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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Should the Lutheran church be renamed?
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ORGANMEISTER
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# 6621
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Posted
LQ, I always keep my ancient copy of SBH on the organ bench with at all times. The hymn arrangements are better than LBW, SBH, WOV, and the "Cranberry" book. This is most certainly true!
Posts: 3162 | From: Somerset, PA - USA | Registered: May 2004
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
Yeah, I was thinking about this thread earlier today, and I still can't let Luther off the hook. He may have not invented european anti-semitism, but he was in a position to speak up against it-- and he did, at first. His petulance and spite prevented him from being an agent of change.
Maybe the Nazis didn't need Luther to do their stuff, but how much harder would it have been for them to do if religious tolerance had been a Lutheran core value?
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Maybe the Nazis didn't need Luther to do their stuff, but how much harder would it have been for them to do if religious tolerance had been a Lutheran core value?
Hitler and most of the top Nazis were raised Catholic. Nazism started in Bavaria, which is predominantly Catholic.
I think that the influence of Luther on Nazism is exaggerated.
Moo
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WearyPilgrim
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# 14593
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ORGANMEISTER:
I can recall that when the ELCA was formed eons ago a friend of mine who was a Pastor proposed that the name should have been The Evangelical Catholic Church in America. He thought that name would have disassociated the church from any idea that it was the exclusive home for those of German and/or Scandinavian ethnicity. I tend to agree with him.
That being the case, why not do what I as an outside observer have long thought to be logical, and merge with the Episcopal Church? Nowadays there isn't much, theologically or liturgically, that separates Lutheranism from Anglicanism.
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Ricardus
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# 8757
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Angloid:
Interesting that Anglican churches never got called Cranmerian (or Henrician I suppose). I wonder why?
I can't actually think of many churches (as in denominations) that are named after people. Hussites, Nestorians, Waldensians, maybe, none of whom are particularly well-known. I don't think there's any major church that's officially called 'Calvinist' (as opposed to 'Reformed') but I may be wrong.
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WearyPilgrim
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# 14593
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
quote:
Originally posted by Angloid:
Interesting that Anglican churches never got called Cranmerian (or Henrician I suppose). I wonder why?
I can't actually think of many churches (as in denominations) that are named after people. Hussites, Nestorians, Waldensians, maybe, none of whom are particularly well-known. I don't think there's any major church that's officially called 'Calvinist' (as opposed to 'Reformed') but I may be wrong.
I have a liberal Methodist friend who proudly calls himself a "Fosdickian." ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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pererin
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# 16956
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Ricardus:
I can't actually think of many churches (as in denominations) that are named after people. Hussites, Nestorians, Waldensians, maybe, none of whom are particularly well-known.
Indeed, the Church of the East (and its various descendents) have always disliked being described as Nestorian. It's roughly on a par with describing the Roman Church as Papist.
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
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Olaf
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# 11804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by WearyPilgrim:
That being the case, why not do what I as an outside observer have long thought to be logical, and merge with the Episcopal Church? Nowadays there isn't much, theologically or liturgically, that separates Lutheranism from Anglicanism.
Fond ties to words.
Give it time. The few ELCA Lutherans of my generation that are still actively involved do not hold the prejudices of the past, wherein the local Lutheran congregation is the One True Church, and other denominations are beyond help. Also, most congregations are completely unrecognizable to each other, except for the L word being on the sign, the link between them being tenuous at best.
I hope merger comes, and I even propose as a transition that we allow churches to retain their current signage for a fixed number of years.
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Gramps49
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# 16378
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Posted
Maybe the Anglicans can join the Lutherans if they agree to the Augsburg Confession.
There are several things that divide us structurally, though. 1) Lutherans are for the most part congregational in polity. A Lutheran Bishop assists a congregation in its calling their pastor, but the Bishop has a limited role in the selection of a pastor. 2) A Lutheran pastor also has more autonomy when it under the Lutheran system--for instance, the congregational pastor will actually confirm the catechumens, no need to wait for a bishop to come through.
But I think the one thing Lutherans would hate to give up is their latitude when it comes to liturgy. While traditional Lutheran liturgy is similar to BCP, there is wide variance within Lutheran circles.
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SeraphimSarov
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# 4335
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
Maybe the Nazis didn't need Luther to do their stuff, but how much harder would it have been for them to do if religious tolerance had been a Lutheran core value?
Hitler and most of the top Nazis were raised Catholic. Nazism started in Bavaria, which is predominantly Catholic.
I think that the influence of Luther on Nazism is exaggerated.
Moo
Yes, but you also had all those Sieg Heiling Lutheran bishops of the official church and Nazism had extremely wide support in heavily Lutheran areas
But then , there was Bonhoeffer as the Catholics had Count Von Galen and Bishop Von Preysing
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"For those who like that sort of thing, that is the sort of thing they like"
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pererin
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# 16956
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Maybe the Anglicans can join the Lutherans if they agree to the Augsburg Confession.
