Lutherans--why Lutheran and not Catholic?

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EvangelCatholic said:
I was also dismayed when the ELCA declared full communion with Reformed Christians. But then I realized that exposing other Christians to the Real Presence as believed by Lutherans [as well as infant baptism, holy absolution, weekly mass, etc.] provides them insight into the mysteries of the faith. The efficacy of holy Communion is never determined by individual understanding.
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Good point. It also exposes Lutherans to the heterodox positions of those Reformed communions, particularly in the area of the Eucharist. And let’s all admit it, we don’t do a good job of catechizing our members. So, the exposure leads to Lutherans believing things that are not doctrine.
Saying the efficacy of the sacrament is never determined by the individual’s understanding is true, but is not a reason to allow heterodox understandings to confuse the faithful.

Jon
 
EvangelCatholic said:
I was also dismayed when the ELCA declared full communion with Reformed Christians. But then I realized that exposing other Christians to the Real Presence as believed by Lutherans [as well as infant baptism, holy absolution, weekly mass, etc.] provides them insight into the mysteries of the faith. The efficacy of holy Communion is never determined by individual understanding.
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Not so much. What it does is expose them to a real presence they don’t believe in and thus makes them receive communion unto their condemnation.
 
To answer the original question, I have been a Lutheran all my life. My parents, grandparents, and many before them were also Lutheran. It was pretty much in the cards that I would be raised as a Lutheran.

Why am I still Lutheran? I have yet to be convinced that any other Christian community is a better expression of my faith in Christ. I have not heard any argument that convinces me that my relationship with God is inferior to those of any other faith tradition.

Having said that, I also pray for Christian unity which I believe will come in its time. I give thanks for all who confess Jesus as Lord. Contrary to teachings that I received as a young person, I give thanks for the Catholic Church without which I might have been raised to worship Odin, Thor and the rest of that Nordic pantheon. This is, indeed, a great gift.
 
gcnuss said:
To answer the original question, I have been a Lutheran all my life. My parents, grandparents, and many before them were also Lutheran. It was pretty much in the cards that I would be raised as a Lutheran.

Why am I still Lutheran? I have yet to be convinced that any other Christian community is a better expression of my faith in Christ. I have not heard any argument that convinces me that my relationship with God is inferior to those of any other faith tradition.

Having said that, I also pray for Christian unity which I believe will come in its time. I give thanks for all who confess Jesus as Lord. Contrary to teachings that I received as a young person, I give thanks for the Catholic Church without which I might have been raised to worship Odin, Thor and the rest of that Nordic pantheon. This is, indeed, a great gift.
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Well said 🙂 My apologies for my part in derailing the intent of this message thread.
 
steido01 said:
I can sympathize with your parishoner, pastor. It’s for precisely those sycretistic (or at least syncretistic appearances) that I wonder why more confessional Lutherans - as I presume you to be, sir - don’t leave that body for more “Lutheran” grounds? :o
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I’ve know one amazingly confessional ELCA pastor that stays within the Synod for two good reasons: The shepherd doesn’t desert their flock, and as a perpetual waning to other ELCA pastors to not cause others to stumble.

God bless him and others like him!
 
JonNC said:
So, the exposure leads to Lutherans believing things that are not doctrine.
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I can vouch for that - my early Lutheran experience was tainted by Receptionism and Consubstantiation, and I’m still finding things that I was taught incorrectly.
 
MaryT777 said:
There are Catholics that feel the same way especially given the views in the ELCA which I don’t know if they are reflective of the LWF as a whole regarding women ordination ,homosexuality and no clear cut stance against abortion that I have read. I stand corrected on the abortion issue if wrong

Mary.
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Unless I am mistaken, for a body to be a member of the LWF open fellowship must be shared with all other members (part of the reason why the LCMS and other Confessional bodies do not join). Chances are that the other member bodies either agree with the ELCA, or do not see its decisions as church-dividing.

The ILC is significantly more representative of Confessional, traditional, and Lutheran thought. I expect future, fruitful dialogue between Roman Catholics and Lutherans to take place largely through this channel.
 
steido01 said:
Unless I am mistaken, for a body to be a member of the LWF open fellowship must be shared with all other members (part of the reason why the LCMS and other Confessional bodies do not join). Chances are that the other member bodies either agree with the ELCA, or do not see its decisions as church-dividing.

The ILC is significantly more representative of Confessional, traditional, and Lutheran thought. I expect future, fruitful dialogue between Roman Catholics and Lutherans to take place largely through this channel.
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What does ILC stand for?
Mary.
I also look forward to dialogue with the Confessional, traditional Lutherans.
Mary.
 
