “all to whom they minister.”

“The resolution stopped short of asking permission to conduct same-sex blessings,” ELCA spokeswoman Melissa Ramirez-Cooper said, “but it doesn’t preclude it, either. That’s where the ambiguity is.”

It’s conceivable, she added, that a congregation’s definition of ministry could include a same-sex blessing.

ELCA Bishop Theodore Schneider, head of the Metropolitan Washington, D.C. Synod, called the vote on blessings “as ambiguous as the church is.”

“There is no stated policy in this church, and that’s the way it still is,” he said yesterday. “[Same-sex blessings are] still seen as the exception, not the norm in the church. There’s no bylaw that permits it, and no rule against it.”

Although the ELCA in 1990 ejected two San Francisco congregations that ordained three homosexuals, a few churches across the country have since then quietly employed at least 14 clergy and seminarians living in same-sex relationships, according to Lutheran Lesbian and Gay Ministries.

The 4.9-million member ELCA has been debating homosexuality for years. In January, a church task force recommended the denomination not change its policy against ordaining noncelibate homosexuals, but that it not censure churches that break the rule.

There was no ruling yesterday on how to deal with churches that insist on ordaining active homosexuals. The matter is expected to come up again during the next ELCA convention in two years.

“In 2007, we’ll still be on the topic of sexuality,” Mrs. Egland said. “Some of us wanted to close the door and move on with the mission of the church, but the matter is still in front of us.”

To date, the 1.3-million member United Church of Christ remains the largest denomination to allow homosexual clergy. On July 4, UCC delegates meeting in Atlanta voted overwhelmingly to approve same-sex “marriage.”

Earlier in the day yesterday, Lutheran delegates passed a resolution 851-127 calling for unity within the church. After that, things got more convoluted.

“There are no winners,” Bishop Schneider said of the convention. “People who wanted to see change lost on this round.”

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Lutheran Church Votes on Sexuality Statements (Christian Post, 050813)

After hours of debate and wrangling, voting members at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s churchwide assembly yesterday re-affirmed the ban on non-celibate gay clergy but left same-sex union blessings up to individual pastors and churches.

With a 670-323 vote, the delegates approved the measure on same-sex unions. The measure urges members to abide by a 1993 statement that prohibits same-sex unions but allows for exceptions under “pastoral care.”

Both proponents and opponents of gay marriage tried but failed to amend the ambiguous wording of the measure. The one change that was approved dropped the reference to giving pastoral care to “same-sex couples” to include “all to whom [pastors] minister.”

Later that day, voting members rejected a resolution 490-503 a resolution that would give exceptions to the no non-celibate gay clergy rule. It would’ve taken a two-thirds majority to pass.

In addition, the 87 percent of the voting members passed a resolution that called for unity despite differences on the issue of homosexuality.

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ELCA Board Commends New Gender-Neutral Worship Resource despite Criticisms (Christian Post, 051115)

The board members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America are backing a new worship resource conservatives say counters the Word of God.

The “Evangelical Lutheran Worship” is the outcome of a five-year project initiated by the ELCA Church Council in 2000 to “renew the worship life” of the five-million-member denomination.

During the biennial Church Council meeting on Nov. 11-13 in Chicago, the ELCA board of directors commended the new worship resource as an “enriching addition” to the church.

Since 2000 when the church council first started the project, staff members have collected more than 700 hymns, songs and service music pieces that reflect 10 different musical settings for Holy Communion. Members of the church are encouraged to “discuss, explore, review and engage with new worship materials” before the new book is published.

Conservatives in the ELCA have largely criticized the worship resource and rallied against moving further in the project. According to reformed leaders, the worship book introduces changes in the language that are “contrary to Christian beliefs because there is a radical feminist agenda behind it.”

One such change is the gender-neutral references to God.

“The renaming of God is just a direct assault on the orthodox faith and the church” said Mark Chavez, director of the Word Alone Network.

This may also lead to other “misuses” of the book, according to Chavez, such as presiding over same-sex marriages. Since the new provision does not instruct a “man” or “woman” but rather “this couple” or “that couple,” the text would be open to use in such services.

During the 2005 Churchwide Assembly – the denomination’s highest legislative authority that meets once every two years – conservatives brought up their concerns but the assembly passed a resolution to move forward with the project.

The Evangelical Lutheran Worship book is still in progress, but once printed, it will be the third-ever musical resource to be released by the denomination and will follow the two volumes, “This Far by Faith” and “Libro de Liturgia y Cantico.”

Funds for developing the new project are allocated through churchwide spending budgets. However, the worship book’s printing costs will be covered by the individual congregations that choose to buy it.

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Lutheran Council Acts on Sexuality Recommendations (Christian Post, 051119)

Top leaders in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America avoided deciding on several controversial requests to change the current standards of ordination that prohibit sexually active gays and lesbians into the ministry.

During its regular fall meeting in Chicago earlier this week, ELCA Church Council declined a request to review the “Vision and Expectation” document that outlines ordination standards. The council also referred to a separate board a resolution related to the church’s discipline in cases where ordination standards are violated.

The council of the ELCA Southwest California Synod in Glendale forwarded a resolution requesting the Council to authorize the denomination’s Vocation and Education board to conduct a review of the ordination standards. Under current standards, ministers are expected to practice fidelity in marriage and chastity if single; homosexuals are expected to be celibate since same-sex unions are not recognized as marriages.

Under the California Synod’s request, the Education board would examine the standards from “a variety of biblical and confessional theologians from the church.” The Synod specifically wrote that the current standards “continue to create much of the disagreement within the ELCA on matters related to the role of gay and lesbian rostered ministers.”

According to ELCA news, the Council declined the request and removed the resolution from its “en bloc” status.

In a separate decision, the Council referred to a separate board a resolution from the ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod regarding the disciplining process for those who break the candidacy standards. Under current guidelines, ministers who violate the standards of ministry are defrocked. The Metro New York resolution recommended that a minister or pastor should not be disciplined if they are guilty solely of being in an active same-sex relationship.

Earlier this year, the ELCA task force on sexuality released three recommendations relating to homosexuality. The first urged members of the ELCA to stay together in spite of disagreements, the second asked the ELCA to keep the ministerial standards of chastity and fidelity, and the third asked to establish exceptions to the ministerial standards in cases where gay ministers were in “loving relationships.”

In June, delegates to the ELCA Churchwide Assembly – the denomination’s highest legislative authority – adopted the first two recommendations but rejected the third. As a result, there is no change in the ELCA’s expectations of rostered leaders.

According to the Word Alone Network, a conservative renewal group within the ELCA, the Metro New York’s resolutions stand in defiance of the current ELCA regulations.

“The long and the short of it is, the Metro NY Synod is defying current ELCA regulations and rejecting the 2005 assembly’s vote against a proposition that would have allowed for such ordinations, but only through a special approval process,” a statement from the Word Alone Network read.

The New York resolution has been referred to the ELCA Office of the Secretary in consultation with the ELCA Office of the Presiding Bishop, Vocation and Education, and ELCA Conference of Bishops. The Council requested that “a report and possible recommendations be presented to the (Council’s) April 2006 meeting.

The Church Council is the ELCA’s board of directors and serves as the legislative authority of the church between churchwide assemblies. The Council meet in Chicago from Nov. 11-13.

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Lutherans Renew Discussion on Human Sexuality (Christian Post, 060213)

America’s largest Lutheran denomination renewed its debate over human sexuality last week by adding six new members to a team that was set aside to develop a social statement on the issue by 2009.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Task Force on Human Sexuality met in Chicago from Feb. 2-5 to help new and continuing members function well together, “to start getting our minds around this complex topic,” and to identify priorities for the social statement, according to the ELCA news service. The members will be continuing the work of an old task force that developed a specific statement on homosexuality early last year.

