LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2001, Page 410

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410 ADDITIONAL THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS AND REPORTS—OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

signing the Lord’s Supper to the Holy Spirit should not force us
into denying that the Lord’s Supper is as much a Trinitarian gift fully
involving the Holy Spirit as it is a christological one. After all, it is
the Father who invites us to the Supper of His Son and so He is prop-
erly addressed in all the eucharistic prefaces: “It is truly meet, right
and salutary that we should at all times and in all places give thanks
unto Thee. Lord God, heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ, our
Lord, . . .” Through the Father’s invitation and the Son’s gift, the
Spirit works in the sacramental elements and creates and confirms
faith in the heart. This activity of the Spirit is specifically associated
with the presence of Christ in the bread and not with some parallel,
disconnected working in the heart. In this Sacrament as in the incar-
nation, He is acknowledged and worshiped as Creator Spiritus.

29. So, for instance Andrews and Burgess, editors, An Invita-
tion To Action, 114-115; and Walter Wietzke. “With Our Closest
Kin,” The Lutheran Standard ( July 11, 1986): 9-11). While nu-
merous Reformed proponents of this argument could be cited, we
will refer only to John W. Nevin’s “The Lutheran Confession”
(Mercersburg Review | |September 1849]: 470): “In particular, we
are not able at all to accept Luther’s idea of Christ’s presence in
the eucharist. With Calvin, and the Heidelberg Catechism, we hold
the mystery itself, and abhor the rationalistic frivolity by which it is
now so commonly denied: but the mode of it we take to be such as
fairly transcends al] local images and signs” (emphasis in original).

30. Wietzke, 9. Ernst Sommerlath, the long-time editor of the
distinguished Theologische Literaturzeitung, made a similar cri-
tique against the Arnoldshain Theses, which prepared the way for
the Leuenberg Concord. The participants were agreed that Christ
was the subject of the sacramental action, “But nowhere is it said,
that he gives his body and blood in the elements.” “Stellungsnah-
men unter Gesichtspunkten der Lehre and des Bekenntnisses,”
Lehrgesprich Uber das Heilige Abendmahl. edited by Gottfried
Niemeier (Munich: Chr. Kaiser Verlag, 1961), 79 (our translation).

31. Christianity Today 41 (October 16, 1997): 81.

32. A certain pre-history here inspires little confidence: A 1980
article in Lutheran World Report, by John Reumann, of the former
LCA, had argued that the whole traditional Christology from
Nicaea and Chalcedon to Article I{l of the Augsburg Confession is
untenable in light of historical-critical scholarship. Thereupon, the
LCMS resolved in 1981 to request the Division of Theological
Studies of the former Lutheran Council in the USA (LCUSA) to
take up “as a matter of urgency a thorough discussion of the far-
reaching implications of historical criticism, as practiced in U.S.
Lutheranism, for: a) the central, Christological-Trinitarian core of
the Gospel; b) the very possibility of confessional subscription; c)
the preamble of LCUSA’s constitution, according to which the par-
ticipating Lutheran church bodies . . . see in the Ecumenical Creeds
and in the Confessions of the Lutheran Church . . . a pure exposi-
tion of the Word of God” (1981 LCMS Proceedings, 160).

Five years later, and shortly before it expired, the Division of
Theological Studies issued a thin leaflet on historical criticism with
a few points of agreement and disagreement, but stating that time
had “not permitted” it to deal “with the implications of historical
criticism for Christology, justification, and confessional subscrip-
tion, which are taken up in the Reumann article.” But readers were
assured that even where “sharp disagreement” had arisen, this
“nevertheless did not destroy our sense of oneness in Christ”!

Lienhard, incidentally, points out that when the Leuenberg Con-
cord speaks of the “collapse of traditional thought-forms,” this
refers to “the two-natures doctrine and the doctrine of the commu-
nication of attributes” (107).

33. Sasse, Union and Confession, 25.

34. For Lienhard whether or not “est” can be understood as
“significat” is not capable of being exegetically resolved (54). He
refers to Eduard Schweitzer who finds Palestinian tradition of the
New Testament perpetuated in Reformed views and Hellenistic tra-

2001 Convention Workbook

dition in Lutheran views, (Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart
[1:18]). The uncertainty over the meaning of “is” apparently docs
not apply to the Agreement’s own reference: “Christ himself is host
at his table.” Would they allow, “Christ is signified [as] Host at the
Table”? Both Lienhard and Schweitzer work with an evolutionistic
understanding of the New Testament in which the simpler Jewish
beliefs developed into more complex Greck ones. The Lutheran un-
derstanding of the Lord’s Supper is judged to resemble the more
advanced Greek (also known as the catholic) form. For a proper
understanding of the Leuenberg Concord, Tuomo Mannermaa’s
painstaking Von Preussen Nach Leuenberg: Hintergrund und
Entwicklung der theologischen Methode in der Leuenberger
Konkordie (Arbeiten zur Geschichte und Theologie des Luther-
tums. Neue Folge Band |. Hamburg: Lutherisches Verlagshaus,
1981) is simply indispensable. It is the first and perhaps the only
“historical-critical” study of Leuenberg, in the sense that it exam-
ines the historical roots and the development of the methodology
behind that document. Without oversimplifying the complexity of
the argument, it may be said that the operative principle of Leuen-
berg turns out to be a distinction between “justifying faith” and
‘‘dogmatical faith,” such that the “theological explication of faith”
comes in the end to be classified with the “human ritcs and cere-
monies” of AC VII, agreement in which is not necessary for the
true unity of the church (see pages 62-63).

A Formula of Agreement

Between the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America,
the Presbyterian Church (USA),
the Reformed Church in America,
and the United Church of Christ
on Entering into Full Communion
on the Basis of A Common Calling

Preface

In 1997, four churches of Reformation heritage will act on an
ecumenical proposal of historic importance. The timing reflects a
doctrinal consensus which has been developing over the past 32
years coupled with an increasing urgency for the church to pro-
claim a gospel of unity in contemporary society. In light of identi-
fied doctrinal consensus, desiring to bear visible witness to the
unity of the Church, and hearing the call to engage together in
God’s mission, it is recommended:

That the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the Presby-
terian Church (USA), the Reformed Church in America, and the
United Church of Christ declare on the basis of A Conmnon Calling
and their adoption of this A Formula of Agreement that they are
in full communion with one another. Thus, each church is entering
into or affirming full communion with three other churches.

The term “full communion” is understood here to specifically
mean that the four churches:

Recognize each other as churches in which the gospel is rightly
preached and the sacraments rightly administered according to the
Word of God;

Withdraw any historic condemnation by one side or the other
as inappropriate for the life and faith of our churches today;

Continue to recognize each other’s Baptism and authorize and
encourage the sharing of the Lord’s Supper among their members;

Recognize each others’ various ministries and make provision
for the orderly exchange of ordained ministers of Word and Sacra-
ment;

Establish appropriate channels of consultation and decision-
making within the existing structures of the churches;

Commit themselves to an ongoing process of theological dia-
logue in order to clarify further the common understanding of the
faith and foster its common expression in evangelism, witness. and
service: