Episcopal Press and News
Prayers offered to mark 10th anniversary of Episcopal-Lutheran full-communion agreement
Episcopal News Service. January 5, 2011 [010511-02]
Mary Frances Schjonberg
Members of the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America are being urged to remember in their prayers the first 10 years of the denominations' full-communion agreement.
Suggested Prayers of the People for use by congregations in both denominations are available here. Prayers are presented for use in all six forms of the Prayers of the People found in the Book of Common Prayer. For example, the suggestion for Form II is: "I ask your prayers of thanksgiving for the tenth anniversary of the relationship of full communion between The Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Pray for enduring commitment to common mission."
The Episcopal Church and the ELCA formally entered into a relationship of full communion through the Called to Common Mission agreement on Jan. 6, 2001 during a Eucharist at Washington National Cathedral. A 2011 commemoration is being planned for later this year.
"Prayers have been prepared to honor the past decade of our mission together, and for our ministry together in the future," the Rev. Tom Ferguson, Episcopal Church ecumenical and interreligious relations officer, said in a press release from the church's Office of Public Affairs.
The Rev. Donald J. McCoid, executive director of ELCA's ecumenical and interreligious relations, told ENS that the anniversary is a time when both denominations "are able to celebrate the shared mission and shared ministries that have enriched our church bodies."
"From shared local ministries and shared ordained clergy to campus ministries, disaster relief, ministry education, global mission training, advocacy work, and many daily ministries in and with our full communion partners, we give thanks to God for the many ways that CCM has blessed our churches," he said.
Ferguson noted that full-communion commitments are not mergers. "In full communion both churches retain their autonomy and structures but agree to work together for joint mission and witness in the world," he said.
McCoid said that "Called to Common Mission acknowledges that our focus is on shared mission."
"As we look to the future, we see the seeds of closer cooperation being sown through mutual mission assessment and planning. We have grown in understanding the traditions and structures of one another. We continue to see the importance of making our commitment to the common mission that our Lord Jesus has given to us."
During the Epiphany Day Eucharist in 2001 that marked the opening of the agreement, then-Presiding Bishop Frank Griswold expressed his hope and prayer that the full communion commitment would "lead to ever-widening and deepening relationships of shared life and mission with other churches of the Reformation, as well as the Church of Rome and the churches of the East." In the meantime, he urged members of both denominations to leave behind "attitudes and self-perceptions which keep us from joyfully welcoming one another as brothers and sisters in the communion of the Holy Spirit, and from opening ourselves to the gifts of grace and truth to be found in one another's church."
The full-communion agreement with the ELCA is one of the Episcopal Church's six such full-communion commitments. Most recently, both the northern and southern provinces of the Moravian Church agreed in 2010 to enter into full communion with the Episcopal Church.
The Episcopal Church agreed during the 76th General Convention in the summer of 2009 to enter into a full communion relationship with the Northern and Southern Provinces of the Moravian Church. The agreement (text is here) is officially known as "Finding Our Delight in the Lord: A Proposal for Full Communion Between The Episcopal Church; the Moravian Church-Northern Province; and the Moravian Church-Southern Province." Other documents pertaining to the agreement can be found here.
The ELCA also is in full communion with the Moravian Church.
A liturgy celebrating the Episcopal-Moravian agreements is planned for Feb. 10 at Central Moravian Church in downtown Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
The Episcopal Church also is in full communion with the Old Catholic Churches of the Union of Utrecht, the Philippine Independent Church and the Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar, India.