Lutheran-Reformed Planners Diagram Festival Worship

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Details surrounding a festival worship service at Chicago's Rockefeller Chapel on Oct. 4 involved much of the discussion May 12 for a Lutheran-Reformed planning committee. The service will formally declare that, after 36 years of dialogues, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is entering into "full communion" with three U.S. churches of the Reformed tradition -- Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Reformed Church in America and United Church of Christ.
"Within the relationship of full communion, participation together in the Holy Eucharist is an important mark of the communion we now share as church bodies," said a special report the committee adopted on "Guidelines for Celebration of the Sacraments in Settings of Shared Worship." The report was prepared by a working group made up of the directors for worship from each of the four church bodies.
The Lord's Supper or Eucharist will be shared during the festival worship service, so the guidelines may first be used in planning the Oct. 4 liturgy. The Rev. Paul R. Nelson, ELCA director for worship, said the document is primarily intended for what follows that service.
"It is designed for use by congregations of the four church bodies that are engaging in any kind of shared worship service," he said. The guidelines "outline the key ingredients for shared eucharistic worship," said Nelson, adding that "some guidance is provided for joint celebrations of Baptism and other worship services as well."
Assemblies of the ELCA and the three Reformed churches approved "A Formula of Agreement," a proposal for full communion, in 1997. Presbyteries officially ratified the relationship on March 11. Ratification becomes official when the Presbyterian general assembly, June 13-20 in Charlotte, N.C., receives a report on the vote.
Full communion is not a plan to merge; it commits the churches to sharing in their mission to work locally and internationally and to develop procedures whereby clergy in one church body may serve as pastors in congregations of another church body.
Among other details of the October worship the planning committee discussed the protocols to be used for inviting guests and for assigning tasks during the festival service. The Rev. James Kenneth Echols, president of the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and the Rev. Cynthia McCall Campbell, president of McCormick Theological Seminary, Chicago, will lead the worship. McCormick is a seminary of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
On other topics the committee heard a report from the Rev. Eric C. Shafer, director of the ELCA Department for Communication, on work the communication departments of the four churches are doing together to use available media in explaining "full communion" to the churches' memberships. He said the festival worship service will be videotaped, and live audio will be available on the World Wide Web.
The committee referred a letter from Bishop Paull E. Spring of the ELCA's Northwestern Pennsylvania Synod to the churches' theological conversations committee. Spring asked the committee to consider a study of full communion in the United States as it relates to the Leuenberg Agreement of Lutheran and Reformed churches in other parts of the world.
The group also discussed the procedures to be used in sending representatives to meetings of each other's governing bodies.
The planning committee represents the four church bodies in implementing the new relationship of full communion and is chaired by the Rev. Lowell G. Almen, ELCA secretary. It will meet again Sept. 1.

For information contact:
Ann Hafften, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://www.elca.org/co/news/current.html