The task force began its work in 2001 and tackled two key questions: whether the church should bless same-sex relationships, and whether it should ordain such people into the ministry.

Following the development of the homosexuality statement, which generally upheld the church’s stance against both same-sex relationships and the ordination of homosexual ministers, some members of the task force decided to step down from roles, leaving open space for new members.

The new task force will tackle the larger topic of human sexuality, and is expected to develop an official church statement on the topic. Part of their task is also to engage the church in an open dialogue surrounding the changing nature of human sexuality.

“We want to engage the entire church in an interesting, helpful, transparent process,” said the Rev. Peter Strommen, bishop of the ELCA Northeastern Minnesota Synod, and chair of the task force. “Our deep desire is that by the time this is all done there is a social statement that will genuinely aid the ministry of the church on a very important topic.”

Their statement will not act as a mandate for the church but rather as a guideline on how church members are expected to view the issue.

During the Chicago meeting, task force members heard several presentations on the way sexuality is presented in the modern world.

Dr. Adina Nack, assistant professor of sociology at the California Lutheran University, discussed popular culture and the media, research, differences between sex and gender, sexual orientation, extra-relational sex, sexually transmitted diseases, and sex education as part of her presentation on “Sexuality and Society.”

“This group is undertaking a large and complicated task, so I wanted to give an overview of some of the major findings and debates among social scientists when it comes to studies of sexuality,” Nack told ELCA news.

“I left people with more questions than answers, and unfortunately that’s the reality of the subject matter,” Nack added. “There are some clear answers [from] a standpoint of what seems to produce better health outcomes – physical and mental well-being – but, when it gets to matters of morality and spirituality, it’s a lot more fuzzy.”

The 14-member task force will be sending out discussion topics and resources for local churches to engage in the debate. Task force members include both lay and ordained ministers, and students and teachers.

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Synod softens stand on gay unions: Lutherans in Canada vote on ‘local option’ for blessings (Anglican News, 060707)

[KH: what kind of Evangelicals are these?]

Homosexual Lutheran couples from Ontario to the Maritimes could soon have their relationships blessed by their pastors.

In a historic move during their biennial convention in Waterloo yesterday, Eastern Synod delegates of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada voted 197-75 to allow individual congregations to decide whether to perform blessings for same-sex couples.

“It was clear,” said Rev. Michael Pryse, the Eastern Synod bishop. “That’s solid support.”

The decision came after about an hour of passionate debate that left opponents of same-sex blessings sombre.

“It’s a triumph of emotion over reason,” said Ken Shultz, a lay delegate from Ottawa.

In Canada, the only other mainline church body allowing blessings for same-sex couples is the Anglican Church of Canada’s New Westminster diocese in B.C.

The United Church of Canada is the only mainline denomination in Canada that will marry same-sex couples.

The decision by Lutheran delegates in Waterloo yesterday allows pastors to bless the unions of same-sex couples — who commit to being in lifelong relationships — only after pastors consult their bishop and after a two-thirds majority vote by the congregation.

The move is known as the “local option.”

The decision does not allow gay couples to wed in Lutheran churches.

It could be months before homosexual Lutheran couples can get their unions blessed.

Opponents plan to table a motion at the synod convention, today or tomorrow, to appeal yesterday’s decision.

They argue delegates didn’t have the jurisdiction to hold the vote because delegates to a national convention last year rejected a motion that was nearly identical.

Opponents from any synod can ask the National Church Council — an executive committee of clergy and lay people with bishops acting as non-voting advisers — to forward the appeal to a national church court. The synod’s jurisdiction to hold yesterday’s vote is debatable, said Pryse, the synod’s bishop.

“I think a good case can be made one way or the other.”

Pryse said if an appeal gets underway, he will ask pastors and congregations to hold off on performing blessings “until there is clarity.”

Pryse didn’t vote yesterday but said he was “pleased” with the result.

Despite the outcome of any possible appeal, the consequences for the Eastern Synod aren’t clear, according to Rev. Raymond Schultz, the church’s national bishop.

“The court has no apparatus for enforcing its ruling,” he said in an interview moments after the vote.

More than a dozen delegates lined up at microphones for the duration of the hour-long debate.

Supporters of the “local option” outnumbered opponents more than two to one.

Nancy Mayberry, a foreign languages scholar and lay delegate from Aylmer, Ont., supported the local option.

She said people can read the same Scriptures and come up with different interpretations.

And when there is a choice between legalism and grace, she said, “go with grace.”

Rev. Frank Haggarty, pastor at St. Peter’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in downtown Kitchener, pointed out that if the “local option” were approved, no congregation would be forced to bless same-sex couples. “If my congregation says no — it’s no.”

Opponents of same-sex blessings argued they are staying true to Scripture.

Rev. Paul Jensen, a pastor from St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Bridgewater, N.S., said supporters of same-sex blessings are absolving individuals of the capacity to sin.

And he bristled at suggestions he doesn’t care for his parishioners if he doesn’t support same-sex blessings.

“Please don’t tell me I don’t love my gay and lesbian (parishioners),” he said. “I do love them, but I’m not going to marry them.”

Rev. Joachim Knaack, a retired pastor from Toronto, predicted dire consequences if delegates approved the blessings.

“This is a matter that will divide the church forever,” he said.

Rev. Peeter Vanker, a retired pastor living in Markham who opposes same-sex blessings, said the outcome of yesterday’s vote will cause deeper division between Lutherans across Canada.

“It’s going to drive an even stronger wedge between us in the East and them in the West,” he said.

Delegates re-elected Pryse as bishop of the Eastern Synod. First elected in 1998, Pryse will serve a third four-year term.

The synod conference ends Sunday.

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Gay Lutheran Pastor Faces Dismissal (Christian Post, 060811)

ATLANTA (AP) - Keep quiet about his gay relationship or keep his promise to the church leadership.

That’s the choice the Rev. Bradley Schmeling faced after his relationship with his boyfriend grew. And his decision could leave him defrocked and ousted from his Atlanta church.

When Schmeling became pastor of St. John’s Lutheran Church six years ago, his homosexuality was no secret to the hierarchy of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. He was also single then, so it didn’t pose as great a problem.

He promised Bishop Ronald Warren that, if his situation changed, he’d come forward. That promise came back to haunt him in March when Schmeling decided his relationship with his boyfriend had become a lifelong partnership.

At the church’s regional office in downtown Atlanta, Schmeling walked Warren through the history of his two-year relationship with his boyfriend.

“It was an issue of conscience and integrity,” Schmeling said. “I was fulfilling my promise to him, knowing full well the consequences.”

After he was finished, the bishop promptly asked Schmeling to resign. And Schmeling promptly refused.

This week, Warren responded by calling for a committee to review evidence, listen to witness testimony and ultimately decide whether to discipline the 43-year-old pastor.

As mainline Protestant denominations struggle over how to include gays and lesbians in their church services and on their pulpits, a more personal battle is being waged in local communities.

Lutherans Concerned, a gay rights group, estimates there are hundreds of Lutheran pastors reluctant to come out of the closet for fear of losing their jobs.

For those who choose to come out, the reaction varies by region. When a handful of pastors on the West Coast came forward, they faced no discipline. Schmeling’s case, however, is the first in the more conservative Southern region, and a test case for the entire denomination’s tolerance, said Emily Eastwood, executive director of Lutherans Concerned.

Other mainline Protestant denominations are facing tough, divisive decisions of their own.

In June, the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) refused to change a church law that required clergy and lay officers to limit sex to heterosexual couples. But it also granted new leeway for local congregations to sidestep the rule and install gay ministers.

Tension over gay rights has threatened to split the Episcopal Church, following the 2003 consecration of the first openly gay Episcopal bishop, V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

And at national Protestant assemblies throughout the summer, the traditional Christian prohibition on gay sex has frequently dominated discussion. As the debate trickles down, local leaders face some of the toughest decisions.

Schmeling said he and the bishop enjoyed a warm, collegial relationship. “It was not an easy decision for him,” Schmeling said. And although Warren wouldn’t comment on the case, he wrote in an open letter that he made the decision after a “lengthy process of prayerful discernment.”

The charges begin a formal process which could take months. To Schmeling, who plans to remain as pastor of the 345-member church until a decision is made, it also offers a chance to tell the story of his church and defend its motto: To love gracefully and welcome unconditionally.

“Our church is determined to welcome everybody and not let the issue of homosexuality divide us,” he said. “There’s far too many people who are trying to draw lines, build walls between communities. We want to be a church that breaks down those walls.”

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Evangelical Lutherans to Release Final Study on Human Sexuality (Christian Post, 061007)

Evangelical Lutherans are signing off on their final human sexuality study to obtain an accurate picture of the different voices on homosexuality in the church.

“Set Free in Christ: Talking about Human Sexuality” is the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s third study guide engaging its 4.85 million members in discussion before the church’s official social statement on human sexuality. The final study is slated for release to the church on Dec. 4.

Responses from the three studies will help shape ELCA’s statement on human sexuality including such issues as gay marriage and the consecration of homosexual persons. The 2001 Churchwide Assembly of the ELCA had mandated that the church engage in such studies under the banner of “Journey Together Faithfully” for a proposed social statement due to be released early 2009.

“One of the most unique parts of our study is that we’re grounding it in an evangelical ethic that’s been very beautifully articulated through the Lutheran tradition,” said the Rev. Peter Strommen, according to the ELCA News Service. “Galatians will help set the framework for conversation and return us to the basics, that we are saved by God’s grace through faith. Grounded in that freedom to seek the neighbor’s good, what does it mean to be sexual beings?”

The study series began with a review of the church’s “Message on Sexuality: Some Common Convictions” which was adopted in 1996 as a summary of the teaching of the ELCA and its predecessor church bodies. Although responses to the study were fewer than hoped for, suggestions for topics to be added included “alternative lifestyles and new family structures,” “bisexuality and transgender sexuality,” “teenage pregnancy,” and “cybersex.”

Concerns were also raised about creating a social statement. Respondents said low participation in the study is a questionable basis for a statement and posed who actually speaks in a social statement. Another concern was that any language the ELCA devises as its statement is “subject to culturally influenced misinterpretation.”

The second study focused on homosexuality and ministries issues such as same-sex blessings and ordination. And the soon-to-be-released third study focuses on aspects of human sexuality in society that have not been extensively covered in the two previous studies.

The ELCA task force had released three recommendations early last year including a proposal to establish exceptions to the ministerial standards in cases where gay ministers were in “loving relationships.” The 2005 churchwide assembly declined the request that would have allowed the church to ordain active homosexual candidates for ministry.

Responses to the third study on human sexuality will be received through Nov. 1, 2007

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Lutheran Council Acts on Sexuality Recommendations (Christian Post, 051119)

According to ELCA news, the Council declined the request and removed the resolution from its “en bloc” status.

According to the Word Alone Network, a conservative renewal group within the ELCA, the Metro New York’s resolutions stand in defiance of the current ELCA regulations.

The Church Council is the ELCA’s board of directors and serves as the legislative authority of the church between churchwide assemblies. The Council meet in Chicago from Nov. 11-13.

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Top Lutheran Council Rejects Synod’s Same-Sex Resolution (Christian Post, 060408)

A top legislative body of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America rejected an effort by its New York Synod to override denomination-wide laws regarding homosexual ministers.

At an Apr. 1-2 meeting in Chicago, the Church Council of the ELCA concluded that a resolution adopted by the church’s New York Synod “contains inherently conflicting statements that may be read as being in conflict with the constitution and bylaws of this church.” The synod resolution addressed the “exercise of discipline” regarding lay leaders and ordained ministers who are openly and actively homosexual.

Last year, the ELCA affirmed its longstanding policy requiring ministers to refrain from any sexual relations outside of heterosexual marriage. Ministers who violate such policies can be lightly reprimanded or have their ministerial licenses revoked.

Despite the church-wide decision, the New York Synod adopted separate resolutions concerning the discipline of a minister “in a loving, committed, same-gender relationship.”

Under its resolution, the New York synod decided that the disciplining of an openly homosexual minister should be determined mainly by the “mission and pastoral needs of the congregation and synod.”

In four points, the resolution urged that the discipline committee refrain from disciplining the minister if the pastoral needs of the congregation are not served through such discipline.

The Church Council, which received the synod’s resolution in November 2005, rejected the resolution on the basis that “synods do not have the authority to adopt their own policies and guidelines for discipline.”

In further explaining the conflict, the council’s chair of legal and constitutional review told the ELCA News Service that the New York resolution would add additional requirements before submitting a charge against ministers who violate church policy.

The resolution suggested “that you can only submit a charge to the bishop if you describe how it would best serve the mission and pastoral needs of that specific ministry,” said the Rev. Kenneth M. Ruppar, pastor of the Lutheran Church of Our Saviour in Richmond, Va.

“That’s an additional requirement to the current requirements to submit charges. So, in our reading of it, that appears to add to the requirements, and it changes the basis for filing charges.”

The ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod includes approximately 80,000 Lutherans in more than 230 congregations in the New York counties of Bronx, Dutchess, Kings, Nassau, New York, Orange, Putnam, Queens, Richmond, Rockland, Suffolk, Sullivan, Ulster and Westchester.

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ELCA Head: Challenging Time to Be a Lutheran Christian (Christian Post, 061016)

MCLEAN, Va. – The predominantly white Evangelical Lutherans are getting clear though not completely clear about their identity in an increasingly pluralistic society.

In a time when mainline denominations are on a steady decline in membership, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, presiding bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), said the dropping numbers are not something he is proud of. But at the same time, he does not want the church to become generic for the sake of survival.

“People want continuity and change,” Hanson told reporters just before delivering a “State of the Church” address at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer on Sunday. But not at the expense of each other, he added.

The ELCA is 97 percent white, Hanson reported, and dropped 1.6 percent in membership to 4.85 million in 2005. Congregants also raised concern over ELCA becoming an “older body” with a continuing exodus of youth. Without hesitation, Hanson told them that Evangelical Lutherans are 10 years older than the average age of the U.S. population.

“You’re right,” he told an older white crowd whose church represented the demographics of the national denomination. Hanson even admitted his own six children, including an African American son, were most likely not all present at church that Sunday.

“I think Lutherans got lazy,” Hanson said directly. Plus, the Lutherans have seemingly lost their evangelical flavor.

“We are evangelicals,” Hanson told the congregation. “We’re still ambivalent about what that says about us.”

The presiding bishop said he worries that the church will look at the statistics and act on impulse and lead the denomination to do the “wrong things.” That wrong way would be shedding the Lutheran identity and becoming a generic church and becoming multicultural for the sake of survival rather than being enriched by other people groups.