Many of whose articles map one-for-one to the Thirty-Nine Articles anyway... (But on the level of sheer personal anecdotes, when I registered for something or other with the German Bible Society, I decided to declare my religion as "Altkatholische Kirche".)
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
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Gee D
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# 13815
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Olaf:
Give it time. The few ELCA Lutherans of my generation that are still actively involved do not hold the prejudices of the past, wherein the local Lutheran congregation is the One True Church, and other denominations are beyond help. Also, most congregations are completely unrecognizable to each other, except for the L word being on the sign, the link between them being tenuous at best.
I hope merger comes, and I even propose as a transition that we allow churches to retain their current signage for a fixed number of years.
Sadly, the Lutheran Church here - at least in NSW - has a very closed table and limited dialogue with others, despite being a constituent member of the NSW Council of Churches and having formal meetings with both the Anglican and Catholic Churches on theological matters. I'm fairly sure that Porvoo does not apply to Anglican relationship with it.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
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leo
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# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Maybe the Anglicans can join the Lutherans if they agree to the Augsburg Confession.
There are several things that divide us structurally, though. 1) Lutherans are for the most part congregational in polity. A Lutheran Bishop assists a congregation in its calling their pastor, but the Bishop has a limited role in the selection of a pastor. 2) A Lutheran pastor also has more autonomy when it under the Lutheran system--for instance, the congregational pastor will actually confirm the catechumens, no need to wait for a bishop to come through.
But I think the one thing Lutherans would hate to give up is their latitude when it comes to liturgy. While traditional Lutheran liturgy is similar to BCP, there is wide variance within Lutheran circles.
In practice, most Anglican bishops no longer send clergy to parishes but assist parishes in finding the right pastor.
I don't think Lutheran liturgy is at all similar to BCP - for example the stand alone words of institution are far removed from Cranmer's Prayer of Consecration.
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SeraphimSarov:
Yes, but you also had all those Sieg Heiling Lutheran bishops of the official church and Nazism had extremely wide support in heavily Lutheran areas
But then , there was Bonhoeffer as the Catholics had Count Von Galen and Bishop Von Preysing
I think those Sieg Heiling bishops were not influenced by Luther nearly as much as they were influenced by the idea that they were supposed to support the state.
The Catholics also had Franz Jägerstätter. His behavior was especially impressive because he had only eight years of schooling, and no one encouraged him in the stand he took.
Moo
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Olaf
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# 11804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't think Lutheran liturgy is at all similar to BCP - for example the stand alone words of institution are far removed from Cranmer's Prayer of Consecration.
Gramps was undoubtedly referring to the American BCP 1979, which was essentially written in tandem with the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978). During the mid-20th century, there were a couple of very Episcopal-friendly Lutheran liturgical scholars who had a heavy influence on the development of our hymnals/worship books (bound together, in standard American Lutheran practice).
Some of the prayers in the Lutheran Book of Worship and the BCP 1979 are almost identical in wording--the Collect for Purity and the prayer of confession are particularly close. Before the LBW was published, the intent was even to take on the "Anglican" location for the confession of sin--between sermon and Great Thanksgiving--but there was a big kerfluffle about it, and in the final published version the confession appears at the beginning as an optional rite.
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k-mann
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# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kelly Alves:
I thought the Danish/ Swedish/ Norwegian state churches were a sort of Lutheran/ Calvinist fusion, like the Covenant church.
They are not. And thank God for that. (No TULIP for us, thank God.) All of the scandinavian 'state churches' are Lutheran,* and they have shunned calvinism.
* The Church of Sweden is no longer a 'state church,' and neither is the Church of Norway (supposed to be). The Church of Sweden follows the Book of Concord, while the Church of Norway and the Church of Denmark do not follow the whole Book of Concord, but only the three ancient symbols (the Apostles's, Nicene, and Athanasian creeds), the Augsburg Confession, and Luther's Small Catechism.
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
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Sylvander
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# 12857
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by S. Bacchus:
I don't think that they should be re-named, but my impression is that the name 'Lutheran' is mostly used in English. In Germany, it is the Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, which is admittedly a combination of Lutheran and non-Lutheran Protestant churches, but my impression is that Germans Lutherans do not usually use the word 'Lutheran', saying instead that they are 'Evangelische'.
Nope.
EKD (Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland) is NOT a church. It is a federation of 20 regional+denominational churches who are each completely independent. EKD has no legal power whatsoever over them.
Of those 20, two are Reformed (Presbyterian/Calvinist), nine are Lutheran and nine are United, i.e. a union of Reformed and Lutheran going back to the 19th century.
