I’ve often heard the service of the acolyte being downplayed as “just lighting candles.” If that’s the case, why have them at all? And since we now have electricity, why have candles at all? For anyone in the congregation can flip the switch. Such denigration of acolyte service is unfortunate and ill-advised.

The reality is that the office of acolyte is a minor order of the clergy. The oldest reference to this office dates to 251 AD. In times past - and it is still nominally true in some confessions of Christendom - serving as a pastor means going through a training process that includes serving in all of the minor orders - culminating in that of subdeacon (also called “reader”), on the way to the major orders of deacon, priest, and possibly bishop.

In the LCMS, we don’t have this traditional path to the ministry. However, we still do something similar albeit informally. A seminarian will function as a subdeacon: vesting and reading the Old Testament and Epistle lessons in the Divine Service. As a vicar, he will function as a deacon: vesting and perhaps reading the Gospel lesson and preaching under the oversight of a pastor (“vicarage bishop”). In my own case, I was consecrated as a deacon when I was installed as a vicar. A seasoned pastor may be elected to oversee other pastors and congregations (“District President” in LCMS parlance), but he will still be referred to as a pastor, being an ordained man in the service of the church. This reflects the same methodology - though perhaps different terminology - used by the church for more nearly two millennia.

That said, in the history of the church - ancient and modern - a pastor will likely never be advanced to bishop or president; a deacon may never be advanced to pastor; a subdeacon may never be advanced to deacon; an acolyte may never be advanced beyond this role in the church. But in the history of the church, many young men who served as acolytes have gone on to serve in the Office of the Holy Ministry. Their service as members of the minor clergy introduces them to serving with the pastor and his assistants in the chancel, with vestments, with prayer, with the privilege to be in the proximity of the body and blood of Christ, and with the humbling responsibility of churchly service. Acolytes may also serve as crucifers or thurifers - and act as assistants to the pastor and other servers, and participate in processions. They model reverence and piety for the congregation - especially for youth and for children. Acolyte duty is a way to draw a young man into the orbit of ministry, whether he ends up pursing the Office or not.

On All Saints Day, I consecrated and installed my eleven-year old parishioner Jon-Paul as an acolyte. His service will begin next Sunday. JP is a smart and pious young man from a solid and faithful family. His dad serves in the military. His mom was a high school student of mine 22 years ago (and All Saints Day is her birthday). JP knows the Bible, the Catechism, and the liturgy. He is a communicant, and is eager to serve the church. He even wore a tie, black pants, and black Oxfords (and finding dress shoes for young men is no small task these days). I prefer my black loafers, but I told JP that I would wear my own Oxfords in solidarity with him when he puts on cassock, cincture, and surplice for service for the first time.

Instead of just suddenly putting him in vestments and having him serve, I made a point to consecrate him to this office during the All Saints’ Day Mass, and to install him into service for our congregation. I modified a prayer used by my dear brother and classmate Latif Gaba, who oversees the Acolyte Corps in his congregation.

The idea of the Acolyte Corps seems to be spreading in liturgical congregations, and I think this is a salutary development. Hopefully, other young men will join JP in service in the chancel of my congregation, Salem Lutheran Church in Gretna, Louisiana. And also, perhaps some of our young men who today serve as acolytes in Lutheran churches all over the country and world will tomorrow consider becoming subdeacons, deacons, and pastors - if God so wills it.

Here is the prayer that I used (thank you, Latif).

Holy Lord, Father Almighty, eternal God, You have sent the light of Your glory into this world through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, and His apostles, and have willed that, in order to blot out the ancient debt of our death, our Lord Jesus Christ should be fastened to the most glorious standard of the Cross, and that blood and water should flow from His side, for the salvation of the human race. Vouchsafe to + bless this Your servant for his service as acolyte, that he may faithfully serve at Your holy altar, and attend to the lighting of Your Church. Enkindle, O Lord, his mind and heart with the love of Your grace, so that, alight with the splendor of Your countenance, he may faithfully serve You and Your holy Church. Through the same Christ our Lord. Amen.

For the consecration, I simply laid hands on the head of the candidate and said:

“[Name] I consecrate and install you as acolyte, in the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

You can order it from anywhere that sells books, including Amazon, but here is the link to the CPH page - https://www.cph.org/jesus-resurrection-new-testament-testimonies

The Rev. Mark Surburg has written a helpful overview of celebrating the sacrament of the altar every Sunday: viewed in light of scripture, tradition, the Lutheran confessions, and contemporary American Lutheran practice.

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Christ the Rock, Rockford, Illinois:

Redeemer Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana:

I think it was during a recent Reformation service that I took to thinking, as I have thought many times before, that it’s helpful to reflect from time to time on the kind of love that God has for His own. There are of course the common adjectives we routinely ascribe to God’s love, the kind we find, say, in St. Paul’s famous love chapter, I Corinthians 13: love is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, etc. Certainly the Apostle is encouraging  the Corinthians (and us) to exhibit that kind of love, but it can also be said that love is like this because that is how God loves. Paul’s love chapter both exhorts us to love and extols the nature of God’s love.

