Saturday, May 31, 1997

ELCA works to defeat pact with Episcopalians

By Clark Morphew

Knight-Ridder Newspapers

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America will decide this summer whether to declare full communion with the Epis- copal Church, the Reformed Church in America, the Presby- terian Church (USA) and the United Church of Christ.

It's a load, to say the least. But delegates to the church-wide as- sembly in August in Philadel- phia will get a fast education on why this is important to Luther- anism and Christianity.

The interesting thing is that the proposal has received scant attention in the Episcopal Church or any of the so-called three reformed denominations. But in the ELCA, a whole move- ment has been rolling along for months trying to defeat all four proposals.

The issue seems to center on the power of bishops if full com- munion is declared. Critics claim that Lutheran bishops will be the only people in the church who can confirm young people. Further, opponents say, Lu- theran bishops will be the only ones who can infuse the presence of Christ in the bread and wine of Holy Communion.

Not true, says the Rev. Merlyn Satrom, a retired St. Paul area pastor and college professor who served on the Lutheran-Epis- copal Joint Coordinating Com- mittee, which produced the ecu- menical proposal called the Lutheran-Episcopal Concordat of Agreement.

Satrom said in an interview that Lutheran pastors would con- tinue to confirm young people if the concordat is approved. And, he says, the notion that only bishops can bring the presence of Christ to the Eucharist is not widely held in Episcopal circles and has never been held in the Lutheran church.

Satrom said the concordat states very clearly that both church bodies believe the "body and blood of Christ are truly present, distributed and received under the forms of bread and wine in the Lord's Supper."

It is true, Satrom said, that bishops in the Episcopal church do ordain all clergy in their synods. But that is also true in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America - and has been true since 1988, when three major Lutheran bodies formed a new Lutheran church. So, there would be no change for either body.

There is also concern in the Lutheran church about adopting the Episcopal Church's historic episcopate. Critics say that would mean there would be three levels of ministry: bishop, priest and deacon. All would be ordained, but the bishop would be more powerful than priest or deacon.

Not so, says Satrom. In 1993, the ELCA's church-wide as- sembly rejected a proposal to es- tablish a three-level ministry. The delegates apparently did not want deacons ordained (they are consecrated) and they wanted all clergy, including bishops, to be equal in all ways. There are no resolutions currently that would revisit that issue.

"We are not going to be part of the Episcopal church's historic episcopate," Satrom said. "Lu- therans will have their historic episcopate, and so will the Epis- copalians. And they will both op- erate separately and differ- ently."

Satrom says he will travel to the ELCA's church-wide as- sembly in Philadelphia at his own expense to observe the fire- works.

"It will not be all love and flowers," Satrom said. "On is- sues like this, every possible prejudice surfaces, every fear."

Because the ELCA will be the last of the denominations to de- cide on full communion, the spot- light will be on the 5.2 million- member denomination. If all the Reformed churches and the Epis- copal church agree to full com- munion and the Lutheran church spikes the deal, the public relations fallout will be enormous. The proposal requires a two-thirds majority to pass.

"There is a fear that we will look like we are not willing to enter into ecumenical agree- ments," Satrom said. "The big question is: Do we take seriously that we are one in Christ?"

(Clark Morphew is an ordained clergyman and is religion writer for the Saint Paul Pioneer Press. Write to him at the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, 345 Cedar St., St. Paul MN 55101.)

(c) 1997, Saint Paul Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minn.).

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