Lutherans Prepare for Churchwide Assembly

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's church council released a book of memorials to be considered at the upcoming assembly; more than half were related to homosexuality

By Pauline J. Chang, Christian Post Reporter Friday, July 29, 2005

More than a thousand voting members from the nation’s largest Lutheran denomination will be gathering next week for their once-every-two-years general assembly in Orlando, Fla., and homosexuality will be the main focus of concern.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)’s Church Council – the denomination’s board of directors – met in Chicago in June to review what memorials will be presented at the August 8-14 gathering. Memorials are requests from the church’s regional synods – or districts – asking for actions by the Churchwide Assembly – the ELCA’s chief legislative authority – on specific issues. The Council found that of the 196 memorials nearly half are related to homosexuality.

Specifically, the memorials on homosexuality deal with three proposed resolutions released earlier in the year by an ELCA task force on sexuality that addressed whether the church should bless same-sex relationships and/or allow people in such relations to serve as professional lay and ordained ministers.

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The three resolutions, each to be discussed separately, essentially: called on the church to “live together faithfully” despite disagreements; recommended the church uphold its standards against blessing same-sex “marriages” but gave leeway for providing “pastoral care” for same-sex couples; and called on the church to give exceptions to the ordination standard requiring pastors – both homosexual and heterosexual- to be celibate outside of marriage.

Thirteen memorials were filed for the first proposal, with 10 favoring it. The second resolution received five memorials favoring, six unsure and at least one against. The third resolution had four memorials supporting, nine opposing and seven supporting the proposed policy change.

Each of the resolutions will be rejected, approved or amended by the delegates next month.

Meanwhile, the rest of the memorials discussed several key topics for the ELCA, including justice issues, worship forms and creation stewardship.

A link to the Memorials Committee report to the 2005 ELCA Churchwide Assembly is at http://tinyurl.com/b7xqg or at http://www.ELCA.org/assembly/05/VotingMatters/MemorialsResolutions.html on the ELCA Web site.