But there is more to that love, which is hinted at when the Apostle adds that love never fails. I find it especially edifying to consider, in this vein, that there is another critical aspect to God’s love, namely that it is fierce. This is reflected in many of the Psalms, particularly in the imprecatory Psalms in which David calls upon God to avenge him of his foes. The Hebrew chesed is normally translated as “mercy,” which doesn’t quite do it justice, because the term contains also elements of eager zeal and desire, that is, fierceness; and it is commonly used in the imprecatory Psalms. In Psalm 31, for instance, David says, “I will rejoice in thy mercy” (v. 7, KJV), in the context of being beset by his enemies. He pleads for rescue, calling the Lord his rock and fortress, beseeching God to pull him out of the net that they have laid privily for him (v.  4) because God has redeemed him (v. 5). The term is repeated in v. 16: “Make thy face to shine upon thy servant: save me for thy mercies’ (chesed) sake.” And the imprecatory mode is evident, with this: “Let me not be ashamed, O Lord; for I have called upon thee: let the wicked be ashamed, and let them be silent in the grave. Let the lying lips be put to silence; which speak grievous things proudly and contemptuously against the righteous” (v. 17-18). In Psalm 40, we read, “Let thy lovingkindness (chesed) and thy truth continually preserve me”; and this Psalm is also imprecatory: “Let them be ashamed and confounded together that seek after my soul to destroy it; let them be driven backward and put to shame that wish me evil. Let them be desolate for a reward of their shame that say unto me, Aha, aha” (v. 14-15). So also in Psalm 44 comes the lament, “Yea, for thy sake are we killed all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter” (v. 22), whereupon David calls upon God, saying “Arise for our help, and redeem us for thy mercies’ (chesed) sake” (v. 26). The imprecatory sentiment is also expressed in Psalm 143:12, which employs chesed, again translated as “mercy”; and here again, the ferocity of the divine love is in view: “And of thy mercy cut off mine enemies, and destroy all them that afflict my soul: for I am thy servant.” It’s not really mercy alone that moves God to destroy the enemies; it’s fierce and passionate, jealous love. It’s chesed. God’s love for His own is fierce. It can even be seen as the very reason for His wrath. That is to say, God’s wrath is reserved most especially for those who have harmed His beloved saints.

Consider Jesus’ dark warning against offending His little ones: “Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 18:10).

In short, this means that when we consider God’s love for His people, for us, we may take comfort in knowing that this love is fierce and full of passion. This is what led Christ to suffer for us. See how fierce and unwavering it is; it is stronger than death (Song of Songs 8:6); and it is also leading to the Day of Wrath to come. He will vindicate His own people, and so His warning is serious: if any of them come to harm, for those that dare to harm them there will be hell to pay, quite literally. God is fiercely attentive to every need of His people, and fully invested in their salvation. This is why St. Paul can confidently assert, “I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39). That kind of love is fierce indeed.

The Danish author Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) who was nominally Lutheran - but in reality, tragically, was not - wrote a cautionary tale in the form of a short fairy tale called “The Emperor’s New Clothes.” It used to be known by everyone, but sadly, many such literary classics are no longer taught in schools, and young people are often not exposed to them.

You can read it here:

Many years ago there was an Emperor so exceedingly fond of new clothes that he spent all his money on being well dressed. He cared nothing about reviewing his soldiers, going to the theatre, or going for a ride in his carriage, except to show off his new clothes. He had a coat for every hour of the day, and instead of saying, as one might, about any other ruler, "The King's in council," here they always said. "The Emperor's in his dressing room."

In the great city where he lived, life was always gay. Every day many strangers came to town, and among them one day came two swindlers. They let it be known they were weavers, and they said they could weave the most magnificent fabrics imaginable. Not only were their colors and patterns uncommonly fine, but clothes made of this cloth had a wonderful way of becoming invisible to anyone who was unfit for his office, or who was unusually stupid.

"Those would be just the clothes for me," thought the Emperor. "If I wore them I would be able to discover which men in my empire are unfit for their posts. And I could tell the wise men from the fools. Yes, I certainly must get some of the stuff woven for me right away." He paid the two swindlers a large sum of money to start work at once.

They set up two looms and pretended to weave, though there was nothing on the looms. All the finest silk and the purest old thread which they demanded went into their traveling bags, while they worked the empty looms far into the night.

"I'd like to know how those weavers are getting on with the cloth," the Emperor thought, but he felt slightly uncomfortable when he remembered that those who were unfit for their position would not be able to see the fabric. It couldn't have been that he doubted himself, yet he thought he'd rather send someone else to see how things were going. The whole town knew about the cloth's peculiar power, and all were impatient to find out how stupid their neighbors were.

"I'll send my honest old minister to the weavers," the Emperor decided. "He'll be the best one to tell me how the material looks, for he's a sensible man and no one does his duty better."

So the honest old minister went to the room where the two swindlers sat working away at their empty looms.

"Heaven help me," he thought as his eyes flew wide open, "I can't see anything at all". But he did not say so.