Of the nine Lutheran Churches, seven have "Lutheran" in their name. Plus the "Lutheran Free Church" (SELK), that is not in EKD.
Seven of the nine Lutheran Churches also form a sub-federation of EKD, called VELKD or Vereinigte Evangelisch-Lutherische Kirche in Deutschland. The Lutherans have a very strong denominational consciousness, far more than the United Churches, so they often stress the "Lutheran".
If you want to drop the name "Lutheran" because of Luther's failings, you'd probably never be able to name anything after a person:
a) everybody fails in some things
b) what counts as "failing" is notoriously subject to fashions. So you'd be obliged to change names every so often (anti-semitism would not have counted against Luther in the past and what is mandatory for a "good Christian" today may well be judged as very bad tomorrow... pick your own example)
Admittedly at present name-changing seems to be the order of the day. With today's speed of re-naming things and groups etc. in the name of political correctness we'll soon be running out of breath, I'm afraid, because every new word for a negative thing tends to assume the negative meaning of its predecessor at some point.
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Kelly Alves
Bunny with an axe
# 2522
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sylvander:
If you want to drop the name "Lutheran" because of Luther's failings, you'd probably never be able to name anything after a person:
a) everybody fails in some things
b) what counts as "failing" is notoriously subject to fashions. So you'd be obliged to change names every so often (anti-semitism would not have counted against Luther in the past and what is mandatory for a "good Christian" today may well be judged as very bad tomorrow... pick your own example)
Well put.
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I cannot expect people to believe “
Jesus loves me, this I know” of they don’t believe “Kelly loves me, this I know.”
Kelly Alves, somewhere around 2003.
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LutheranChik
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# 9826
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Posted
I'm a Lutheran Christian who isn't particularly interested in no longer being a Lutheran Christian. We have, in many ways, a unique theological point of view and historical experience to bring to the table . I'm not saying that it isn't possible to be a theological Lutheran within some larger big-tent church body; I have friends in The Episcopal Church who are self-admittedly Lutheran in their general theological thinking and appreciation of the Lutheran confessional documents even though they prefer the worship aesthetics and polity of TEC. I'm also not saying that ecumenism is a bad thing. The ELCA is involved in many levels of ecumenical partnerships.
But the idea that we can all just moosh together into one amorphous church body and all find some comrpomise in thought and worship that "works for everyone" is, I think, on this mortal coil, an idea that flies in the face of actual human experience. There is no monolithic Christian way of doing or thinking, in the same way that there's no monolithic Jewish or Muslim or Buddhist or pagan or atheist way, and that is why ALL belief systems tend to spawn multiple schools of thought/organizations whose members tend to group together.
And...just a minor, admittedly whiny kvetch here...I wonder why churches identified as "Wesleyan" or "Mennonite," etc., don't seem to be criticized as much about their names the way Lutherans are. It's just a shorthand way of knowing what the theological point of view of a particular faith community is.
[ 28. August 2013, 21:46: Message edited by: LutheranChik ]
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malik3000
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# 11437
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by LutheranChik:
And...just a minor, admittedly whiny kvetch here...I wonder why churches identified as "Wesleyan" or "Mennonite," etc., don't seem to be criticized as much about their names the way Lutherans are. It's just a shorthand way of knowing what the theological point of view of a particular faith community is.
I think the criticism of Luther in this thread had to do with his specifically antisemitic statements. Which IMHO is unfortunate since if that part of what he said could be removed, he had a lot of good things to say theologically, again IMHO.
But anyway, LutheranChik, I agree with you, that the Church Universal doesn't have to be just a big mosh pit. I take extremely seriously Jesus' prayer "that all may be one". But, by that, I don't think Jesus meant that we all have to do everything the same way. People are different, culturally and otherwise. Speaking just of worship styles, on that continuum I guess I would place myself somewhere around the MOR Rite Two US Episcopal and RC Novus Ordo (pre-revised translations anyway!) but I consider myself fortunate to have been exposed to a wide range, from African-American pentecostal services to Tridentine Roman rite liturgies and Ethiopian Orthodox, and I have found value in all of them. (Well with a few exceptions which I have not and will not name here). This shows the beautiful diversity of the Body of Christ. Diversity doesn't have to mean disunity.
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God = love.
Otherwise, things are not just black or white.
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k-mann
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# 8490
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't think Lutheran liturgy is at all similar to BCP - for example the stand alone words of institution are far removed from Cranmer's Prayer of Consecration.
The practice of (normally) celebrating the Eucharist with the words of Institution standing alone is not that common in Europe. In the Church of Norway, we have whole Eucharistic prayers. A given Eucharistic prayer (which contains the words of institution at its center) is seen as a single whole. The American tradition may be different.
