From
Living Theology in the Metropolitan Chicago Synod
Evangelical Lutheran Church In America
Volume 3, Number 2
Pentecost 1998
Confessional Renewal Movements
The Theses,
Confessionalism, Me, and My Congregation
Frank C.
Senn
How
surprised I was to receive an emotional phone call from an acquaintance at the
ELCA Churchwide Office asking how I could endorse such an attack on the ELCA!
At first I didn't know what my caller was talking about. But the 9.5 Theses had
arrived by mail on Higgins Road; I hadn't received my copy yet. When it came
the next day there was my signature on the list of nearly 60 signatories to the
Theses after the initial 8 pastors who had drafted them. The Theses had been
mailed to the clergy on the ELCA roster, including those at the denomination's
Churchwide Office, to solicit more signatures by the Festival of the Holy
Trinity, 1995. Eventually, more than a thousand pastors, teachers, bishops and
lay people would sign. When I signed among the first group I had no idea who
else might also subscribe. But when I looked at the initial list of
signatories, I recognized the names of a number of respected bishops and
pastors and I was proud to have my name among theirs.
But I was the only initial signatory
from Illinois. So I was the object of phone calls from pastoral colleagues,
like my acquaintance at the big house, asking why I did this. The answer I gave
then is the answer I still give. I agree with the Theses that the root problem
afflicting the ELCA is a crisis of faith, not just an institutional crisis.
Whether there is a correlation between the two I don't know. Nor do I regard
any putative correlation as relevant since the church has never been called to
be sociologically successful, only faithful to the gospel.
Furthermore,
the 9.5 Theses were not an attack on the churchwide expression of the ELCA at
8765 W. Higgins Road but a wake-up call to the whole Church at every level of
its expression. The letter accompanying this mailing clearly stated that
"Now and again this crisis [of faith] erupts in church-wide controversy.
But we believe that most of the damage is being done quietly, on the parish
level, where 'the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints' (Jude 3)
is replaced by ideologies not centered in the revelation of God in Jesus
Christ." Or, in the words of the immortal Pogo, "We have met the
enemy and he is us."
The most
serious undermining of the faith occurs in the parishes. One still hears of
instances of invocations and baptisms in names other than that of the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit in spite of the clear teaching of our bishops that no
other name is to be used. Sin is downplayed in the frequent omission of the Brief
Order for Confession and Forgiveness and in the nearly utter absence of any
preaching of the law in its second use. Downplaying the unique saving work of
Christ in his atoning sacrifice (which I take to be the essence of the gospel)
follows from that. In fact, if sin is turned into sickness, which automatically
gives one "victim" status, if death is no longer an
"enemy," and if personal evil has been relegated to the dust bin of
mythology, what need is there of a gospel at all as it has been proclaimed in the
Christian tradition as God's victory over sin, death, and the devil? In the
face of widespread theological accommodations to cultural sensitivities there
is no visitation of pastors and parishes by bishops to ascertain just what is
being preached and practiced.
I won't let
the ELCA off the hook entirely in this "crisis of faith." Most of my
contact with the ELCA is through printed material mailed to pastors and
congregations. I would have to say that there's not a lot of literature coming
from the ELCA that supports Christians in their vocations as spouses, parents,
craftspeople, professionals, employers or employees, but there is a lot of
advocacy of selected causes and life styles. The effort to produce a church
social statement on Human Sexuality did very little to address the fundamental
social issue in our country, which is the 50% divorce rate and its deleterious
effects on family life and the mental health of the children of divorced
parents. The draft statement was a basically unhelpful document that was wisely
shelved.
Church
polity is up for grabs in the ELCA. On the one hand, a quota system based on
biological and cultural accidents of birth is still in place in pursuit of
elusive, inclusivist and multicultural goals rather than the discernment of
gifts of the Spirit. On the other hand, we have among us plenty of pietistic
Lutherans whose notion of the invisible church precludes making decisions that
move in the direction of restoring the traditional church polity preferred by
our Confessions but abandoned at the time of the Reformation because of the
critical need to get the gospel preached and taught in the face of bishops who
would have prevented it. Our churchwide assembly is constitutionally composed
of 60% lay people who have no authority to exercise the public teaching
ministry of the Church (according to Augustana XIV); yet these lay members who
could outvote clergy on any issue are the ones who adopt church statements that
tell the pastors what to teach. We no longer have a ministerium; we have
"rostered persons" (or is it "persons of roster?'). The ministry
has been professionalized and is often compartmentalized into various
specialties. There seems to be little conviction that the church has an
ordained ministry of word and sacraments to serve the apostolic function of
calling the church to faith through preaching the gospel and administering the
sacraments.