Both the swindlers begged him to be so kind as to come near to approve the excellent pattern, the beautiful colors. They pointed to the empty looms, and the poor old minister stared as hard as he dared. He couldn't see anything, because there was nothing to see. "Heaven have mercy," he thought. "Can it be that I'm a fool? I'd have never guessed it, and not a soul must know. Am I unfit to be the minister? It would never do to let on that I can't see the cloth."

"Don't hesitate to tell us what you think of it," said one of the weavers.

"Oh, it's beautiful -it's enchanting." The old minister peered through his spectacles. "Such a pattern, what colors!" I'll be sure to tell the Emperor how delighted I am with it."

"We're pleased to hear that," the swindlers said. They proceeded to name all the colors and to explain the intricate pattern. The old minister paid the closest attention, so that he could tell it all to the Emperor. And so he did.

The swindlers at once asked for more money, more silk and gold thread, to get on with the weaving. But it all went into their pockets. Not a thread went into the looms, though they worked at their weaving as hard as ever.

The Emperor presently sent another trustworthy official to see how the work progressed and how soon it would be ready. The same thing happened to him that had happened to the minister. He looked and he looked, but as there was nothing to see in the looms he couldn't see anything.

"Isn't it a beautiful piece of goods?" the swindlers asked him, as they displayed and described their imaginary pattern.

"I know I'm not stupid," the man thought, "so it must be that I'm unworthy of my good office. That's strange. I mustn't let anyone find it out, though." So he praised the material he did not see. He declared he was delighted with the beautiful colors and the exquisite pattern. To the Emperor he said, "It held me spellbound."

All the town was talking of this splendid cloth, and the Emperor wanted to see it for himself while it was still in the looms. Attended by a band of chosen men, among whom were his two old trusted officials-the ones who had been to the weavers-he set out to see the two swindlers. He found them weaving with might and main, but without a thread in their looms.

"Magnificent," said the two officials already duped. "Just look, Your Majesty, what colors! What a design!" They pointed to the empty looms, each supposing that the others could see the stuff.

"What's this?" thought the Emperor. "I can't see anything. This is terrible!

Am I a fool? Am I unfit to be the Emperor? What a thing to happen to me of all people! - Oh! It's very pretty," he said. "It has my highest approval." And he nodded approbation at the empty loom. Nothing could make him say that he couldn't see anything.

His whole retinue stared and stared. One saw no more than another, but they all joined the Emperor in exclaiming, "Oh! It's very pretty," and they advised him to wear clothes made of this wonderful cloth especially for the great procession he was soon to lead. "Magnificent! Excellent! Unsurpassed!" were bandied from mouth to mouth, and everyone did his best to seem well pleased. The Emperor gave each of the swindlers a cross to wear in his buttonhole, and the title of "Sir Weaver."

Before the procession the swindlers sat up all night and burned more than six candles, to show how busy they were finishing the Emperor's new clothes. They pretended to take the cloth off the loom. They made cuts in the air with huge scissors. And at last they said, "Now the Emperor's new clothes are ready for him."

Then the Emperor himself came with his noblest noblemen, and the swindlers each raised an arm as if they were holding something. They said, "These are the trousers, here's the coat, and this is the mantle," naming each garment. "All of them are as light as a spider web. One would almost think he had nothing on, but that's what makes them so fine."

"Exactly," all the noblemen agreed, though they could see nothing, for there was nothing to see.

"If Your Imperial Majesty will condescend to take your clothes off," said the swindlers, "we will help you on with your new ones here in front of the long mirror."

The Emperor undressed, and the swindlers pretended to put his new clothes on him, one garment after another. They took him around the waist and seemed to be fastening something - that was his train-as the Emperor turned round and round before the looking glass.

"How well Your Majesty's new clothes look. Aren't they becoming!" He heard on all sides, "That pattern, so perfect! Those colors, so suitable! It is a magnificent outfit."

Then the minister of public processions announced: "Your Majesty's canopy is waiting outside."

"Well, I'm supposed to be ready," the Emperor said, and turned again for one last look in the mirror. "It is a remarkable fit, isn't it?" He seemed to regard his costume with the greatest interest.

The noblemen who were to carry his train stooped low and reached for the floor as if they were picking up his mantle. Then they pretended to lift and hold it high. They didn't dare admit they had nothing to hold.

So off went the Emperor in procession under his splendid canopy. Everyone in the streets and the windows said, "Oh, how fine are the Emperor's new clothes! Don't they fit him to perfection? And see his long train!" Nobody would confess that he couldn't see anything, for that would prove him either unfit for his position, or a fool. No costume the Emperor had worn before was ever such a complete success.

"But he hasn't got anything on," a little child said.

"Did you ever hear such innocent prattle?" said its father. And one person whispered to another what the child had said, "He hasn't anything on. A child says he hasn't anything on."

"But he hasn't got anything on!" the whole town cried out at last.

The Emperor shivered, for he suspected they were right. But he thought, "This procession has got to go on." So he walked more proudly than ever, as his noblemen held high the train that wasn't there at all.

The moral of the story is fairly easy to discern. And it teaches us about many things pertaining to individuals and groups. The grift was only possible because of a collective cultural fear of confronting the truth. The story has been translated into many languages precisely because its lesson is universal.

If there were a sequel to the story, set among LCMS members, it might go something like this.

Once upon a time, after the triumph of the Emperor’s New Clothes, the townspeople had to deal with the child who said that the emperor was naked. The boy had broken the Eighth Commandment, had not followed Matthew Eighteen, and had violated synodical bylaws.

The boy’s pastor, principal, and parents set him down and called him to repentance. For the little boy had not put the best construction on the actions of the emperor, the weavers, and the townspeople. He did not “explain everything in the kindest way.”

And according to Matthew Eighteen, the lad should have made an appointment to have a face-to-face meeting with the emperor, to get his side of the story, and to seek reconciliation. Instead, this sinful child blurted out his accusation that the emperor was naked in front of everyone. Following the face-to-face meeting with the emperor, the child should have then gotten one of the townspeople to come with him and have another private meeting with the emperor. And during this official process of reconciliation, the child would be obliged to say nothing about the emperor’s nakedness while the process went on, week after week, month after month, year after year.

But the boy had done none of this. He was wicked, and did not follow the rules. He had broken the commandment, “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” His parents gave him a good spanking in front of the emperor, the weavers of the fine fabric, and the townspeople.

And they all lived happily ever after.

The End.

The normalization of homosexuality in the west was a long-term campaign to shift the paradigm. Its advocates had to remove the stigma that it was sinful (according to Christianity) and abnormal (according to mental health professional standards).

A rhetorical tactic by a psychologist named George Weinberg proved successful. He coined the term “homophobia” in 1965. It took a while for the term to gain traction. In 1969 it appeared in print in a pornographic magazine. And a few months later, it appeared in the more mainstream Time Magazine. In 1972, Weinberg used the term in his book Society and the Healthy Homosexual.

Weinberg’s reframing was successful, as the term redefined those who held that homosexuality was abnormal or sinful as the pathological ones, while the homosexuals were normalized. The use of not just “fear,” but “phobia,” implied mental illness on the part of Christians and social conservatives. The very next year, 1973, homosexuality was removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as a mental health disorder.

So if you simply agree with Scripture that homosexuality is sinful, or if you agree with what was the standard view of mental health professionals prior to 1973 that it is a mental disorder - you are seen as being motivated by “fear” - and pathologically so. The “phobia” rhetoric was also applied to so-called transgenderism in 1993, and by 2013, the term “transphobia” was added to the Oxford Dictionary.

Rhetorically, it is brilliant. For it frames Christians and social conservatives as being motivated by “fear.” This implies that their beliefs in what Scripture and natural law teach are cowardly, whereas homosexuals, their advocates, and those who favor abolition of the Christian and natural law approach to be “stunning and brave” as the trope goes - which was incidentally coined by a satirical South Park episode concerning Bruce/Kaitlyn Jenner.

Those in the LCMS who want to shift the paradigm regarding pastoral formation are taking a similar tack in ascribing the motives of those who disagree with them as “fear.” If you listen to just about any podcast by those who advocate change to the status quo in the LCMS in which pastors are mainly forged by residential seminary education and formation, you will hear the same reframing tactic used by Weinberg.

Here is an example (27:18):

I don't share the same fear. Why? Because the Holy Spirit is in charge of the church. The Holy Spirit has led us up to this point. And the Holy Spirit has raised up a lot of really, really excellent lay men and women in our congregations that understand the times and would not allow such a move to occur if there were more adaptive models for raising up leaders, pastors, etc. in the LCMS. I do not believe it's a valid fear, but I understand I understand historically the fear.

The overwhelming vote at convention was to bolster our residential program, to disallow formation in online or non-LCMS seminaries, and to judiciously limit the use of the SMP program. There is simply a range of opinions on this matter. But to hear those who want an expanded SMP program (if not a full-blown non-residential option) frame the issue, what is motivating this majority view is “fear.”

And, of course, “perfect love cast out fear.” So, as those who want to shift the paradigm frame the issue, they are the “stunning and brave” ones, the people of perfect love, who trust the Holy Spirit. You can find that very thing said on popular podcasts. People like me who disagree with them are apparently just scaredy-cats who don’t trust the Holy Spirit. There is also an implication that we are “technophobes.”

It’s clever! The forces of change are typically more adroit in their use of rhetoric than conservatives are. We should commend them for their shrewdness.

But I don’t buy the premise. Just speaking for myself, I’m no technophobe. My first career was in IT. My initial foray into technology was FORTRAN and punch cards. I left my state university to pursue a computer programming certificate from a technology school back in the 1980s. I subsequently had a great career. I left my IT life to go to seminary as a married second-career student. I completed my undergraduate degree (required for admission to seminary) from a university that was a pioneer in online education - in 2000.

I have three degrees, and two of them were awarded by non-residential universities. I’m in my fifteenth year teaching high school classes online. I’m not a technophobe, and there are many places where online education is a great boon. But it is simply my opinion that online education cannot do it all. There are some forms of formation that have to be done in person, things like the emergency services, aviation, military, and the practice of law and medicine, and the pastoral office. Again, this is my opinion. It isn’t some kind of irrational fear.

I have an M.A. in Law from one of the top 100 law schools in the country. The M.A. program is for things like doing legal research, writing, and paralegal work. It is not a J.D. - which is required to become an attorney. There are online J.D. programs, but my alma mater does not offer a non-residential J.D. For being a paralegal or legal researcher is different than being a lawyer. To be a lawyer requires not only education and training, but formation. The same is true for medical school. Nobody would want to go to a brain surgeon who just got an online M.D. Nor can military personnel be trained online. Can you imagine the U.S. Marine Corps offering basic training via Zoom? Pilots also do ground school and train on simulators. But they are also required to actually fly airplanes, to be in the cockpit with a flight instructor - in both training and testing. Online education has its limits. And to recognize that is not a phobia.

Now, I’m not opposed to online theological study for clergy and laity alike. Technology is a great gift in that endeavor. But I don’t believe it to be up to the task of pastoral formation.

I’m against changing our pastoral formation paradigm not because I’m afraid of something. I just believe that pastoral formation is important, and like training lawyers, soldiers, doctors, and pilots, is not only about the acquisition of information, but of being formed into a way of life itself. And this is partly due to our Lutheran understanding of the pastoral office. While non-denominational Christians often use the verb “pastoring,” we Lutherans typically use the noun form: we serve as pastors - because we are pastors. It grows out of who were are, how we have been formed. It’s not a job with a checklist of skills. It is a holy office that is, per our confessions, not an option. It is a divine call.

Of course, no system is perfect. But it is far more difficult for someone unfit for ministry to get through a program with a lot of eyes on him: fellow students, professors, seminary staff, etc. I’m not fearful or phobic. Nor do I lack trust in the Holy Spirit. This is a false accusation. I simply think that we should continue with the paradigm that we have developed - knowing how crucial it was to my own formation and that of my brothers. And as I have said before, formation is incarnational. It happens in chapel: praying, singing, and receiving the Holy Sacrament together. It happens in the physical classroom - eyeball to eyeball with brother students and father professors. It happens working in the co-ops, in field work, in the dining hall, in the dorms, in the student commons, on the running track, in the gym, at the ice cream socials and at Gemütlichkeits. It happens in the Chapel Choir and on tour with the Kantorei. It happens while serving on student government and volunteering for various in-person projects. It happens during your professors’ office hours and at coffee after chapel. It happens being with your brothers from around the country and around the world.

There are simply formative elements that cannot be replicated by an electronic simulacra on a screen. As the legendary computer scientist Jon Paris told a group of us consultants at IBM in Rochester, Minnesota back in the Eighties: “Emulation is… never as satisfying as the real thing.” Well, that is a cleaned up version of the aphorism.

And yes, residential seminary it is more costly in terms of time and resources for the church, and it is more of a sacrifice to a seminarian and his family. It is my opinion that it is worth it. My opinion is not forged in fear. Seminary was not easy, but I would not trade a moment of it for something quicker, cheaper, and easier. If my motivation were fear, I would have been too afraid to leave my old job and old life behind to take a leap into the unknown.

So I think we can dispense with the false fear narrative.

So when you hear the faux fear accusation pop up like the proverbial Whac-a-Mole at a carnival, feel free to swat it down. Think about “homophobia” - because it really is nothing more than a rhetorical trick to affect a paradigm shift. Advocating for our residential seminary programs doesn’t make you afraid or pathological. You don’t have to accept that framing. I sure don’t.

For the last few years, we’ve been testing The Lutheran Missal materials with a limited field testing audience, first the temporal lectionary, then the sanctoral lectionary, then the gradual texts, after that the collects, and now the complends (post-communions) and super populums (for weekdays in Lent).

We’re happy to announce that now anyone can access the mass texts for every day of the year in the new app for The Lutheran Missal, available for iOS and Android. While much more remains to be done, nearly the entirety of the temporal calendar is complete and available — orations, lections, and gradualia. In addition, the lections and gradualia for the sanctoral are also largely complete. Major remaining items that are currently or will soon be underway include the common, votive masses, and distinctive rites, such as those of Ash Wednesday and Holy Week. A new hymnody endeavor is also in the beginning stages, seeking to compile a list of Hauptlieder and supplementary hymns drawn from hymn lists in Sehling’s Die evangelischen Kirchenordnungen des XVI. Jahrhunderts and later Lutheran hymnals and church orders. New data on all of these fronts will periodically be added to the app as it is compiled and/or translated. A desktop web app will soon also be available, complete with an export function to export texts for your service leaflet in the same way that you might from Lutheran Service Builder.

