August 25, 2005

STRASBOURG, France/GENEVA – A number of ethical issues are challenging the churches increasingly, some of them leading to tensions that threaten unity within and among churches. It is against this background that the Institute for Ecumenical Research in Strasbourg, France, focused its 2005 Summer Seminar, on two currently divisive issues, namely genetic engineering and homosexuality.

Sixty participants from different countries and confessions attended the seminar. Although opinions were diverse, the participants engaged in an "open and charitable debate finding a great deal of consensus and identifying areas for further discussion," said Dr Kenneth Appold, research professor at the institute and the seminar's coordinator.

Three keynote speakers addressed the issue of bio-ethics, agreeing on a number of important principles, including the fundamental belief that human life is God's creation and requires special protection at all stages of development. However, the speakers could not agree on how to define the beginning of life. For Roman Catholic professor Eberhard Schockenhoff (Germany) the moment of fertilization is the definite point of beginning.

Lutheran theologians, Prof. Klaus Tanner (Germany) and Rev. Dr Jean-François Collange, president of the Church of the Augsburg Confession of Alsace and Lorraine (France), were less precise in this regard, observing that rapidly evolving scientific knowledge made most such efforts problematic. Differing views on the beginning of life led to different positions on embryonic stem-cell research. Schockenhoff opposes this area of research, while the two Lutherans give their consent, albeit with rigorous ethical qualifications.

On the topic of homosexuality, the participants shared experiences from their various home churches. They especially focused on how to respond to homosexual partnerships; and whether to ordain homosexuals living in such partnerships. Rev. Dr Karen Bloomquist, director of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) Department for Theology and Studies, proposed theological and methodological perspectives for engaging the differences on this topic without their becoming church-dividing.

Professors Eugene Rogers (USA) and Philippe Bordeyne (France), developed some creative understandings of marriage in general, and how these may or may not apply to same-sex relationships. Marriage, they agreed, is a part of the church's public witness; married couples contribute to the church's mission. They disagreed on whether homosexual partnership is capable of such a contribution. Bordeyne argued that it cannot, since marriage witnesses to God's will for sexual difference – male and female – at Creation. For Rogers, marriage is above all an exercise in spiritual asceticism, cultivating spiritual values of fidelity, self-sacrifice and love. In his view, any couple whose relationship embodied those qualities contributed to the church's mission to the world, hence, his call for allowing homosexuals to marry.

Participants left with a sense that it is possible and necessary to continue these discussions in their own churches.

Lutheran World Information