If I find
the ELCA so unfaithful by confessional standards, why don't I leave? I'll admit
that I've considered it. Like many others I've played the game of asking,
"What church would you go to if the Lutheran Church ceased to exist
tomorrow?" I've seen the dribbling away of respected pastors and teachers
to Roman Catholicism (e.g. Richard John Neuhaus, Robert Wilken, David
Gustafson, Jennifer Ferrara) and Eastern Orthodoxy (e.g. Michael Plekon, Sharon
Zanter Ross, Jaroslav Pelikan, and now Robert Nelson from our own synod). But
making a personal move to a different Christian tradition (and it would have to
be to Roman Catholicism or Eastern Orthodoxy since most of the Protestant
Churches are tempted by the same ideological seductions as the ELCA) would be
difficult for me. Not just because I am married with children and have my
future tied up with the ELCA Pension Plan, but also for faith reasons. I simply
think like a Lutheran. If and when I enter into full communion with the Bishop
of Rome and the Churches in communion with the apostolic see of the West (as I
pray will someday happen), I want to do so along with my Lutheran brothers and
sisters and with our own rite and practices of church life affirmed and
respected under the rubric of reconcile diversity. Moreover, given my confessional ecumenical commitment to
"decline or refuse nothing whatever, allowed by God and a good conscience,
which may tend to bring about Christian concord" (Preface to the Augsburg
Confession), I cannot imagine myself being comfortable in any Lutheran church
bodies in the United States that tend to "decline and refuse" all
actual expressions of Christian unity.
My
evangelical catholicity and ecumenical interests are not self-taught; they were
nurtured by the faith community in which I was baptized, confirmed, and
ordained: the ULCA and the LCA. I'm not alienated from my ecclesial tradition;
I'm in conflict with those who are eroding it. This very thought has prompted
in me a new feistiness to stay and fight for my church and its faith in the
midst of the cultural struggles in which we are engaged.
There are at
least two weapons available with which to fight for the faith of the church
within the Church. One is evangelical persuasion, which sometimes takes the
form of argument and debate. Using a forum such as Let's Talk is a way of
engaging pastoral colleagues. The other is setting an example of faithfulness in
worship, doctrine, and life. Given the frailties of the flesh, the influences
of the world, and the assaults of the devil, having a support group in this
endeavor is helpful. I'm happy to be a part of the newly formed pastoral
Society of the Holy Trinity, living under the discipline of its Rule and
supporting and being supported by my brothers and sisters in this new kind of
religious order. One may also recognize that the struggle for the faith of the
church is taking place within the Churches, not only in the ELCA, and look for
kindred spirits and theological allies in other Churches. Confessionalism and
ecumenism are not incompatible.
One of the
most difficult things to do as a pastor is to deal with the reactions of
members of one's congregation when they discover aberrations in the ELCA's
faith and practice. "The faith that was once for all delivered to the
saints" is still alive among the saints, for which I give thanks. I've
decided that there's no point in trying to hide the instances of the ELCA's official
acts of unfaithfulness; my constitutional duties, after all, require me to
promote the Church's magazine. Our people can read in The Lutheran that the
ELCA Pension Plan was required, first by the churchwide council and then by the
churchwide assembly, to pay for abortions. Whatever they might individually
think about public policy concerning abortion, most Lutherans don't like the
idea that their offerings are paying for them. But they also need to be
challenged by our own Catechism that there is no dichotomy between faith and
morals, between the first commandment and the fifth. In both the issue is
"fearing and loving God," who is invested in his human creatures from
beginning to end.
Our lay
people can read that the Lutheran Youth Organization flirted with the idea of
having a pre-Gathering conclave in the year 2000 for gay, lesbian, bi-sexual,
and trans-gender youth and gave up the idea only under the feeble pretext that
they could not guarantee the safety of those who might attend such an event. Our
lay people attend synod assemblies that have been exercises in the
ecclesiastical version of the culture wars. And, yes, they have encountered at
such assemblies worship leaders who publicly avoid saying the Name of the
Trinity and participated in worship services that studiously avoid the historic
cultural particularities of the Lutheran tradition. For example, not one
classical Lutheran hymn was sung among all the hymns sung at the recent
Assembly of the Metropolitan Chicago Synod.
The natural
inclination of our laity is to raise the question of whether their congregation
should consider leaving the ELCA or at least withholding benevolence
contributions. I must tell my congregation what I tell myself: we are the ELCA
too. At Immanuel we have a banner that was made for the congregation's
centennial celebration a few years ago. On it are the seals of the
denominations of which Immanuel has been a part: the Augustana Lutheran Church,
the Lutheran Church in America, and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
This congregation was at Lake and Sherman in downtown Evanston preaching the
gospel, celebrating the sacraments, reaching out to others with the gospel and
gathering in the faithful long before the ELCA was formed. What may be a new
idea for us today is that there must be a loyal opposition to the Church within
the Church.
American
Lutherans have been synodically-organized. The name "synod" suggests
"walking together," but for too long that has meant walking
lock-step. One is either loyal to the denomination or one leaves. But this has
not been the whole history of Lutheranism in this country. We have not had only
a tradition of splinter groups "walking out" instead of "walking
together." We have also had a tradition, stemming from one of our great Lutheran
patriarchs, Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, of walking toward the unity of the
church. This year marks the 250th anniversary of the first Lutheran synodical
organization in North America, the Ministerium of Pennsylvania. The first
meeting of the Ministerium also adopted Muhlenberg's Liturgy as its common
service. So the church was planted in a new pluralistic culture and
revolutionary society with its confession, traditional polity and historic
liturgy as sources of ecclesiastical identity and theological orthodoxy---and
it flourished! The trajectory has not always been smooth. There were serious
instances of cultural accommodation in the early nineteenth century in which
doctrine slipped and liturgy disintegrated (the two usually go hand-in-hand).
But the church recovered its bearings and moved on to establish its place in
American society. This was an ecclesiastical tradition at once faithful to its
confessional heritage, open to ecumenical cooperation, and willing to address
issues in our society with a voice that bore witness to God's rule over both of
his kingdoms, using but not confusing law and gospel.
I'm sure
that the drafters of the 9.5 Theses would have preferred to hold up this
positive model and rally their fellow Lutherans around it. But the wake-up call
of the Theses was necessary and it wouldn't have aroused anyone without those
alarming anathemas that so rub us the wrong way, formed as we have been in a
culture that teaches tolerance of everybody and everything. But anathemas are
necessary. You can't stake out a claim for "no other God" without
rejecting the false gods--by name. You can't confess the gospel without saying
what is not the gospel--not when there are so many false gospels clamoring for
our people's ears and loyalties. My hope is that the pastoral leaders of our
Church will hear the alarm, wake up, and go to work to provide a vision for our
Church of how our confessional commitments and missionary situation in America
at this end of the modern age connect. We don't need programs to accomplish
this; we need our bishops to do the work of true evangelical bishops and
pastors: preach the gospel and give leadership to the church's mission of
extending God's kingdom. That's what the apostolic office is all about.
If, as the
Theses warn, the word of God can be silenced and driven out of the Church, it
is time to speak the word and keep it in the Church. Bishop Anderson, in my
humble opinion, should enlist the ablest and soundest bishops, pastors, and
theologians to assist him in a great preaching and teaching mission. Let the
Word of God sound forth--the Word which is Christ, the content of the Scripture
and of the church's preaching-- and the faithful will rally and be energized
for mission. But if it is too late, if the word of God has truly been silenced
among us and driven out of the Church, then lamentably some of us will have to
consider where else we can go to hear it and speak it.
Frank C.
Senn, STS
Pastor,
Immanuel Lutheran Church, Evanston,