While The Lutheran Missal will utilize the Common Service, the application includes various other options, including the Bugenhagen Liturgy, as found in The Lutheran Hymnary (1913) and Evangelical Lutheran Hymnary (1996), as well as various possibilities for Exhortations, and a large number of other texts from varying sources that will not find their way into the printed volume, but may prove to be of interest to the user. These are noted at the top of the Settings tab, along with a convenient option to view the propers alone, or to view the propers in the mass ordinary. A myriad of font and display options are provided, with eight themes (including dark mode), six fonts, and five text sizes to suit every user. Another tab in the app also includes a preliminary version of the vesting prayers, still also subject to change.

In addition to the missal texts now readily available, the app also includes a beta version of The Lutheran Breviary. The offices of Matins, Lauds, Prime, Terce, Sext, None, Vespers, and Compline are now all available, arranged as they appeared in late medieval and Reformation-era breviaries and chant books. Our research in this area is still very preliminary, so some changes are to be expected in the coming months and years, though the heart of the office, the psalter arranged to be prayed over the course of a week, will remain unchanged. The office is, at this point, largely the ordinary only with no propers, but we hope to have more of the proper antiphons added to the daily office for the season of Advent, and hopefully also the majority of the traditional Matins lectionary.

Many, many thanks for all of this are due to the app developer, Mr. Seth Kasten. Seth is a father, software engineer, and subdeacon in the LCMS. He runs the Confessing Lutheran blog and co-owns the Scholastic Lutherans YouTube channel. His published work includes Against the Invocation of Saints: An Apology for the Protestant Doctrine of Prayer over and against the doctrine of the Eastern Orthodox Church and Philip Melanchthon's Sketch of Theology, The Argument of the Epistle to the Romans, and A Theological Introduction to Paul's Letter to the Romans. Seth also has forthcoming work in liturgics, hymnody, and scholastic political theology.

This was published February 13, 2014. — Ed.

Fr. Eric Wismar has posted the entirety of Pro Ecclesia Lutherana, the journal of the Liturgical Society of St. James, online. Fr. Wismar's great-grandfather Father...well, Father Wismar (Adolph), was one of the founders of the society. From his introduction to the collection:

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The following is the conclusion of “The Office,” the third chapter in Fr. Gunnar Rosendal’s 1956 book Vårt Katolska Arv (Our Catholic Inheritance), translated by the Rev. Roy Axel Coats of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Baltimore. You can read the first installment here, the second here, and the third here.

Bishop and Priest

Is a Bishop just a priest, or is a priest a Bishop?

If a Bishop has no other ability than the priest, then he is simply a priest. He has a higher dignity, but so does a pröst. [trans. note: This term could be used for a prior, the dean of a region under a bishop, or one who is a pastor in his own parish as opposed to being under a kyrkoherde. In any of these senses it is an honor given to a priest.] A monsignor and a cardinal, an archpriest and an abbot, these are all higher 23 dignities of the clerical estate, but all these high prelates are only priests. And there is a significant group of theologians, who cannot be denied the epithet catholic, in the present day, who believe that the Bishop is a priest. We have made their acquaintance in the most noteworthy article in the fine Nouvelle Revue Théologique, which we have just gone through. The opinion has its seat in the Roman Church and is to some extent codified in Canon 951. But it is even more richly represented in the Churches of the Augsburg Confession and is also there to some extent codified in the Smalcald Articles and the Apology. But on that side, as a rule, one does not have the same clear language, and I fear that we also <150> must, at least in this chapter on the Office, lack the same clear thought, which is the honor and crown of Rome.

If the priest can ordain a priest, then he is a Bishop. That is the Presbyterian thesis. Every priest is a Bishop, and therefore there is episcopal succession, a good Presbyterian would argue.

How complicated the issue is, you can learn and see, if you can read such a chapter as “The Parity of The Ministers” in The Apostolic Ministry by the aforementioned specialist in succession and the Office, Doctor T. G. Jalland. It is not a thing to dismiss either with a condescending, embarrassed ignorance —which often appears on high horses— or with an obscure statement. The interesting thing is that Canon 951 in the Codex Iuris Canonici reckons with two possibilities for ordination to the priesthood. Partly the ordinary consecrator, who is the Bishop, and partly the extraordinary consecrator, who has received the assignment from the Holy See to consecrate but is a priest, not a Bishop. The Holy See must be considered in this case to represent the Church, and we, who cannot accept the supremacy of the Pope, could as well use the word “Church” instead. And then undeniably interesting possibilities open up. Was Bugenhagen's consecration in Copenhagen of the Danish bishops absolutely without validity? That question arises, but it naturally only arises for those who previously considered this ordination invalid, because Bugenhagen was only a priest and not a Bishop. Those who have always considered the consecration to be valid can only be strengthened in their belief by what we have found here. If there is any question there can be no response.

Is the priest a Bishop? I want to answer no. Even if the priest has the ability to ordain priests through his own ordination, he is thus nothing more than a potential Bishop. He must be elected and ordained to this new degree in the Office under normal circumstances. The Augustana retains its authority, it proves to be of good catholicity. Bishops have always existed, there is no doubt that they are kat’olon. And that the office of bishop, whatever it may mean, is instituted by God, it is also Catholic faith and teaching; our Church Order holds the proof. And what now concerns <151> order in the Church of Sweden in this whole difficult mess, what do we have to say about the Catholic heritage?

