How can Lutherans engage the challenges posed by our emerging culture in order to make a difference in the mission fields right in their back yards? The answers are embedded in their Lutheran DNA, Bishop Claire S. Burkat told the Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod's 2007 Mission Fair March 24.
"The ancient treasures of our church will bless us with future directions for generations to come," Burkat said in her keynote address, titled "Missional Imagination."
Lutherans can mine the tradition not for easy answers or packaged solutions to church problems but to draw upon key insights that can inspire new ways to engage post-Christendom culture and embrace a future that "is already in God's hands," Burkat said.
The bishop set out six core Lutheran characteristics that can inform the Church's missional imagination: comfort with paradox, a tradition of being reformers, a theology of grace, the priesthood of all believers, being a bridge for Christian unity, and a sense of humor.
Lutheran theology is known for its embrace of
paradox, such as Martin Luther's key insight that Christians are simultaneously saints and sinners. "Lutherans are suspicious of easy answers," Burkat said. "We are open to some ambiguity, and cautious about those who claim to have all the right answers," she said.
While many who are looking for black-and-white distinctions are uncomfortable with paradox, "it's a rich part of human experience and it just may be an antidote to the simplistic and legalistic theology that is riddling our country," the bishop said.
By embracing paradox, Lutherans can be people who "actively engage people in faith dialogue and bear witness to our experience of God's activity in our lives without dumbing down the message or having to be naiNve to sins" that trouble people's hearts, Burkat said.
As heirs of a reforming tradition, Lutherans are free to discern where God's Spirit might be leading them in the present and future.
"We are
reformers at our core. It's in our DNA," the bishop said.
"It was Luther who translated the Bible into the language of the people and wrote hymns to popular tunes people loved to sing so they could be connected to their God. It was Luther who made preaching the Word of God a discipline geared to the faith formation of the listeners."
Those questions are no less important today, as the Church tries to connect with a culture to which it is increasingly foreign.
"Let's begin to imagine how God would want us to reform our beloved Church for Christ's sake," she said. "Let us listen to those who would courageously call us to reform. Let us not be so hypersensitive to criticism that we fail to see where God is leading us. There is nothing to be afraid of."
Martin Luther started a tradition of discussing and wrestling with faith issues in his "Table Talk," the bishop noted. As that conversation continues, Lutherans need to ask "who else should be invited to the table, to the debate, to the meal, to the miracle."
The Lutheran theological core is the tenet that Christians are saved by
grace through faith. Though this insight articulated by Luther set off the Reformation, "we do not have a lock on this concept of salvation," Burkat said. "Many other traditions live into it and believe it."
But this "radical belief in grace can once again be the lifeblood of the Lutheran expression of faith in this country," she said.
"Many people have no church experience. Can we find the words and blessings to bring it to them? Some people have been hurt by so-called organized religion, from chains of shame and legalism which strikes fear and breeds anger instead of love and compassion. Can we welcome them with sensitivity and compassion? We want to scare the hell out of people, not into them."
Luther's concept of
the priesthood of all believers, the idea that all Christians | not just pastors | are sent to bear witness to God's action, to teach and to bless the world, has been called "the unrealized dream of the Reformation," Burkat said.
While Lutherans tend to have a very high regard for the corporate faith of the church, that emphasis can lead to a clergy-centered church. Living out the priesthood of all believers would not devalue or supplant clergy but instead "release the gifts of the people of God to bless the world," the bishop said.
"We Lutherans need to work on faith formation as a (personal) discipline" to balance the emphasis on corporate faith, Burkat said.
At the same time, the bishop suggested that congregations could embrace a parallel concept, which she called "the missiology of all congregations," understanding themselves as being sent to participate in God's mission in the world. The ELCA mission statement, she noted, says that the church is gathered and sent "for the sake of the world."
Lutherans also play a key role as "ambassadors for
Christian unity," Burkat said. The ELCA, with its partnerships and conversations with Roman Catholic, Episcopal, United Church of Christ, Presbyterian, African Methodist Episcopal, Mennonite, Disciples of Christ and Orthodox churches, is a key bridge in the ecumenical movement. Locally the synod has ecumenical and interfaith links including a new dialogue between Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders centered on peacemaking in the Philadelphia region.
"In spite of the hatred and terror caused by so many religious zealots in this world, never before have so many traditions honestly and respectfully tried to listen to each other and to God for the sake of the world," she said.
"We (Lutherans) have a sense of
humor. We can laugh at ourselves," Burkat said. "We often take our theology seriously, but we can't take ourselves too seriously."
About 300 mission leaders attended the day-long Mission Fair held at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. The featured presenter was author and pastor Brian McLaren, whose books include "A New Kind of Christian," "A Generous Orthodoxy," and "The Secret Message of Jesus."
Photography by Pr. Jesse Brown