Some Lutheran Educators Endorse 'Called to Common Mission'

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The faculty of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia and the president of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, Columbia, S.C., announced their support for "Called to Common Mission: A Lutheran Proposal for a Revision of the Concordat of Agreement." CCM, for short, is a Lutheran proposal for "full communion" between the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and The Episcopal Church.
"I urge the adoption, celebration and joyful implementation of 'Called to Common Mission' in response to the ministry of Christ's grace and love to us," the Rev. H. Frederick Reisz Jr., president of Southern Seminary, said April 7. "With confessing integrity, both the Episcopal Church and the ELCA together may now participate in a new way in the power of a unifying gospel."
"We, the faculty of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, strongly encourage the ELCA Churchwide Assembly to adopt CCM and forward it to the Episcopal Church for its approval," the Philadelphia faculty said in a unanimous statement April 6. The faculty includes 17 theological professors.
A round of Lutheran-Episcopal dialogues that began in 1983 developed a proposal for full communion between the two churches, "The Concordat of Agreement," and issued it in 1991. The Lutheran faculty in Philadelphia had also supported the Concordat.
A convention of the Episcopal Church approved the Concordat in 1997. The proposal failed to win a two-thirds majority of the ELCA assembly that year by six votes. The assembly asked that the Concordat be revised, taking its debate into account and clarifying the technical language of the dialogue. CCM was issued in November 1998 as that revision, and the ELCA Churchwide Assembly will vote on it this August in Denver.
"A convocation on CCM and the evangelical office of bishop held at the seminary in December 1998 provided us with an opportunity to examine again the question of full communion with the Episcopal Church," said Philadelphia faculty members.
"We confess that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God for salvation. As Lutherans, our witness to this gospel is the strongest and best gift we offer in any ecumenical conversation. We believe that this agreement, too, will offer us new opportunities to witness to that gospel with our Episcopalian brothers and sisters and in the world," they said.
The Philadelphia faculty highlighted five reasons for its decision: witness to the gospel, unity of the church, full communion between churches, a common confession of faith and practical matters.
"We believe that the level of cooperation between our two churches envisioned in CCM will enhance our witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ in North America," said the faculty. "We understand full communion to be an expression of unity between two distinct churches, arising out of the real human need to order our churches to serve Christ's mission in this world."
"We recognize that this agreement may mean that both churches may need to accommodate certain aspects of their organizational life in order to welcome fully their brothers and sisters in the other church and to be welcomed by them. We do not fear these changes," said the faculty. "The gospel, as witnessed to in the Lutheran confessions and in our churches, remains pure and strong even when we change or abandon cherished practices and traditions."
The possible "need to accommodate certain aspects of their organizational life" has been a point of debate in the ELCA.
Lutherans and Episcopalians agree on the doctrine of "apostolic succession," an ongoing faithful proclamation of Christ; Episcopalians bring to the relationship the "historic episcopate," a succession of bishops as a sign of unity back to the earliest days of the Christian church.
CCM includes provisions for the ELCA to incorporate the historic episcopate of the Episcopal Church.
"The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America agrees that all its bishops chosen after both churches pass this Concordat will be installed for pastoral service of the gospel with this church's intention to enter the ministry of the historic episcopate," said the proposal. "The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America agrees to make constitutional and liturgical provision that bishops shall preside and participate in the laying-on-of-hands at the ordination of all clergy."
Reisz listed the reasons for his support of CCM in a series of "because" statements.
"Because many Christians, including some Lutheran communions throughout the world, have found the bishop's office and the 'historic episcopacy' to be a testimony to penultimate unity, a witness to the one gospel, a sign of continuity with those who have gone before and a discipline of salient oversight, we can rejoice in the possibility of this sign locally and evangelically adapted," said Reisz.
"Because Christ is always ahead beckoning us into mission, we can pray for grace to be led into unaccustomed forms of church life and unexplored possibilities of mission which begin to gather the hue of gospel faithfulness and the excitement of a common witness to the world," he said.

EDITORS: The full text of "Called to Common Mission" is located at
http://www.elca.org/ea/proposal/text.html

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