The denomination is also currently shaping its stance on human sexuality, and more specifically, homosexual ordination and same-sex “marriage.” Since 2001, the church has released studies to its members to come to a consensus for the drafting of the ELCA social statement on human sexuality – due out early 2009.

Hanson made clear that the statement will be concocted on the basis of the congregants’ responses. While Hanson, who will possibly seek another six-year term as presiding bishop, does not yet know the direction that the church is headed in its stance on homosexuality, he stressed both diversity and unity.

“You can differ and you don’t need to divide,” he said. “Differences can also enrich us.”

His words also applied to the milestone agreement on justification that Lutherans, Methodists and Roman Catholics came to in July in Seoul, South Korea – an agreement that some Lutheran congregants worry would have conflict. The three bodies arrived at a “differentiated consensus,” Hanson pointed out, on the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, meaning they had “enough” agreement not to condemn each other but not “complete” agreement.

Despite the raised concerns and challenges facing the church, one Evangelical Lutheran feels good about the direction the ELCA is headed.

“I feel very good about it (issues that the ELCA faces) and having dialogue about it,” said Ron Kutscher, 74, a member of Lutheran Church of the Redeemer.

Hanson also expressed optimism.

“It’s a challenging time to be a Lutheran Christian in the United States and in the world,” he said. The challenges and the questions raised in the church “humble us but don’t paralyze us.”

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Lutheran Head Empathizes with Episcopal Church (Christian Post, 061116)

[KH: Lutherans may be the third one to go after ECUSA and PCUSA.]

Evangelical Lutherans have much to empathize with the divided and highly publicized Episcopalians. They are both struggling over diversity and human sexuality, just at different public levels, indicated the head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

The Rev. Mark S. Hanson, head of the ELCA and the Lutheran World Federation, met with the Episcopal Church’s newly installed presiding bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori, Tuesday to build on the two body’s full communion relationship.

Hanson said the Lutherans “feel the burden” that the Episcopal Church and the new presiding bishop bear in having struggles over diversity and human sexuality played out in a more public way than in the ELCA, according to the Episcopal News Service.

The U.S. Anglican body, which just invested its first woman as head early this month, has been wracked over the issue of homosexuality since the consecration of an openly gay bishop in 2003. The media has widely stayed on top of the homosexual issue in the Episcopal Church ever since, and without the exception of the controversial investiture of Jefferts Schori – a supporter of homosexuality.

Homosexual controversies are prevalent in many other mainline denominations including the ELCA, but on a more quiet level. The ELCA is currently conducting studies on its member bodies and congregants nationwide to shape the church’s official social statement on human sexuality, slated for 2009.

Last year, the Lutheran churchwide assembly declined a request by the ELCA task force that would have allowed the ordination of active homosexual candidates for ministry.

Recognizing the differences lying within the Lutheran body, Hanson has continued to embrace both diversity and unity, saying differences do not necessitate for division.

Differences between the ELCA and the Episcopal Church were put aside when the two church bodies agreed to a Called to Common Mission agreement in 1999, establishing full communion between them. Both fully recognize each other as part of the whole Church of Jesus Christ.

The two denominations have “only begun to imagine” what work can be done through their agreement, as Hanson put it.

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ELCA Head Urges Lutherans to Be ‘Evangelical’ (Christian Post, 070308)

The head of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is turning things around to make the denomination more “evangelical.”

“I suppose one of my greatest frustrations in six years as presiding bishop is, it just feels like we haven’t been able to turn around what I think is a deep ambivalence and resistance in this church to being what we claim in our name, and that’s evangelical,” said ELCA Presiding Bishop the Rev. Mark Hanson, according to the ELCA News Service.

Although such resistance will not change quickly, Hanson indicated, the presiding bishop recently announced that 65 ELCA synods will be given a one-time $10,000 grant to be used for “evangelical outreach.”

“We want you to use your imagination,” said Hanson. Suggestions for outreach included evangelism, training, transformational mission or to help synods fund new mission starts. Beyond programs, Hanson pointed out that becoming more evangelical requires a “deep, fundamental cultural change.”

Funding for the grants, which will be delivered immediately, come from advance grants made from the 2006 church-wide budget to help start new churches this year. The evangelical outreach grants do not “jeopardize” funding for the planned 50 new starts for 2007, Hanson noted.

The push for evangelical outreach comes in addition to Hanson’s efforts to draw diverse people groups into the churches. Hanson expressed concern over the dominantly white and elderly denomination, which claims 4.85 million members, and began meeting with youth and African Americans to break barriers.

Moreover, Hanson called for multicultural and multi-lingual churches rather than segregated congregations of white and other ethnic groups.

The recent grants were announced at a meeting with the ELCA Conference of Bishops, an advisory body of the church. Other topics of discussion included full communion relationship with the Episcopal Church, currently wracked by theological differences, particularly over homosexuality.

“We continue to pray for a church body that’s experiencing incredible tensions, challenges and opportunities,” said Hanson. “I hope that you’re reaching out to your Episcopal bishop colleagues for personal support, and I hope you’re continuing to convene conversations (about) how we can be in mission together. ... This is not a time to pull back from a church that’s facing issues not unlike those we face, but it’s a time for remaining together in full communion.”

A full communion relationship between the ELCA and the Episcopal Church was inaugurated in January 2001.

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Defrocked Gay Pastor Appeals Lutheran Church Decision (Christian Post, 070313)

[KH: Luther would turn in his grave!]

ATLANTA (AP) - The pastor of Atlanta’s oldest Lutheran church has appealed the decision by an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America disciplinary committee to defrock him because he’s in a same-sex relationship.

The Rev. Bradley Schmeling, who was ordered last month to leave the pulpit of St. John’s Lutheran Church on Aug. 15, has appealed that decision in an effort to prompt the church to change its rules on gay clergy, his spokeswoman said in a statement Monday.

The appeals committee, which consists of 12 lay and clergy members, will take at least two months to reach a decision, said ELCA spokesman John Brooks. He said Bishop Ronald Warren of the ECLA’s Southeastern Synod also had appealed a portion of the ruling deemed unfavorable to the synod, and that appeal would also be heard by the appeals committee.

Schmeling told St. John’s 350-member congregation and his bishop that he is gay before he was chosen as pastor in 2000. But last year, when Schmeling announced he had found a lifelong companion, Warren asked the 44-year-old pastor to resign. When Schmeling refused, Warren started disciplinary proceedings against him that led to a closed-door January trial in which a disciplinary hearing committee basically served as the jury.

In their decision, released last month, seven members of the 12-member committee said they felt the rule as stated left them no choice but to defrock Schmeling. [KH: only bare majority??] But the committee also wrote that, if not bound by the church’s rules, it “would find almost unanimously that Pastor Schmeling is not engaged in conduct that is incompatible with the ministerial office” and would order no discipline. [KH: This is a church going downhill. First, almost half of the committee members voted against their own rules. Then, almost everyone voted against the Bible.]

Further, the committee suggested that the ELCA remove its rule and reinstate gay clergy who were removed or resigned because they were in a same-sex “lifelong partnership.”

At the ELCA’s last national meeting in 2005, a proposal to allow synods to decide if they would accept a pastor in a same-sex relationship failed after getting nearly half the 1,000 votes, short of the required two-thirds majority.

St. John’s members and gay rights groups hope Schmeling’s case will provide the final push for change, which the ELCA could consider at its biennial meeting churchwide assembly Aug. 6-12 in Chicago, just days before Schmeling is set to be removed from the clergy.

The ELCA, which has 4.9 million members, allows openly gay clergy, but only if they are celibate. Still, many Lutheran churches support ordaining partnered gays and perform same-sex blessing ceremonies despite the policy. The same debate over how biblical verses on gay relationships should be interpreted is tearing at many mainline Protestant groups.

