What is a Lutheran? Part 1
In some other posts, there has been some discussion about what makes one a Lutheran. PS brought to my attention that Lutheran churches and pastors do not always do the best job about educating people about what it means to be a Lutheran. Thus, I am starting a series of posts on What is a Lutheran.
The first thing that it means to be a Lutheran is to be an orthodox, catholic Christian. That is to say, to be a Lutheran is to be a part of that broad stream of Christianity that adheres to the three great ecumenical (universal) creeds: the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian.
Very often, we Lutherans spend so much time talking about what makes us distinctive, that we neglect talking about what united us with the Body of Christ around the globe and throughout time. Lutheranism is not an island. We are a part of something much larger -- and ultimately more important -- than just us by ourselves.
I have found that when people talk about the contents of the Book of Concord (the Lutheran Confessions, more on that later), they often pass right over the creeds. The creeds are too often left off of the list of the contents of the Confessions, and passed over in discussions of the Confessions.
Here I stand as a Lutheran: I believe in the Creeds.
The text of the three ecumenical creeds can be found here.
4 comments:
I have often floored people by telling them that I wish I didn't have to be Lutheran. In a perfect world, I would be Catholic (not Tridentine Roman, mind you), and so would all other Christians. There would be but one Body, and all would gather round Word and Sacrament. Rome never would have lost sight of the Gospel, and the abuses of the Protestants never would have further fractured Christendom.
We know what the real world is like, though. I'm not Lutheran because I somehow relate and identify with the narrative of a grumpy German monk or Saxon immigrants looking for religious freedom. I'm Lutheran because I love Christ. Or, more appropriately, because Christ first loved me and I wish to receive His gifts as frequently as He offers them. In the Lutheran church I align myself with others who have taken a firm stand for the Gospel.
Your observation of how Lutherans approach the creeds is spot-on; they seem rather trivial now, but at the time of Council of Nicea and during the life of St. Athanasius these were, quite literally, matters of life and death.
As trivial as they may seem at times, I often point people back to them. This has been the case especially with folks who stroll into Barnes and Noble and buy stuff by Borg, Crossan, Ehrman etc. Giving people a little backgound about the creeds and then fleshing out with them what the creeds mean for us today in light of the reassertion of heresies by some scholars is a moment of clarity for some parishioners.
LP,
I think you are right ... we are entering into an era where affirmation of the creeds is optional for many who bear the name of Christ. It used to be that one only ran into this with persons from Anabaptist / Fundamentalist backgrounds. But more and more, scholars and those from what would seem to be mainstream traditions present the creeds as optional.
All the more reason to begin first with the creeds when thinking about what it means to be Lutheran.
bettler,
Yes, indeed, the creeds were once a matter of life and death. I believe that they are still of such great importance for the church today ... unless we are intentional about reasserting the authority of the creeds, we will lose all continuity with the Christianity of the preceeding 2000 years.
It has become common for the test of Christian orthodoxy to be one's position in the "culture wars." That is, a person is only truly Christian if they agree with me on abortion, the death penalty, social justice, etc. I think it is a grave error to let these questions replace the role that the creeds have played until now.
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