Not without a sigh of relief, I withdraw from this intricate labyrinth and establish the following Catholic facts: First, the Church of Sweden has preserved a succession through Bishops, which is good Catholic order under any circumstances. Secondly, it is prescribed with us that a Bishop shall ordain a Bishop, one or more may consecrate, but it must be a Bishop or Bishops, and that is how it has always been. Thirdly, it is taught above all in our confessions, I leave the commentaries and tracts to the side, where the matter is discussed, that the office of bishop is de jure divino, so far as it is a spiritual office, and de jure humano only in its eventual feudal function. These are Catholic facts in the Church of Sweden and in the Church kat’olon.

Well, we have priests and Bishops, but do we also have deacons? Certainly we have deacons, deacons in the true, early Church, catholic meaning of the word. It is worth observing that several churches are working to introduce a diaconate of our kind. We could supplement our diaconate by ordaining prospective priests at the appropriate time, that would be catholic and good, but it is not necessary.

But now suppose that one of the Bishops, who have ordained our Bishops without interruption, has had a false doctrine about the Office and did not understand and consent to what it means, what happens to the continuity then? According to the catholic view, the theological view of the consecrator has nothing to do with the validity of the consecration or its value in other respects. The only thing that is required is that the one who consecrates does so with the intention of consecrating a Bishop, a Bishop of the Church, such a Bishop as the Church has always had. Whether he then considered the Bishop and the priest identical or whether he held the office of bishop to be the office in its fullness, it is of no consequence. It matters as little as what the priest celebrating the Lord's Supper believes about the essence of the Lord's Supper. He cannot change it by his false perception, <152> if he has one. It is catholic teaching, and we find it in Augustana, when it is asserts that bad priests do not destroy the effect or essence of the Sacraments.

But then why this complicated story about priest and bishop? On the one hand, it has great ecumenical significance. But we have no reason to concern ourselves with that matter here, where the question is only how we preserved our catholic heritage. However, the problem should be brought forward and highlighted, because it shows that the question of the Office must be worked on. For one thing, it is not without a certain humorous pleasure to note the similarity between the Church of Rome and the Church of Sweden. Both have their doctrine of the height and value of the office of the bishop, both have preserved the office of the bishop, but both also have a troublesome clause, not in the confession, but Rome in its canon and we in some of our commentaries. It is quite funny to note.

Since this was written, we have read the lively and instructive debate in the Svensk Kyrkotidning. One harbors the most sincere gratitude to both participants: to Wingren for giving Gärtner reason to write and to Gärtner for making the most brilliant entry in the Exegesis of the Office that I have ever read. Gärtner opens up new paths in the exegesis, paths that have regrown and narrowed into forgotten paths during times of indifference to these chapters of theology and to the gifts of grace they treat. He shows the Biblical origins of the Office in a new, fresh and scientifically convincing way. He teaches us both prudence and boldness in an excellent union.

The last word has by no means been said on this difficult subject. In the international periodical literature, one meets promises of great works, dedicated to the Office. The latest issue of Irenikon has an editorial that mentions several upcoming books, and contains an article that is very noteworthy. Openness and clarity, firmness and soft opportunity for development and growth should be united in all those who want to fulfill the extremely important task of researching the theology of the Office.

I hope that this chapter has proven profitable to the reader, most especially in giving voice to many of the concerns that still arise today. More writings on this subject will be forthcoming on this blog, particularly from the period of Lutheran Orthodoxy. - SG

The “Praise and Worship” genre is surprisingly old.

One Praise and Worship song predates Hillsong and Elevation, Chris Tomlin and Phil Wickham of today. It predates Amy Grant and Twila Paris from the 1980s. It predates Larry Norman and Phil Keaggy of the 1960s and 70s. It predates Reg Layzell and the Latter Rain movement of the 1940s. It predates the Azusa Street Revival of 1906. It predates the two Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th centuries. It predates the Reformation and the discovery of America. It predates when we needed four digits to indicate the year. It predates the filioque controversy, Gregorian Chant, and possibly the the fall of the Roman Empire. One Praise and Worship song has survived from as far back as the fifth (and possibly the fourth) century to today. It is still in our hymnals, and is still sung by churches, by high school and college kids at youth retreats, and even by elementary school children in their chapel services.

The title of this Praise and Worship song is “We Praise You, O God.” The song literally has “praise” in the title, and also has the word “worship” in the lyrics. Sadly, many of our “modern worship” congregations have never sung “We Praise You, O God” - which we still know by its original name: Te Deum Laudamus. And it really is too bad, because it is not only part of our Lutheran identity, it is also part of our broader Christian identity. Its loss among so many who practice “modern worship” is a tragic example of deracination and replacement by objectively inferior (and ephemeral) music that is really more about the singer than the One being praised. But the good news is that the Te Deum is still being sung with gusto as part of the Matins service that traditionalist Lutherans continue to sing - even sometimes in Latin - even though it is not likely to be heard at events like the National Youth Gathering or at congregations that have traded the altar, font, and pulpit for stage, kiddie pool, and barstool.