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World’s Lutherans Debate Homosexuality, Critical Issues (Christian Post, 070326)

While facing debates over ethical issues, including homosexuality, Lutherans from around the world were encouraged to stay in communion around their common faith.

At the Lutheran World Federation’s 60th anniversary service on Sunday, Church of Sweden Archbishop Anders Wejryd told hundreds of attendants that the different practices of the churches on several matters should not threaten the communion of Lutheran churches, according to an LWF press release.

“All we do in our churches and in our entire lives can and should be related to justification as a gift from God that is to be humbly received and lived by, in faith,” he said. “A true interpretation of the Bible does not only bring people to understand the rules and contents of the Bible but it brings them to Jesus.”

Although Jesus had shed light on Scriptures it was up to the members of the communion to interpret them, based on the hermeneutical principles and “looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfector of our faith,” he added.

The archbishop’s comments come in the midst of an eight-day meeting of the LWF Council (the group’s main governing body) where Lutheran churches were encouraged by LWF’s general secretary, the Rev. Dr. Ishmael Noko, to discuss issues of marriage, family and sexuality among other topics.

Church representatives from Africa were vocal in their opposition to same-sex “marriage.”

“If God had wanted people from the same sex to have relationships he would have created Adam and Adam, not Adam and Eve,” said Satou Marthe, a woman delegate from Cameroon, according to Ecumenical News International.

The European Lutheran churches called for a “profound theological study on marriage, family and biblical hermeneutics,” according to LWF. And the North American conference said there is a need to “identify social, political, cultural and interfaith factors” that shape perspectives on these issues.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America had issued a three-part series of studies on human sexuality in recent years out of a mandate by the 2001 Churchwide Assembly. Responses from congregants around the country are expected to help shape ELCA’s statement on human sexuality, including such issues as same-sex marriage and the consecration of homosexuals.

While Noko urged for dialogue among member churches on the controversial issue, African and Asian regions felt there was too much emphasis on issues of sexuality and not enough on pornography, child prostitution, and violence in the marriage and family.

The Lutheran World Federation does not have a stand on the issue of homosexuality yet.

The Church of Sweden – the largest Lutheran church in the world – had announced last week that marriage should be reserved for heterosexual couples but that the church would give blessings to same-sex couples in committed, faithful relationships, according to Ecumenical News International.

The Council meeting, which concludes Tuesday, is taking place in Lund, Sweden, where the government is taking steps toward allowing gay marriage. Sweden already recognizes civil unions between homosexual couples.

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Lutheranism Looking Less Lutheran in the West (Christian Post, 070516)

Traditional Lutheran congregations are looking a little different these days. With mainline churches either losing people in the pews or fearing such a loss, more have chosen to implement evangelical approaches to their less popular traditional ways.

At Zion Lutheran Church in California’s Silicon Valley, the congregation was installing their new associate pastor. A rock-n-roll band was set up on the front lawn of the church and clergy wearing brightly colored Hawaiian shirts sat down in front. After sermons were delivered and the service ended, the luau began.

The church was “not really Lutheran at all except that it took place on the front lawn of a Lutheran church,” wrote Stephen Ellingson, author of The Megachurch and The Mainline.

Ellingson, assistant professor of sociology at Hamilton College in Clinton, N.Y., studied nine Lutheran congregations in the San Francisco Bay Area which has more residents who report having no religious affiliation and fewer Christians than the Orange County and Los Angeles Counties of Southern California. With Lutheranism looking relatively weak in terms of membership on the West Coast, the sociologist was charged with a grant to explain how and why some congregations were able to flourish amid a long-standing loss of membership in the state.

“I go to these churches and I go to worship services, and I start talking to clergy and insiders – people who’ve been around in the Bay Area – who knew the history of Lutheranism in California. And one of the things that hit me over the head from the very beginning was no one really cared about being Lutheran,” Ellingson explained to The Christian Post. “No one seemed very knowledgeable about the tradition. No one seemed to care much about it.”

While some churches were intentional about Lutheran tradition, by and large, it seemed like “who cares?” said Ellingson.

People are not committed to their denomination, the author observed after studying the nine Lutheran churches. Although some surveys have suggested that Lutherans do care about tradition, as Ellingson noted, a recent survey by LifeWay Research revealed lack of loyalty to a denomination. Among people who switched churches, 54% changed denominations when moving to a new church and 44% consider denomination as an important factor in selecting a church.

“Tradition, writ large, is dead. Being a uniquely, a particular type of Christian - a Lutheran Christian, a Presbyterian Christian, an Episcopalian Christian - doesn’t matter anymore (people in their 20s, 30s and teens),” said Ellingson. “So people just want to be Christian.”

Particularly in the West, congregations are less interested in following or reproducing doctrine, theology, and ethics emanating from denominational centers and more interested in creating church life to fit the local context, wrote Ellingson. He noted some historians argue that geographic distance from the national religious centers and pervasive individualism and pragmatism in the West have produced such congregations.

Retired clergy in the Bay Area have suggested to Ellingson that Lutheran congregations in California either hold on to the tradition so tightly that they become life-long Lutherans and irrelevant to everyone, or they adopt the traditions of other Christian groups and in the process lose the strongest parts of their Lutheran heritage.

Not all churches are on the decline in membership, but those that have stable numbers are afraid that they are going to die, said Ellingson. As the members in such churches age, they fear they won’t get replaced, he explained.

“We have to change or die” served as a mantra for most of the congregations Ellingson studied.

For churches that choose to change, many are adding elements of evangelicalism.

“Anecdotally, one of the things I heard and witnessed a lot was just how important the megachurches are for all sorts of clergy especially,” said Ellingson.

Some clergy and lay leaders, not just within the Lutheran denomination, connect with different church professional groups such as the Willow Creek Association for resources and help in understanding the different practices that have led to the success and growth of megachurches.

One surprising finding, Ellingson pointed out, is that the synod – the local administrative region of Lutheranism – would bring in people who weren’t Lutheran to talk with Lutheran ministers about the problems facing Lutheran and mainline churches.

The book suggests that “the old boundaries that kept evangelicalism and mainline Protestantism in separate religious worlds are breaking down as churches within the old mainline adopt the worship practices, theological language, and identities of evangelicalism and nondenominationalism,” wrote Ellingson. “It appears that evangelicalism and nondenominationalism are colonizing mainline Protestantism.”

Overall, mainline churches realize they have got to do stuff differently, said the sociologist – whether it means “really being Lutheran” and embodying the best of tradition or embracing evangelical practices.

There isn’t one solution, Ellingson said, and the Lutherans haven’t figured out the best way to go yet. Right now, it’s a period of trial and error and “whenever it ends, Lutheranism will look differently than it does today.”

Traditionalists won the 19th century fight regarding these issues, noted Ellingson, but he’s not convinced the traditionalists will win this fight.

The Megachurch and The Mainline was released on May 1 and was written as an academic book for sociologists from a sociologist point of view, Ellingson clarified.

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Sex and a Lutheran Youth Group (Townhall.com, 070819)

By Frank Pastore

How do they do it?

I mean, how can the leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) tell their kids with a straight face not to be sexually active outside of marriage when they’ve just voted last Saturday to no longer enforce the celibacy requirement for their unmarried staff—both straight and gay?

The ELCA and other pro-gay denominations have been ordaining gays for decades. That’s nothing new. What’s new is that now staff can openly have lovers while on the job and there will be no disciplinary action for violating the celibacy requirement.

