Another Open Letter to Bishop Hanson
As the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has drifted away from the Christian and Lutheran traditions under the leadership of Mark Hanson, several people have attempted with open letters to persuade him and inform others of various tragic courses of action the denomination has taken in its brief history, with the hope that there might be some possibility of change. Letters have been written by Carl Braaten, George Paul Mocko, Gerhard Forde and James Nestingen, and Paul Spring, (please share any others you know of in the comments), and here is the latest, from Paul R Hinlicky (via Lutheran Forum):
Dear Bishop Hanson,
On July 1, 2009, you released a pastoral letter on the unity which we have in Christ Jesus even in the midst of severe and growing polarization in the ELCA. You noted that “we remain a church body that is not of one mind about these decisions [on the draft Social Statement and Recommendations for Ministry], and that these continuing differences have raised concerns among some about whether we are headed toward a church-dividing decision.” Towards the conclusion of your letter you summon “this church,” the ELCA, to maintain this unity: “Some may question why I am writing and wonder if this letter is advocating for a particular position on the questions before the churchwide assembly. It is not. Rather, it is an honest expression of my conviction that the Gospel of Jesus Christ, God’s mission for the life of the world, and the members of this church deserve this witness from us: In Christ we are members of one body serving God’s mission for the life of the world.” You thus called us to faith in this unity of the ELCA.
I am glad that you have awakened to the imminent danger threatening the unity of “this church.” Since I am one of the ELCA’s Teaching Theologians who has in fact repeatedly warned of the danger of a “church-dividing decision,” and since I unhappily confess to reading your disavowal of partisanship on the matter before us with less than full confidence, I am responding publicly to the remarkable reasoning I find in your letter.
You write against “a fear that unity depends on the actions of church leaders or assemblies.” Against this fearful misapprehension, you urge that unity “comes to us because God gives it freely and undeservedly in Jesus Christ. Although everyone in leadership shares responsibility for stewarding our unity in Christ, it will not be won or lost at the churchwide assembly in a plenary session vote. Rather, it will be received as a gracious gift from God when the assembly is gathered each noon by the Word and Sacrament through which God gives us unity, making us one in Jesus Christ. We hold in common this confession that God makes us one in Jesus Christ, but it is not making this confession that makes us one. Rather, because God unites us to Jesus Christ in Baptism we are also united to each other in one body that transcends any other difference. Paul states this clearly. “For in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith. As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ” (Galatians 3:26-27).
It is remarkable that you draw this conclusion about the ELCA’s unity from the Letter to the Galatians which warns against receiving any other gospel (Galatians 1:6-9) and demands testing of doctrine and church practice by the rule of faith (Galatians 6:15-16). But what is even more remarkable is that you apply this gospel theology of our God-given unity in Christ through baptism into His death and resurrection, not to the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, but to an American Protestant denomination, the ELCA, on the cusp of a self-induced institutional catastrophe. This is an egregious category confusion. But it is far worse than a merely intellectual mistake.
You apply this wonderful gospel theology of new human unity given in Christ to a separated denomination’s institutional existence, on the occasion of a decision that may seal its sectarian stance and burn bridges to Christians through 2000 years of history, across the range of ecumenical relations opened up in the last generation since Vatican II, and indeed within the world-wide Lutheran communion.
This is a theological abuse of the holy sacrament. Your letter uses the right theology of holy baptism falsely, that is, to serve the institutional interests of a separated American denomination possibly about to make a sectarian decision, rather than to challenge that separated American denomination to deal with the real implications of its baptismal bonds to other Christians in the decision facing it.
If what I have just said is not clear to you, permit me to ask you in turn as bishop of my church: Why should I trade my baptismal unity in Christ with Catholics, Orthodox, Evangelicals, the consensus fidelium through the ages, and indeed the vast majority of member churches of the LWF in order to stay in an American Protestant denomination which increasingly asks me to support things I conscientiously judge to be heterodox, indeed, at variance with baptismal faith itself in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit?
I said I was glad that you have awakened to your duty as bishop to minister to the unity of the church, and I mean it. Accordingly, permit me this counsel. The truly pastoral thing to do now would be to cease blaming the bearers of bad news for “this church’s” own failings of process and theology. The truly pastoral thing to do now would be to come out for the 2/3rds rule, as own your council of Bishops recommended by a vote of 44-15, or, even better, to advise the assembly that it has no right to change binding doctrine as specified in the ELCA Constitution Chapters Two and Three.
The truly pastoral thing to do now would be to urge that the draft Social Statement be sent back to the drawing board for failing to gain a theologically convincing Lutheran interpretation of the problems of human sexuality, and for failing to uphold the normative status of the confessional doctrine of marriage, to which the ELCA is committed by its Constitution and, apart from which commitment, has no claim on conscience for institutional loyalty. The truly pastoral thing to do now would to stop the torture that has sapped the strength and demoralized “this church” for so many years and support defeat of the draft Social Statement, the Four Recommendations and adoption of a 10-year moratorium on the issue.
Paul R. Hinlicky
N.B. This letter was sent on July 3. So far, no response has been received.
