Ecumenical Spirituality 2017 (original) (raw)
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Special Editor's Introduction, The Reformation in Context
Journal of Religious History, Virtual Issue, 2017
2017 is the five hundredth anniversary of the promulgation of the “Disputation on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences,” better known as the “Ninety-Five Theses,” a Latin text that invited academic debate on the Catholic practice of selling indulgences written by Martin Luther (1483-1546), an Augustinian friar and professor of theology at the University of Wittenberg. On 31 October 1517, Luther allegedly affixed his text to the door of All Saints’ Church Wittenberg; in 1521 Luther appeared before Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor to answer charges of heresy, after Pope Leo X had excommunicated him on 3 January 1521. The Reformation spread like wildfire and by Luther’s death in 1546 Europe and Christianity had been irrevocably changed.
“Dealing with Some Unfinished Business of the Reformation”
Theology Today, 2017
This month Protestant communities around the world will celebrate 500 years of revolutionary changes in Christian belief, behavior, and belonging. Though Augustinian monk Martin Luther may not have actually nailed a set of proposed debating points to the church door in Wittenberg on October 31, 1517, his leadership in the reform of Western Christianity goes undisputed. With apostolic clarity, Luther brought back into focus the central message of the Good News of Jesus Christ for the world as distilled so beautifully in the fifth chapter of Paul's Letter to the Church in Rome: ''God proves [God's] love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us'' (5:8). The first and last word in human salvation belong to God alone. This grace comes to us from beyond ourselves; we can only receive it as what it is: a free and unmerited gift from God. Taking hold of the Life Preserver in the midst of the shipwreck of our lives and our world is simultaneously a gift of grace and a call to a life of grateful obedience. For this cruciform clarity of Luther, all branches of Christianity can give thanks. In addition to a fresh outbreak of the Gospel in the world five centuries ago, Protestants today rightly celebrate many positive changes that came as a result of the energetic and transformative renewal that accompanied the recovery of the core Christian message. The many translations of the Bible and forms of worship into languages spoken by ordinary people around the world, the movement toward universal literacy, the enduring value and ongoing challenge of critique of outworn structures and outmoded expressions of belief, the holiness and equality of all socially constructive vocations, and the promotion of individual conscience all have their roots in the seismic surge of spirituality that emerged in Saxony in the second decade of the sixteenth century. Though it has taken nearly half a millennium to work through, this month Protestants and Roman Catholics around the world can celebrate together the growing rapprochement on the heretofore dividing issue of the doctrine of justification. Much thanks can be lifted up also for nearly a century of various configurations of ecumenical dialogue among Protestants, Roman Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox churches. The growth of mutual understanding on matters like Scripture, liturgy, and social witness between the three largest categories of
Re-Membering for a Common Future: Lutherans and Catholics Commemorate the Reformation, 2017
Journal of Ecumenical Studies
This e s s ay e xamine s the s ig nificance of the joint comme moration of the Re formation by Luthe rans and Catholics in 20 17 as an opportunity for a he aling of colle ctive me morie s. It arg ue s that the common rere ading of his tory propos e d by the Luthe ran-Catholic Inte rnational Commis s ion on Unity in From Conflict to Communion provide s a corre ctive vis ion with cons e que nce s for ide ntity-cons tituting me mory and is ke y to a common future. The re ce ption te xt of the U.S. Luthe ran-Catholic working g roup, Declaration on the Way, take s ReMembering for a Common Future: Lutherans and Catholics Commemorate the Reformation, 2017. s tock of the cumulative e e cts of fi y ye ars of dialog ue , rig htly arg uing for a move toward a more g e ne rous mutual e ccle s ial re cog nition.
Recognition and reception are integral conditions for moving churches towards a fuller realization of shared unity. This article brings the 2013 Joint Working Group text Reception and the Lutheran-Roman Catholic Commission on Unity's 2013 report From Conflict To Communion into dialogue with the 2017 commemoration of the Reformation with Reformed Christianity, Anabaptists, Baptists, Brethren, Evangelicals, and Pentecostals. This investigation takes as its backdrop the mutual recognition and reception of churches. The paper reviews recent documents with a view to applying the reception of the quincentenary vision among these churches.
What Kind of Reformation?: The 500th Anniversary of the Reformation and Today
Ecumenical Review, 2017
While Luther did not intend to start a Reformation with his 95 Theses, the increasingly sharp conflict with the ecclesiastical authorities led to a separation between Luther and his followers and the Catholic Church of the time. Nevertheless, while the focal point for the 500th anniversary commemorations is Germany, even in the 16th century the Reformation had more centres than Wittenberg, such as Z€ urich, where Zwingli was active, and particularly Geneva. From here the impulse of Calvin's Reformation together with Free Church traditions prepared the way for the development of the culture of modernity in its various social and political manifestations. In view of the contemporary cultural conflicts in the globalized world, the churches of historic Protestantism should use the anniversary celebrations as an occasion to reappropriate the Protestant principle as a dynamic force, to search for a transformed embodiment of grace in the contemporary situation of cultural conflict, and to contribute to the shaping of a new culture of life.