The message to the kids is loud and clear: We can have sex with our boyfriends and girlfriends, but you can’t.

What hypocrisy.

This is what happens when sin and the Bible collide: either the Bible will change the sin or the sin will change the Bible.

In this case, it’s homosexual passion that’s changing the Bible.

Not only have they decided, essentially, to rewrite the Bible and declare homosexuality no longer a sin, but now they’ve gone beyond that to include fornication too. Adultery can’t be far behind.

Look for other liberal denominations to follow suit.

So, this means an unmarried youth pastor can openly discuss the sex life he has with his boyfriend without fear of losing his job, while at the same time supposedly providing spiritual leadership to teenagers and counseling them to “wait until marriage?”

Maybe Lutheran parents should be a little more concerned when their kids come home and say they want to be just like the youth pastor. Perhaps they should be a little more suspicious when their kids display a sudden new zeal to attend Lutheran youth camp.

Or, maybe they’re not concerned at all about their kids being sexually active with the church’s tacit permission.

Maybe they—like the entire denomination—have just given up on the whole “try-not-to-sin” thing.

Our kids are going to do it anyway … we can’t stop them … all we can do is be “responsible” and try to prevent them from getting AIDS or getting pregnant … what we really need to do is provide them condoms—just like we do with our adults.

Who needs moral purity when you can have such tolerance and understanding?

It used to be that girls were sometimes deterred from being sexually promiscuous in high school out of fear of getting a bad “reputation.”

Now an entire denomination has a well-deserved bad reputation.

I looked around on the official ELCA Web site for what they teach their children about sexuality. Here’s what I found on a page entitled, “Sexuality: Some Common Convictions.”

• Under “Responsible procreation and parenting” I found the following:

Youth need the support and guidance of the church to resist cultural and peer pressures that encourage sexual intercourse prior to marriage. Open and honest discussion of sexual questions is to be encouraged, in ways that communicate God’s guidance, forgiveness, and ongoing care. As a church, we affirm the importance of education about sexuality that emphasizes respect, mutuality, responsibility, and abstinence outside of marriage.

But, why should you try to “resist the cultural and peer pressures that encourage sexual intercourse prior to marriage” and value “abstinence outside of marriage” when your leadership doesn’t? Furthermore, does this statement imply anything short of intercourse is acceptable?

• Under “Promiscuity” I found:

Having casual sexual relations is sinful because this does not proceed from or contribute to respect, intimacy, and care of the other. Promiscuity is inconsistent with our identity as Christians (1 Cor. 6:12-20). Being sexually active in order to be popular or only to gratify sexual desire is morally wrong.

And, for what purpose do you think ELCA staff members are sexually active if not to “gratify sexual desire?” I’m sure ELCA editors are already working on new copy for the Web page that will bring what’s posted on the Web in line with what they actually believe—i.e., that it’s not “morally wrong.”

• And, under “Practices that spread sexually-transmitted diseases” there’s this:

Irresponsible, unprotected sexual contact can expose sexual partners to incurable and fatal sexually-transmitted diseases. Sexual practices that result in physical harm to another are sinful and must be countered. Education about sexuality should emphasize monogamy, abstinence, and responsible sexual behavior, as well as practices intended to prevent the transmission of disease during sexual intercourse. This church supports efforts to prevent, cure, and care for those afflicted with such diseases.

Let me translate. “For all our teens and adults, whether single or married, straight or gay, or laity or leadership, when you are sexually active we want you to always wear a condom.”

Apparently, that’s the new ELCA standard for moral purity. Enough of those archaic notions of monogamy, fidelity and abstinence. It’s simply been reduced to “be responsible—wear a condom.”

Thank God that at the Missouri Synod there are still Lutherans who are also faithfully Christian.

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Lutheran Gay Clergy Debate Prolonged (Christian Post, 070810)

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America delayed further talks on whether to ordain non-celibate homosexual clergy after two days of emotional debate.

While supporters of gay and lesbian clergy in committed relationships are calling for a decision now during ELCA’s Churchwide Assembly, particularly to lift the current ban that’s in place, opponents say a sudden decision could be risky.

“Throughout 18 years, this church has chosen not to make decisions on separate and particular elements of sexuality,” said Bishop Gregory Pile of the Allegheny Synod, according to The Chicago Tribune. “It has continued to call for a broad and thorough conversation leading up to a proposed statement in 2009.”

With discussion on gay ordination scheduled to continue on Friday, voting members of the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination decided on Thursday to refer memorials on the blessing of same-sex unions to the Task Force for ELCA Studies on Sexuality. The church task force is charged with drafting a social statement about human sexuality by 2009.

“I don’t believe that a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ at this Assembly will be helpful to us when so many in our church are expecting a social statement of some sort in 2009,” said the Rev. Leonard H. Bolick, bishop of the North Carolina Synod, according to the ELCA News Service. “That social statement, it seems to me, would be very helpful in guiding conversation, in explaining what we have done, a spring board for our deliberations.”

After voting in 2005 to maintain its ban against non-celibate gay and lesbian clergy, the issue was not expected to be debated again until the social statement was concocted in 2009. The statement is to be based on a comprehensive study that collected responses from congregants across the denomination since 2001.

A third of the ELCA’s regional governing bodies, or synods, have pushed for a proposal this year that would permit gay and lesbian clergy in committed relationships to serve congregations. But conservatives argue that a decision preceding the social statement would be premature.

Earlier at the biennial churchwide assembly, which is being held in Chicago, more than 80 lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered Lutheran ministers “came out,” declaring their sexuality on Tuesday. Most of the pastors, some of whom were removed from the roster, have been open with their congregations about their sexuality.

“The courage of these 82 ministers is amazing,” said Emily Eastwood, executive director of Lutherans Concerned in North America, a ministry that works for the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender Lutherans in all aspects of the life of their Church and congregations. “They are all well aware of the risks they take in introducing themselves and their families to the wider church. For those who are rostered leaders in the ELCA, they risk discipline from their bishops, discipline which may include formal ecclesiastical charges, a trial and ultimate removal.”

The Rev. Bradley Schmeling, an Atlanta pastor who was removed from the church roster last month after announcing that he found a lifelong partner, was among the 82 protesting the current ELCA policy that requires LGBT ministers to remain celibate.

On Thursday, Schmeling and hundreds of other gay-rights advocates held a separate service at a nearby hotel in hopes of a decision that night that would lift the ban. The stalled debate disappointed the gay-rights crowd, according to The Chicago Tribune.

A motion Thursday to continue debate on the homosexuality issue for the rest of the night and postpone items on the agenda that were scheduled was not approved by a two-thirds majority and discussion was discontinued until Friday.

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Defrocked Gay Pastor Refuses to Leave Pulpit (Christian Post, 070706)

The openly gay pastor of the oldest Lutheran church in Atlanta was removed from his position, officials announced on Thursday.

The decision from the Committee on Appeals of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is final but the Rev. Bradley Schmeling, who told St. John’s Lutheran congregation last year that he was in a same-sex relationship, doesn’t plan to leave the pulpit.

He said on Thursday that he plans to remain minister of St. John’s.

“The congregation issued a call to me in 2000 and as far as we are concerned, that hasn’t changed,” affirmed Schmeling, who said he was deeply disappointed but not surprised. “I plan to continue to follow my call in ministry at St. John’s and to pray for the day when all God’s children are equally welcomed into the Lutheran church.”

“Change has always proven difficult for the church. I continue to hope that the church will be centered in God’s message of love, compassion and justice, rather than in the enforcement of discriminatory policies,” he said.