Question for Lutherans; are you still trying to reform the Catholic Church? What was the original reformation about and in what way are you still working towards such a reform?
 
The Lutheran viewpoint, among other Christian denominations, is what makes the most sense to me and I arrived at it after studying Luther and the Book of Concord and talking to people about it. I try to go over everything here but there is a lot so we may need to talk more about some of these points. I wanted to try to get everything out there in one post. .

First I start with the Real Physical Presence of Christ in the Eucharist as a required belief so that is pretty much going to leave for me the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Lutheran groups because only these require belief in the Real Physical Presence of Christ.

I love much of what the Eastern, and Oriental Orthodox Churches have to offer. The theology and prayers are deep and have much reflect on. However, I personally do believe in extreme asceticism and required fasting and I do not believe that personal confession to a priest should be obligatory which is going to be a reason I am not Roman Catholic either. We have a short service of general confession before Mass starts at my Lutheran parish which I think should be the model and then personal confession to your pastor if you feel that you need to do it that way. Also as Psalm 19 suggests, who can enumerate their sins? Plus the nearest Orthodox parish is an hour drive away.

So we finally arrive now at the big question: Why Lutheran and not Catholic?

Because I believe that the Church is truly universal and is simply made up of the people who believe in Christ and that nobody has a monopoly on it. I believe that the Sacred Scriptures are the final authority that we test all of our beliefs with. I do not accept “Sacred Tradition or Magisterium.” What teachings make up Sacred Tradition? Can the Holy Spirit inspire the Church kill people (referring to the so called Ecumenical Council of Constance which put Jan Hus and John Wycliffe to death)? Also that I believe there are only two sacraments and not seven and this is important. I also do not accept Apostolic Succession in the traditional sense. What matters is that we pass down the teachings of Christ and the Apostles from generation to generation. There is the priesthood of all believers and from that God calls some people to ordained ministry

The big reason though is going to be Sola Fide, Faith Alone. You are saved by faith alone. You do not have to uphold the law perfectly to be saved. It is your faith that saves you. Committing sin does not mean that you don’t have faith it generally means that you have weaknesses that God wants to help you overcome. So therefore there would be no need to have purgatory and indulgences. There is also no distinction then among sins to be held. You cannot commit mortal sin because you are saved by your faith. The only sin then that destroys your salvation is to lose faith in God. I know there is Calvinism out there that talks about once saved always saved but I am not comfortable going that far though I will accept that the longer you have faith the harder it is to lose it because I know I have grown much in my faith in God over the year.

Also the local Catholic parish here is horrible. The people don’t greet you and the priest just shakes your hand and says have a nice day when you leave. They do not sing all the verses for the hymns and there seems to be this “routine” feeling about Mass and everyone is always in a hurry.

Finally there is clerical dating, women’s ordination, and homosexuality. The Catholic Church frowns on all of these. Lutherans allow for clerical dating. We are divided on women’s ordination and homosexuality. I support women’s ordination and homosexuality so I choose to be a Lutheran in fellowship with the ELCA.

The local Lutheran parish I attend has a nice blend of Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox elements, especially the Eastern Orthodox stuff. We use the Lutheran Book of Worship which is a little more traditional. We stand for the Eucharistic Prayer and all the Eucharistic Prayers have the Epiclesis AFTER the Words of Institution. We have 4 options (Hey just like Roman Catholics and Episcopals) and we use #3 which has the most defined Epiclesis. Of course we also have icons in our parish and we pray some of the prayers from the Great Litany at the beginning of Mass so in those ways we have some similarities to the Eastern Orthodox but then there is the usual Roman Catholic influences as well.

I know this was a lot and it is not meant to offend anybody but this was my attempt to try to explain why I am Lutheran and not anything else even though there is only one Faith and I do hope we can all be One one day. May the Lord’s Peace be with you all.
 
dronald said:
Question for Lutherans; are you still trying to reform the Catholic Church? What was the original reformation about and in what way are you still working towards such a reform?
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No. Chiefly because we believe that the church which professes the catholic faith to its fullest exists within those congregations which confess the Book of Concord. That is to say, we don’t believe that the Lutheran Reformation went unfinished.
 
MichaelSC said:
Finally there is clerical dating, women’s ordination, and homosexuality. The Catholic Church frowns on all of these. Lutherans allow for clerical dating. We are divided on women’s ordination and homosexuality. I support women’s ordination and homosexuality so I choose to be a Lutheran in fellowship with the ELCA.
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You lost me right there. Do you mean you support that people can be homosexual and it’s not a sin to be so? If that’s the case then Catholics agree with you. Are you saying that homosexuals can have sex with each other? If that’s the case then Paul disagrees with you.
Per_Crucem said:
No. Chiefly because we believe that the church which professes the catholic faith to its fullest exists within those congregations which confess the Book of Concord. That is to say, we don’t believe that the Lutheran Reformation went unfinished.
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So why don’t you just call yourselves, “Catholic” if you believe you’re the true Catholic Church with it’s own declarations.

