December 10, 2002
by David L. Mahsman

ST. LOUIS – Renewed theological talks and more frequent meetings of top leadership are in the offing between the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS). Members of the Committee on Lutheran Cooperation (CLC) agreed Nov. 12 they would pursue discussions of issues that divide the two church bodies.

The CLC has six members from each of the two church bodies, including the Rev. Mark S. Hanson, ELCA presiding bishop, and the Rev. Gerald B. Kieschnick, LCMS president. The committee met at LCMS offices here.

The CLC agreed once again to meet twice a year. In recent years, the committee had reduced its original semiannual meeting schedule to one meeting a year.

Both church bodies have new leadership. Hanson and Kieschnick each were elected to first terms in office by their respective church bodies last year.

During a discussion at the Nov. 12 meeting of relationships with other church bodies, the Rev. Samuel H. Nafzger, executive director, LCMS Commission on Theology and Church Relations (CTCR), said the CTCR is "concerned" that the Missouri Synod was not part of recent dialogues between the ELCA and the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches. Nafzger noted that the Missouri Synod had been partners in those dialogues until the most recent rounds of talks.

At that point, Hanson raised the issue of a resolution adopted at last year's LCMS national convention that affirmed "the late [LCMS] President Alvin L. Barry's judgment that ‘we cannot consider them [the ELCA] to be an orthodox Lutheran church body.'"

It is "confusing ... for an ecumenical partner to read that the LCMS does not consider the ELCA orthodox," Hanson said.

Nafzger said the resolution said that the ELCA and Missouri Synod do not have doctrinal agreement.

The Rev. Raymond L. Hartwig, LCMS secretary, said the resolution could be seen "as a reaching out" to the ELCA.

The Rev. Donald J. McCoid, bishop of the ELCA's Southwestern Pennsylvania Synod and chair of the ELCA Conference of Bishops, replied "that is not how it was received."

By the end of the discussion, the participants had agreed on more frequent CLC meetings and to develop a proposal for separate discussions of issues dividing the two bodies.

In addition, Hanson agreed to talk with ELCA officials and the ELCA's ecumenical partners about bringing the Missouri Synod back into the Lutheran dialogues with the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches.

For his part, Kieschnick said he would encourage the Missouri Synod's Praesidium – he and the Missouri Synod's five vice presidents – to "create a dialogue" with the ELCA as it examines the joint work of the two church bodies. Hanson had asked that the ELCA be included in discussions of that work.

The 2001 LCMS convention resolved that "current cooperative pastoral working arrangements with the ELCA be evaluated by the Praesidium with results and recommendations reported to the next synodical convention." Kieschnick said the Praesidium began working in September on that assignment.

The next CLC meeting is set for April 3 at the ELCA's offices in Chicago. The committee plans to meet next November in Baltimore, where several of the churches' joint agencies have their offices.

ELCA News Service

The Rev. David L. Mahsman is director for the News and Information Services of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, St. Louis.