ELCA, the largest Lutheran body in the United States, allows gay pastors, but only if they remain celibate.

Schmeling had told the 350-member congregation and his bishop, Ronald Warren, that he is gay before he was chosen as pastor in 2000. When he announced that he had found a lifelong companion, Warren asked the pastor to resign. Schmeling refused and Warren started disciplinary proceedings against him.

A disciplinary committee, which served as the jury, ruled that Schmeling should be allowed to remain on the clergy roster until after ELCA’s biennial meeting churchwide assembly Aug. 6-12 in Chicago. The committee also suggested that ELCA remove its policy of forbidding gay pastors to have sexual relations and reinstate gay clergy who were removed or resigned because they were in a same-sex “lifelong partnership.”

However, the Committee on Appeals on Monday said the first committee exceeded its authority by suggesting the church should change its policies. The appeals committee ordered Schmeling removed immediately.

In response to the appeals committee decision, Warren wrote in a pastoral letter on Thursday, “My decision to seek Pastor Schmeling’s removal from the ministry of this church was difficult because of my deep respect for the pastor and the congregation at St. John’s, but the policy of this church is clear.”

St. John’s members have backed Schmeling and the effort for the denomination to change its rules about sexually active gay clergy at the August assembly. Schmeling’s decision to remain in St. John’s pulpit could open the congregation to disciplinary action from ELCA.

Like many Protestant denominations, ELCA has been in heated debate over gay clergy and St. John’s representatives plan to attend the upcoming churchwide assembly when a vote on allowing active gay ministers is expected.

ELCA is currently drafting a social statement on human sexuality, including homosexuality, based on responses from members nationwide, collected in three separate studies on human sexuality. A proposed social statement on human sexuality is slated for release early 2009.

“As this church continues prayerfully to consider the issue of clergy who are gay or lesbian and in committed relationships, both the synod and I will continue to work on finding ways to live together faithfully in the midst of our disagreements,” said Warren.

Warren and Schmeling conversed on Thursday and agreed that Warren and the synod staff will meet with the executive committee of St. John’s council and the St. John’s congregation in the coming weeks.

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Lutherans Again Face Homosexuality Debate (Christian Post, 070807)

Evangelical Lutherans opened a churchwide assembly Monday and are slated to again open debate over the controversial issue of gay clergy and same-sex blessings.

The weeklong biennial gathering in Chicago convenes more than 1,000 members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination, who will confront the issue of human sexuality years earlier than originally planned for.

The ELCA will continue its conversation on human sexuality and “the place of gay and lesbian people in ministry” although “we are still in the process of developing our social statement on human sexuality,” ELCA presiding bishop the Rev. Mark S. Hanson said on Monday, according to the ELCA News Service.

In 2005, the ELCA Churchwide Assembly had voted in favor of maintaining its noncelibate gay and lesbian clergy ban. The issue was not expected to be debated again until a proposed statement on human sexuality was formed in 2009. Hanson stressed that the statement will be concocted on the basis of responses from lay people which were given in a comprehensive study that was conducted across the 4.8 million-member denomination between 2001 and 2006.

“They didn’t get their way in 2005, and now they want to throw it back at us,” said the Rev. Mark Chavez, director of Word Alone Network, a Lutheran group that contends homosexuality violates Scripture, according to The Chicago Tribune.

A third of the ELCA’s regional governing bodies, or synods, have pushed to place the homosexuality issue on the 2007 agenda, endorsing a proposal from the Metropolitan Washington branch that would permit gay and lesbian clergy in committed relationships to serve congregations. It would further reinstate those who have been removed because of a same-sex relationship.

The ELCA’s 65 synods have the authority to bring actions to the assembly for consideration, said Hanson, who expects some voting members to push for immediate change. “A number of our synods have brought a variety of memorials regarding human sexuality,” he said.

Debate on the gay clergy standard was fueled by the dismissal of the Rev. Bradley Schmeling, who said last year from the pulpit of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Atlanta that he found a lifelong gay companion. While ELCA’s Committee on Appeals ruled last month to defrock Schmeling, the Atlanta pastor has refused to leave the pulpit.

Hanson has said that the ELCA has not reached a schismatic point over homosexuality, emphasizing that conversations on the issue have continued churchwide.

“I’m certainly hearing concerns ... for how the relationships would be impacted,” Hanson said, according to the local Tribune. “I hear ‘impacted’ not ‘severed.’ I hear honesty in that statement, but I also hear an invitation.”

“The Lutheran communion has not come to the point of division over human sexuality,” he added. “It’s not to minimize the tension, but it is to affirm the thoughtfulness with which we have engaged each other.”

Hanson, who is also president of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), recently came out of a global LWF Council meeting where the homosexuality issue was also debated.

The Lutheran World Federation does not have a stance on the issue yet.

Meanwhile, Hanson said that an ELCA social statement on human sexuality is slated for presentation to the 2009 Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis.

“The statement on human sexuality is intended to bring all of us into the conversation in the context of Scripture, our tradition and the context in which we live our lives to develop a bedrock social statement upon which then we will look at the policies and practices of this church and see whether they reflect that,” Hanson said at a conference call July 26.

Resolutions this year may not require a constitutional change and can possibly be passed by a simple majority, said ELCA spokesman John Brooks, according to the Religion News Service.

“It will be a full week, but I think we have matured as a church in our ability to engage one another around questions where we don’t have an agreement,” said Hanson, who is expected to be re-elected for a second six-year term. “We’re mindful that within the unity we have in the body of Christ there is deep diversity. But diversity does not demand uniformity, nor does it need to be the occasion for division. It can be, in a respectful way, a way that we enrich the unity we have in the body of Christ. That is my prayer for the assembly.”

Other significant issues that will be discussed at the Aug. 6-11 ELCA Churchwide Assembly are biblical literacy and education.

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Defrocked Gay Pastor Returns to Pulpit (Christian Post, 070814)

[KH: falling one step further]

The Atlanta pastor at the heart of the homosexual clergy debate in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has returned to the pulpit. And the Atlanta congregation is ecstatic.

A day after the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination voted to encourage its bishops to practice “restraint” in disciplining gay ministers who are in “faithful” same-sex relationships, St. John’s Lutheran Church – Atlanta’s oldest Lutheran church – celebrated Sunday the continuing pastorship of the Rev. Bradley Schmeling.

Earlier this year, Schmeling, who announced that he found a lifelong gay companion, was ordered to be removed immediately from the clergy roster. The order by the Committee on Appeals overruled an earlier decision by a disciplinary committee which said Schmeling should be allowed to remain on the clergy roster until after ELCA’s biennial churchwide assembly, Aug. 6-12. The committee also suggested that ELCA reinstate gay clergy who were removed or resigned because they were in a same-sex “lifelong partnership.”

Despite the removal, Schmeling refused to leave St. John’s and said he planned to continue to follow his call in ministry there.

Furthermore, although the gay clergy debate was expected to come up in 2009, Schmeling was a major part of the push at this year’s assembly to lift the ban on non-celibate homosexual clergy.

Although a vote last Friday fell short of approving a change to the current clergy policy, the assembly voted 538 to 431 the next day to pray for, urge, and encourage bishops to refrain from disciplining people and congregations who call qualified leaders in “chaste and faithful” same-gender relationships to ELCA’s professional rosters. It also urged the same restraint on leaders who are already on the official rosters and in committed same-sex relationships.

Regarding Saturday’s passed resolution, ELCA’s presiding bishop, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, highlighted the words “prays, urges, and encourages” as “words of counsel” for synods and bishops considering what actions to take when confronted with non-celibate gay clergy.

