(ENS) The Evangelical Lutheran Church (ELCA) and the Episcopal Church have appointed teams to explore avenues for better understanding in the wake of last summer's failure to approve a Concordat of Agreement establishing full communion.
The ELCA's Churchwide Assembly fell six votes short of the required two-thirds majority necessary to approve full communion. Subsequent resolutions called for an expansion of "education opportunities" in the church dealing with the doctrine, creeds and polity of the two churches.
"The task of the committee is to provide opportunities for members of the faculties of ELCA colleges and seminaries, the Conference of Bishops, clergy and laity to communicate the history, theology and ecclesiology of both the Episcopal Church and the ELCA," said Dr Darlis Swan of the ELCA's Department for Ecumenical Affairs.
The Revd David Perry, ecumenical officer for the Episcopal Church, said that he and Midge Roof, president of the Episcopal Diocesan Ecumenical Officers, would work with the Lutherans. "Our intent is not to understand the Concordat itself but to better understand each other, to explore the culture and ethos of each church." That will include dealing with such crucial issues as the role of not only bishops and the episcopate but also the role of laity.
"The real goal," Perry added, "is to help people talk with each other, in the widest possible variety of settings. That might include workshops, joint meetings at the local level, and parishes working together. Undergirding everything will be our common understanding of baptism."
Perry said that he agreed with a proposal by the Lutherans to develop videotapes that could be used at ELCA Synod assemblies this spring and one for congregations. At a mid-January meeting at Lutheran headquarters in Chicago, the Revd Clarence Harms, an ELCA pastor in Wisconsin, said that video resources "can be effective in congregations" but he expressed the hope that "education will take place through different means of communication."
"I'm still urging Episcopalians to take a Lutheran to lunch-or even dinner," Perry said in emphasising the importance of conversation on a personal level.
He is still hopeful that the two churches can "find a clear, simple way to express our hopes for the mission possibilities of full communion." The six-member Lutheran-Episcopal drafting team met for the first of four working sessions in Chicago January 14-15 and addressed areas of consensus. Members began to outline the content of a rationale for the new proposal for full communion and set a goal of having a text ready to circulate by Easter.