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Up one levelPlease Greet All in the Missouri-Synod for Me
On April 18th Pope Benedict XVI was in New York and he met with some 350 local and national ecumenical leaders for prayer and a brief message. Cardinal Egan, Archbishop of New York, invited 15 of these ecumenical figures to greet Benedict personally. Bishop Daniel McCoid, the new Ecumenical Officer of the ELCA, represented Bishop Mark Hanson and immediately followed the Orthodox representatives. Bishop David Benke of the Missouri Synod Atlantic District, which corresponds in part to the Archdiocese of New York, was the first of several local leaders invited by the Cardinal...
The Elastic Lutheran Polity
In the early 1960's the ecumenical vanguard was the Consultation on Christian Union (COCU). It involved Episcopalians, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists in an effort to bring together their diverse and mutually exclusive understandings of ministry and church polity. American Lutherans were not involved, but we are evolving slowly but surely toward restoration of the three-fold office of ministry (bishop, pastor, and deacon). I think this is good thing and, judging from wide spread acceptance, most all concerned believe so too...
The Spirit of the Iowa Synod
Pastor Albert Hock, now living in retirement after a full career in the pastoral ministry, has put together a scholarly history documenting the adventures of those who were sent to America by Johann Konrad Wilhelm Loehe. Like Loehe, their mentor, these pilgrims were highly energetic and expansionary...
Wanted: Evangelical Catholics in Missouri
This inaugural column is addressed to the Evangelical Catholics of the Missouri Synod. You don’t call yourselves that, of course, but I don’t know what else to call you. You are exactly the counterpart to your ELCA cousins (brothers? sisters?) who are known as Evangelical Catholics, so if you insist on a separate name you’ll have to tell us what it is. Whatever you may be called, you are the continuation of a important tradition in American Lutheranism...