“They are not words that change the standards of the church … or the guidelines for discipline,” he said. “But they reflect the mind of this assembly as it seeks to give counsel to the leaders of this church.”

Still, conservatives say the vote contradicts church policy and allows gay clergy to ignore the standards of the church.

“Any time you start ignoring God’s word on matters, you better watch out because you’re in dangerous territory,” said the Rev. Mark Chavez, director of the conservative Word Alone Network, according to The Chicago Tribune.

Jaynan Clark Egland, president of Word Alone Network, called it a double standard for discipline.

“I don’t know as a Christian, as a pastor and as a parent, what really would be worse – a church with no biblical standards to govern our ministry or standards we don’t intend to enforce,” said Egland. “To refrain from discipline in the home is bad parenting, but we’re about to do so in the Christ’s church.”

The assembly decided to postpone a more concrete decision on gay clergy until 2009, when the Task Force on Studies of Sexuality is expected to propose a social statement on human sexuality based on responses from congregants across the denomination collected in a comprehensive study.

Still, Schmeling praised the latest decision by the assembly, calling it a “crack in the dam,” according to The Associated Press.

Schmeling will continue to pastor St. John’s although he will stay off the clergy roster. Since he plans to remain with St. John’s, he said his removal from the clergy roster will have no effect unless he tries to move to another congregation.

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Lutherans Prepare for First Draft on Human Sexuality (Christian Post, 071015)

The largest Lutheran denomination in the nation is continuing work on developing a social statement on the controversial issue of human sexuality with a first draft due out early 2008.

The Task Force for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Studies on Sexuality met over the weekend in open and closed-door discussions amid “fatigue” by Lutherans after years of debate and studies conducted across the denomination on human sexuality, including the issue of homosexuality.

“The church has given us the responsibility of writing a social statement, and we are working hard to do our best,” said the Rev. Peter Strommen, bishop of ELCA’s Northeastern Minnesota Synod and task force chair, according to the ELCA News Service. “We want it to be helpful to the church and faithful to its core convictions. Our task force, like the whole church, represents diverse backgrounds. There is genuine respect for one another, reflective of our unity in Christ, but we do not see all things in the same way.”

In a meeting between the task force and the ELCA Conference of Bishops on Oct. 6, some bishops suggested the social statement seek agreement on “core” teachings, and that biblical interpretation and authority guide the statement, according to ELCA News.

According to Strommen, the task force, which represents diverse backgrounds, is approaching its work from a biblical, ethical and theological perspective.

ELCA’s presiding bishop, the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, has said that the statement will be concocted on the basis of the congregants’ responses. Once the first draft on human sexuality is available next year, it will be distributed across the denomination for feedback. The task force will reshape the document based on that feedback. The final proposed statement will be requested to be placed on the agenda at the denomination’s churchwide assembly in 2009.

In August, at its annual assembly, ELCA passed a resolution urging bishops to refrain from disciplining pastors who are in “faithful committed same-gender relationships.” Its previous policy had allowed gays to serve as pastors but only under the condition that they abstain from any sexual relations. The vote had come after days of emotional debate on whether to ordain non-celibate homosexual clergy.

The denomination recently released a study guide – “Free in Christ to Serve the Neighbor: Lutherans Talk about Human Sexuality” – to members of ELCA along with a separate study for senior high-school-age members to engage the church in thoughtful discussion and theological discernment on topics of human sexuality. Responses from both studies are due later this year.

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Lesbian Ordained in Lutheran Church, Refuses Celibacy Vow (Christian Post, 071119)

A lesbian became the first homosexual minister to be ordained since the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America gave leeway to churches in disciplining pastors who violate a celibacy vow requirement.

Jen Rude, 27, was ordained on Saturday at Resurrection Lutheran Church in Chicago despite her refusal to take a vow of celibacy. She was installed on Sunday.

Under church policy, homosexual – and not heterosexual – ministers are required to make a vow of celibacy before they can be ordained. Although not currently in a relationship, Rude called the policy discriminatory.

Rude is the first homosexual pastor to test a resolution that urges ELCA bishops to refrain from disciplining pastors who are in “faithful committed same-gender relationships.” The resolution was passed at a national assembly in August when members also rejected measures that would have allowed the ordination of non-celibate homosexual clergy.

More than 100 congregants witnessed Rude’s ordination and showed support for the lesbian pastor, whose father and grandfather are both Lutheran ministers.

“This is who we are and this is what we do,” said Kathy Young, a member of Resurrection Lutheran Church, as reported by The Chicago Tribune. The congregation welcomes people of all sexual orientations and gender identities, according to its website.

“It’s meaningful to me in the sense that my call is being affirmed not only by God but the people of God,” Rude said.

Chicago bishop Wayne Miller did not try to block Rude’s ordination but also did not attend the weekend ceremony. He met with the congregation last month to inform of the potential consequences of the ordination, such as expulsion, should the denomination choose to enforce the policy in the future, according to The Chicago Tribune.

“This does not imply any bitterness or any hostility. It’s simply where we are right now,” Miller told the local Tribune. “My goal is to keep people in the conversation, and I do not see this as an issue that should be dividing the church. I think it’s one of the many places where difference of opinion can make the church stronger and healthier, as long as people stay at the table and keep talking.”

Miller said he believes the celibacy policy should be lifted but also believes bishops should follow the church rule.

Despite the ordination, Rude’s name will not be listed on the official rolls of ELCA clergy.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is the largest Lutheran denomination, claiming 4.8 million members across the country.

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Swedish Church Backs Gay Weddings (Christian Post, 071213)

The Swedish Lutheran Church has declared that it is in favor of allowing homosexual couples to have weddings in church, although it recommended that the word “marriage” be used only for heterosexual unions.

The Church of Sweden – the largest church in the country, claiming 7.2 million members in a country of 9.1 million people – said Wednesday that it approves of legislation that would make laws governing marriage “gender neutral.” The church, among many other bodies, had been asked to comment on the gender neutral bill which the Swedish government hopes to present to parliament early next year.

“Marriage and (same-sex) partnerships are equivalent forms of unions,” the Church of Sweden said in a statement. “Therefore the Church of Sweden’s central board says yes to the proposal to join the legislation for marriages and partnerships into a single law,” according to Agence France-Presse.

While supporting the proposed changes to current legislation, the Church of Sweden’s board agreed that the word “marriage” should be used only for heterosexual relationships.

The response reflected “the different theological interpretations within the Church of Sweden,” said Archbishop Anders Wejryd.

“There were different opinions on the board, but there was a large majority who felt that the word marriage should only be used for man/woman relationships,” he said, as reported by AFP.

Since 1995, civil unions for homosexual partnerships have had the same legal status as heterosexual marriages in Sweden. Still, homosexual organizations have been campaigning to remove the last remaining difference between heterosexual and homosexual unions – having their union described as a “marriage.”

Currently, Swedish law defines marriage as being between a man and a woman only. The government’s new bill, however, takes gender out of the definition of marriage.

The Church, while rejecting the idea of homosexual “marriage,” has nevertheless said for the first time that homosexual couples may wed in the church. Until now, homosexuals could only have their partnerships registered in civil ceremonies.

Sweden introduced the new legislation earlier this year in March when a government-appointed committee proposed expanding the rights of same-sex couples. If the new law is passed, couples who have entered civil unions would automatically be considered legally “married,” and Sweden would become the first country in the world to allow homosexuals to “marry” within a major Church.

The Swedish Lutheran Church has offered blessings to homosexual unions since January 2007.

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