Why name yourself after one man?
 
dronald said:
You lost me right there. Do you mean you support that people can be homosexual and it’s not a sin to be so? If that’s the case then Catholics agree with you. Are you saying that homosexuals can have sex with each other? If that’s the case then Paul disagrees with you.
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In referring to homosexuality I mean both people who experience it and people who engage in homosexual acts. This is definitely something of a complex topic. What I am trying to say is that within the context of a life-long monogamous partnership, homosexual activity can be ok. I am not necessarily comfortable in saying that this partnership can be called “marriage” but I do think God can bless same-sex couples. Marriage seems to imply that you are going to be bringing children into the world but at the same time I am willing to bet there are some great same-sex partners who are awesome foster parents or guardians. I am only aware of two places where Paul talks about homosexual behavior so let me address them.

In Galatians, Paul uses the term “homosexual offender.” What exactly is a homosexual offender? Then there is the passage in Romans 1. Most people use verse 26-27 to say that God condemns homosexual behavior in general. But look at verses 23-25. There Paul mentions idolatry as a sin. As a result of the idolatry God gave them over to homosexual behavior. This letter was written to the Romans. Is it possible that Paul is referring to the Pagans in Rome and elsewhere who practiced homosexual behavior they worshiped their Gods?
 
MichaelSC said:
In referring to homosexuality I mean both people who experience it and people who engage in homosexual acts. This is definitely something of a complex topic. What I am trying to say is that within the context of a life-long monogamous partnership, homosexual activity can be ok. I am not necessarily comfortable in saying that this partnership can be called “marriage” but I do think God can bless same-sex couples. Marriage seems to imply that you are going to be bringing children into the world but at the same time I am willing to bet there are some great same-sex partners who are awesome foster parents or guardians. I am only aware of two places where Paul talks about homosexual behavior so let me address them.

In Galatians, Paul uses the term “homosexual offender.” What exactly is a homosexual offender? Then there is the passage in Romans 1. Most people use verse 26-27 to say that God condemns homosexual behavior in general. But look at verses 23-25. There Paul mentions idolatry as a sin. As a result of the idolatry God gave them over to homosexual behavior. This letter was written to the Romans. Is it possible that Paul is referring to the Pagans in Rome and elsewhere who practiced homosexual behavior they worshiped their Gods?
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Excellent example on what happens when you trade the authority of the church for the authority of the individual.

Perversion of the Gospel.

Paul knew what he wrote. So did his audience. The early church made it completely clear how we should read these.

You read into the text to find a modern slant that does not exist.
 
MichaelSC said:
In referring to homosexuality I mean both people who experience it and people who engage in homosexual acts. This is definitely something of a complex topic. What I am trying to say is that within the context of a life-long monogamous partnership, homosexual activity can be ok. I am not necessarily comfortable in saying that this partnership can be called “marriage” but I do think God can bless same-sex couples. Marriage seems to imply that you are going to be bringing children into the world but at the same time I am willing to bet there are some great same-sex partners who are awesome foster parents or guardians. I am only aware of two places where Paul talks about homosexual behavior so let me address them.

In Galatians, Paul uses the term “homosexual offender.” What exactly is a homosexual offender? Then there is the passage in Romans 1. Most people use verse 26-27 to say that God condemns homosexual behavior in general. But look at verses 23-25. There Paul mentions idolatry as a sin. As a result of the idolatry God gave them over to homosexual behavior. This letter was written to the Romans. Is it possible that Paul is referring to the Pagans in Rome and elsewhere who practiced homosexual behavior they worshiped their Gods?
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I’m not going to debate homosexuality here so I’ll keep this on topic…

Do Lutherans actually believe this?
 
dronald said:
Question for Lutherans; are you still trying to reform the Catholic Church? What was the original reformation about and in what way are you still working towards such a reform?
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Just to get the ball rolling on this question are you enjoying receiving the Chalice as a Roman Catholic in the United States? That was a major point for Luther, Melancthon, and the other Lutheran reformers.
 
MichaelSC said:
Just to get the ball rolling on this question are you enjoying receiving the Chalice as a Roman Catholic in the United States? That was a major point for Luther, Melancthon, and the other Lutheran reformers.
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Look at my Religion, I’m not Catholic.

But I have developed an interest in Apostolic Churches
 
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