Catholic-Lutheran document sums up agreements, maps steps to full unity

[gilliam]

BALTIMORE (CNS) — A new 120-page document marks the progress in Catholic-Lutheran relations over the past 50 years and maps the remaining steps needed to achieve full unity.

The “Declaration on the Way” was prepared by a joint task force of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs and the Chicago-based Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which has more than 3.7 million members in 9,300 congregations across the United States.

The document was inspired by a December 2011 speech by Cardinal Kurt Koch, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, and draws on the work of national and international Catholic-Lutheran dialogues since 1965, particularly on the topics of church, ministry and the Eucharist. It was intended to mark the 50th anniversary of Catholic-Lutheran dialogue in 2015 and the upcoming 500th anniversary of the start of the Protestant Reformation in 2017.

cnstopstories.com/2015/11/05/catholic-lutheran-document-sums-up-agreements-maps-steps-to-full-unity/

 

[midori]

Kathryn Johnson, ELCA director for ecumenical and interreligious relations, said the declaration marked the beginning of “a totally different world of relationship and hopefulness” between Catholics and Lutherans.

Father John Crossin, executive director of the USCCB Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, said he had been approached by an Anglican colleague about doing a similar document that looks at remaining issues dividing the two communions.

The declaration “is already starting to have a little ripple effect,” he said.

Cool beans.

 

[Robert_Bay]

Document is here: usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/ecumenical-and-interreligious/ecumenical/lutheran/declaration-on-the-way.cfm

 

[_Abyssinia]

It says in the catholicnews.com article:

The declaration is not a statement of the full body of Catholic bishops, but was affirmed in October by the ELCA Conference of Bishops, an advisory body, which asked the ELCA Church Council to forward the document to the 2016 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, its highest legislative body.

catholicnews.com/services/englishnews/2015/catholic-lutheran-document-sums-up-agreements-maps-steps-to-full-unity.cfm

Worth remembering.