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"Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt."
— Paul Tillich
Katolikken
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malik3000
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# 11437
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Posted
I also think that to say the Lutheran liturgies are "not at all" similar to Anglican liturgies is an overstatement, even when referring to Lutheran liturgies that use only the institution narrative instead of a full eucharistic prayer.
Of course that is a very significant difference, but, even so, the liturgy is more than just the eucharistic prayer. Certainly the liturgy of the Word is very similar in both Lutheran and Anglican liturgies, as are opening and closing rites, I believe.
As is noted, many Lutheran liturgies now incorporate full eucharistic prayers.
The only Lutheran eucharist I was ever at, last year, had a full eucharistic prayer. My subjective impression was that it was indeed very similar to an Anglican eucharist, and perhaps even more to a Roman rite Novus Ordo eucharist.
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God = love.
Otherwise, things are not just black or white.
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Knopwood
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# 11596
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
quote:
Originally posted by leo:
I don't think Lutheran liturgy is at all similar to BCP - for example the stand alone words of institution are far removed from Cranmer's Prayer of Consecration.
The practice of (normally) celebrating the Eucharist with the words of Institution standing alone is not that common in Europe. In the Church of Norway, we have whole Eucharistic prayers. A given Eucharistic prayer (which contains the words of institution at its center) is seen as a single whole. The American tradition may be different.
I would associate the practice more so with the self-styled "confessional" groups. But then, it's also in the cranberry book and so could presumably be used with the authorisation of an Anglican diocesan bishop.
quote:
Originally posted by malik3000:
I also think that to say the Lutheran liturgies are "not at all" similar to Anglican liturgies is an overstatement, even when referring to Lutheran liturgies that use only the institution narrative instead of a full eucharistic prayer.
Yes, that's a bit much. The LBW and the American BCP certainly developed side by side (informed by the post-conciliar Roman Rite too, of course). I have a copy of this slender volume which lays the two rites out next to each other.
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Gramps49
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# 16378
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Posted
People:
I am not talking about the similarities of the official Lutheran Liturgies in comparison to the Anglican Liturgy--they are indeed very much the same. What I am talking about is the relative latitude individual Lutheran pastors have in using various worship styles apart from the official liturgy. I think many Lutheran would chafe if they would have to get permission from their bishop to make those changes.
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Olaf
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# 11804
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by k-mann:
A given Eucharistic prayer (which contains the words of institution at its center) is seen as a single whole. The American tradition may be different.
Put together a dozen ELCA pastors, and 11 of them will prefer Words of Institution alone, with 9 of them citing 'shorter' as their compelling reason. And then they'll give a 25-minute sermon and 10 minutes of announcements. Trust me, I deal with this all the time! (Of course, our texts are not exactly the greatest, either, but nobody has cited that yet.)
quote:
Gramps49:
I think many Lutheran would chafe if they would have to get permission from their bishop to make those changes.
All pastors I've dealt with certainly would. In fact, all bishops I've encountered would chafe if they had to get involved with this at all. Yet, I can't tell you how many times I've heard from people who have moved away, "I can't find an ELCA church like us," and then they end up unchurched. They're talking liturgy and music, because when probed they have never been at a place long enough to scratch the surface of their programming or camaraderie.
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pererin
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# 16956
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Olaf:
Put together a dozen ELCA pastors, and 11 of them will prefer Words of Institution alone, with 9 of them citing 'shorter' as their compelling reason. And then they'll give a 25-minute sermon and 10 minutes of announcements. Trust me, I deal with this all the time!
There's nothing new under the sun. Here's what good old Percy Dearmer had to say about what the Puritans wanted from James I:
'When James I came to the throne, the Puritans drew up a "Millenary Petition" for reform ; and as a result the Hampton Court Conference (1604) was held by the King, who loved disputations above all things. The familiar petty objections were raised to the cross in Baptism, to the square cap, and the surplice ("a kind of garment," said they, "which the priests of Isis used to wear") ; the wedding-ring, the word "priest," bowing at the name of Jesus; the Puritans also disliked the Thirty-nine Articles as not sanctioning Calvinism; they desired that Baptism should never be ministered by women, that Confirmation should be taken away, and also the Churching of Women, that "examination" should go before Communion, that "the longsomeness of service" should be "abridged" and "Church songs and music moderated," that the Lord's Day should not be "profaned" (by the playing of games), that an uniformity of doctrine should be prescribed, and a few other things. Some of these requests (especially that for uniformity) were very bad indeed, and few would be defended to-day: even that against "longsomeness," we fear, was only to gain more room for sermons and ex tempore prayers that were more longsome still.'
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"They go to and fro in the evening, they grin like a dog, and run about through the city." (Psalm 59.6)
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