- Unity of the Church:the ELCA’s In-House Controversy on the Historic Episcopate
Colleagues,
Last week’s posting, a series of your responses to ThTh #111, asked me to re-think the historic episcopate , specifically my contention that if HE is now a YOU GOTTA in the ELCA, then it could indeed be a no-no for Reformation-rooted Lutherans.
Several of you respondents went to the Lutheran Confessions themselves to show that ...
- Readers’ Responses
Colleagues,
Today’s edition, ThTh #115, offers readers’ responses to recent postings. There’s quite a bunch. If possible I’ll try next week to address some of the items raised here.
Peace & Joy!
Ed
Last week’s critique (ThTh 114) of a Christ-less sermon we encountered on the weekend of the Schroeder family reunion elicited this from an ELCA pastor in ...
- Preaching the Gospel (again!)
Colleagues,
It’s clearly a bone caught in my craw (or a barley-beard inside my pants leg, as we used to say back on the farm 60 yrs ago). Namely, preaching, less-than-Gospel preaching–and that from preachers who know the Gospel, but (apparently) don’t notice when they are NOT preaching it.
Case in point.
Background: Every two years on the ...
- Common Christological Declaration of the Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East
This week’s piece comes through Richard Leigh, a frequent student of the Lutheran School of Theology here in St. Louis.
Enjoy!
Ed
Common Christological Declaration of the Catholic Church and the Assyrian Church of the East
His Holiness John Paul II, Bishop of Rome and Pope of the Catholic Church, and
His Holiness Mar Dinkha IV, Catholicos-Patriarch of the Assyrian ...
- Nestorius and the Nestorian Church
Colleagues,
Last week’s ThTh #111–Luther and the Jews, historic episcopate–generated considerable response. It’s still coming in. So I’ll wait a week or two before sorting it out and passing it on to you. Another reason for such a delay is that we’re doing a bit of vacation from now to mid-August–and NOT taking along the laptop!
So ...
- Requests from Bishops
Colleagues,
Two ELCA bishops have asked me for some theological help on sticky questions. That doesn’t happen often, so when it does, I perk up. Each bishop had 2 such tough questions. One bishop’s pair was:
What did Luther really say about the Jews (and why)?
Do the Lutheran Confessions give us any real help in the ELCA’s ...
- Reader Responses
Colleagues,
Our posting for ThTh #110 is a collection of smaller items–a mixed bag, but good stuff. After a lead-in citation from Luther there follows reader-responses to recent postings and then an insider’s report from Canada.
Peace & Joy!
Ed
God’s law and Christian ethics: The heart of the matter.Sent in by an ELCA pastor
Luther’s Sermon on I Timothy ...
- Women Pastors – Christ’s Gifts to the Church
Colleagues,
For this week, one from the archives of 24 years ago. Ancient as it is, it may cheer some ThTh receivers in the Lutheran Church of Australia right now. In the next days the LCA at its 2000 church assembly will vote yes or no on women clergy. Our year in Adelaide (1994) as guests ...
- Church Discipline
Colleagues,
Only once in my life–almost 70 years now–did I experience a case of church discipline. I was hardly a major player in the event. But I was present–as an uncomprehending child–in the Sunday morning service 60 years ago when a member was formally excommunicated from Trinity Lutheran Church in Coal Valley, Illinois. Asking my dad ...
- Coping with Chaos
Colleagues,
Robin sent over this slice-of-life for me to send on to you today. It’s powerful.
Peace & Joy!
Ed Schroeder
GOD SAID
“Wild and waste” is the way the Bible I was reading translates “tohu va-vohu” in the Hebrew text of Genesis 1:2. “When the earth was wild and waste darkness over the face of Ocean, rushing spirit of ...
