ELCA Church Council Meeting

The mosaic tile installation at the first floor
elevators in The Lutheran Center.

I just returned from attending a 3-day meeting of the Church Council of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) at The Lutheran Center in Chicago. The Lutheran Center is an 11-story building near O’Hare Airport with dedicated space for Church Council meetings and a chapel with organ on the first floor. The entire building is filled with religious art worthy of a separate tour.

The organ in the first floor chapel during the last day's Eucharist.

The lobby of the 9th floor of The Lutheran Center.

I’m the invited ecumenical advisor, elected from the Executive Council of The Episcopal Church (TEC), our counterpart to the ELCA Church Council. In both cases, the Councils are the governing bodies in the interim between the TEC’s triennial General Convention and the ELCA’s biennial Churchwide Assembly. Incidentally, the Lutherans generally don’t use the initials “ELCA” when referring to themselves but say “Evangelical Lutheran Church.”

The Church Council is comprised of 37 (vs. 38 in the TEC Executive Council) elected members including four presiding officers: the Presiding Bishop, a lay Vice President, a lay Secretary, and a lay Treasurer, all of whom are on staff at The Lutheran Center. Guests include synodical (diocesan in TEC lingo) bishops, and representatives from program units, advocacy organizations, and ecumenical partners.

Three interconnected rooms held approximately 120, with the Council members seated in two U-shaped tables facing the head table, the bishops and youth representatives behind them, and the guests on either side of the Council members. Although expensive to include so many advisors in Church Council meetings, the Lutheran commitment is to inclusion of all the voices of the church, particularly during small group and committee work.

The Church Council meeting room.

The bishops' seating is on the right.

Even though the ELCA is intentional and attentive to racial, ethnic, gender, youth, pastors and lay representation in its elected members (mandated quotas of 40% female, 60% male; 10% youth; 10% people of color), the room held mostly Whites, a handful of Blacks, and even fewer Hispanics/Latinos and Asians (no Asian Council members, however). I also did not see anyone who was visibly handicapped.

Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson stated that the ELCA is 97% White, and the intentionality towards diversity is very present. Their concept of “Reconciled Diversity” acknowledges our unity always in the ground of our diversity with reference to First Corinthians 12 (There are many parts, yet one body), which was referred to repeatedly as reports and resolutions were presented.

“The ELCA Church Council is committed to lead the church toward racial and gender justice and full inclusion and participation,” is a statement on the daily “Process Observation Form” which attendees complete. Process Observers reported at the close of each day’s business session as a means of addressing racism within the Council itself.

Goodsoil, a consortium of organizations working for the full inclusion of LGBT people in the ELCA, had a cadre of six to eight persons present throughout the Council meeting. They took up the entire back row of one side of the guests’ seating. A retired bishop told me that in response to his query, Goodsoil representatives said they would keep showing up for Council meetings until LGBT people are fully integrated into the sacramental and ministerial life of their church.

The Lutherans approach “ubuntu,” the theme of TEC’s General Convention this past July, through the words “interconnected,” “interdependent,” and “neighbor.” Ubuntu, a Bantu word, means “I in you and you in me,” or as Archbishop Desmond Tutu says, “you can't exist as a human being in isolation. It speaks about our interconnectedness. You can't be human all by yourself . . . .”

From Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson to numerous pastors and lay leaders in breakout sessions, the interdependence of human beings was foundational in every discussion and in every document that was presented to the Council members and guests. Part of the Lutheran theology is that they seek to respond to God’s love through care for the neighbor, and they acknowledge a pastoral responsibility to all God’s children.

One of the challenges of serving in this liaison post is learning a whole new church vocabulary and church polity. The Lutherans are sticklers for language, especially right now as they engage the reactions to the August, 2009, adoption of their tenth Social Statement entitled “Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust.” Two concepts from the Social Statement were discussed widely during the Church Council meeting: “the bound conscience” and “publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same gender relationship.”

The bound conscience refers to the different understandings of Scripture and what constitutes responsible action that faithful people come to in their discernment of ethics and church practice. The ELCA acknowledges that consensus does not exist regarding same gender sexual relationships.

Publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same gender relationships are no longer a barrier to full inclusion in the rostered (ordained pastors) life of the ELCA in terms of church policy. How each bishop and each congregation responds (calls or doesn’t call an LGBT pastor) is a matter of bound conscience. Much discussion ensued around what “publicly accountable” means. Among the ideas raised by Council members was that a possible benchmark might be that the same gender relationship would be marked by whatever is the highest civil designation, e.g., civil union or marriage, in the relevant locale.

Many Council members were uncomfortable with the lack of clear guidelines, and it was suggested that clarity may not be possible. Presiding Bishop Hanson referenced the “Background Essay on Biblical Texts for ‘Journey Together Faithfully, Part Two: The Church and Homosexuality’” as another example of how clarity is not always possible. (Journey Together Faithfully is the Lutheran study guide that preceded the Social Statement on Human Sexuality.) The Background Essay’s authors, Arland J. Hultgren and Walter F. Taylor Jr., concluded that biblical scholars cannot be the final and only arbiter of human sexuality: “But finally their contributions are only one part of a larger discussion among those who seek the mind of Christ in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.”

One last observation is on the discipline that the Lutherans exhibited in not using the term “dissenters” to refer to those who disagree with the actions of the August, 2009, Churchwide Assembly in adopting the Social Statement on Human Sexuality and thus, removing any policy bars to full inclusion of LGBT people in rostered ministry. The theology behind this is that all are within the circle, all are full, equal and necessary members of The Body of Christ, and "dissenter" is a term that makes the neighbor into the other.

Bishop Hanson reported that a recent survey of the 65 synodical bishops indicated that out of approximately 10,400 congregations in the ELCA, 87 have held the first of two required votes to leave the ELCA of which 28 failed to reach the 2/3-majority required, and only 5 have held a second vote. He pointed out that the ELCA is at present living at the intersection of hope and fear and is committed to the proclamation of the Gospel and service to the neighbor.

I was greatly enriched and blessed to have the privilege of attending this Church Council meeting. Four highlights stand out in my experience. The first was doing Bible Study with Presiding Bishop Hanson and retired Bishop Donald McCoid. The second was "Cafe Conversations," a guided hour and a half discussion on reactions within the synods to the Social Statement on Human Sexuality. I was at a table facilitated by the deeply reflective Synodical Bishop Michael Burk, who has been spending the vast majority of his time in recent months pastoring to those who are discomfited by the actions of the Churchwide Assembly.

The third was Lutheran Evening Prayer, which turned out to be what we Episcopalians call Evensong. I thoroughly enjoyed all of the hymns from the Lutheran Worship book, which seem to somehow be more liltingly melodic than the hymns of the Episcopal Hymnal. And the fourth was an early morning (7:00 AM) breakfast meeting to learn more about the Church in Society Unit, comprised of the domestic and world mission and public policy and advocacy portfolios of the ELCA.

I was warmly welcomed and well orientated along with the new class of 13 Church Council members. I look forward to the next Church Council meeting in April, 2010.