I sing this Praise and Worship classic in the Matins services at my congregation six days a week (seasonally, at least). And it never ever gets old.

And to be frank about it, even the most popular of the “modern” Praise and Worship genre will fall away within a few years, removed by the passing of time like dross, while the magnificence of the Te Deum will continue to shine like gold. We will still be singing the Te Deum a thousand years from now, whereas the stuff coming out of praise bands and speakers today will be long gone perhaps in decades if not years or even weeks.

Here is an interesting article showing the Te Deum’s adaptation from Ambrosian chant, to Gregorian, and then to an early Anglican chant (which sounds, at least in my reading, similar to Healy Willian’s setting (as found in the new Lutheran hymnal, Te Laudamus). It is also similar to Luther’s German Te Deum (again, at least to my ears) - an English version of which is also in Te Laudamus. We used to sing it antiphonally on occasion at Kramer Chapel, and it was glorious! I remember the little ones singing the Willan version from memory in the chapel services at Zion in Fort Wayne, where I did my field work, and where I was ordained.

The tune in our TLH/LSB Te Deum follows in the train of this English chant tradition, being set to two Anglican chants - one by Henry Lawes (1596-1662) and Robert Cook (1768-1814). This setting was first used in the LCMS’s 1912 hymnal called Evangelical Lutheran Hymn-Book with Tunes (ELHB). For more, see the LSB Companion to the Services (pages 698-702) commentary by Paul J. Grime.

Here are a few videos showing the Te Deum’s adaptations through the centuries. This is one Praise and Worship song that never goes out of style - even though some Lutherans have traded it away for a bowl of pottage.

Here is the Ambrosian version:

Here is the Gregorian version:

Here is an Anglican chant version:

Here is Luther’s German version - sung beautifully by a guy who felt it appropriate to do so in a beautiful sanctuary clad in an undershirt (sigh):

Here is an English translation of Luther’s Te Deum:

Here is the Healy Willan setting by an all female choir:

Here is the Willan version sung by a mixed choir:

Here is our setting from LSB sung by the Concordia Theological Seminary Kantorei:

And here is a mixed-voice choir version:

And as a bonus, here is Dr. Eckardt’s history of the Te Deum…

… and my own presentation on the Te Deum at the same conference:

Here is a search of all Gottesblog posts that contain the words “Te Deum.”

As a postscript, LCMS Worship published this helpful article - which includes sheet music - for singing Luther’s Te Deum.

The following is the continuation of “The Office,” the third chapter in Fr. Gunnar Rosendal’s 1956 book Vårt Katolska Arv (Our Catholic Inheritance), translated by the Rev. Roy Axel Coats of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Baltimore. You can read the first installment here, and the second here.

The Priest

Once upon a time, I stood at the altar in Trelleborg's church together with Axel Malmberg, who is now the vicar in Klippan, and he greeted the congregation with the ordinary liturgical salutation: “The Lord be with you.” It was a situation that I had often experienced before and never thought anything about, but this time the question came to me: “Shall I answer with the congregation? Shall I answer with the words ‘With you also the Lord ’, [trans. note: the traditional response in the salutation in Sweden is Med dig vare ock Herren] or am I one liturgical person with the other priest at the altar, so that instead I should receive with my brother in the office the congregation's response.” Then the question arose in my mind of a deacon and celebrant. These were not at all question regarding ceremonies. There is probably just as much ceremony, just as much splendor, with two priests in identical chasubles [mässhakar - trans. note: Often in the Church of Sweden when there were two priests at the altar they would all wear matching chasubles.] as one priest in a chasuble and one of his assistants in surplice [röklin] and stole. But it was a matter of consequence. There must be consistency in church action, the liturgy must be logically structured, otherwise it nullifies its inherent meaning and proclamation. It was actually from that experience that much of my liturgical rambles and investigations had their starting point.

And now, many years later, I have been faced with the same desire <143> for consistency in a completely different context. This time the question is as follows: "If ordination is a Sacrament, if the Office is the Office of the PRIEST, how can it be that the Bishop has the fullness of the Office?" This is where Tom G. A. Hardt comes in. He taught me by putting the appropriate literature in my hands to formulate the question more precisely: "Is the consecration of a bishop [biskopsvigningen] a Sacrament?"

The complex of problems that this question brings to the fore is extremely serious. It seems to nullify and destroy the whole solid foundation laid in the preceding section. And if the truth demands it, it also must be exploded. Because the demand for truth overrides everything else. Although the foundation is laid with solid blocks from the Augsburg Confession, we must undoubtedly blow it up, if the truth demands it. There is no choice. On the other hand, it is sensible not to rush into danger which I naturally like to do. May we therefore impose upon ourselves an asceticism of patience and look at the matter calmly and comprehensively.

So I received from my Stockholm friend after a lecture in the KGF in Stockholm an issue of Nouvelle Revue Théologique. It was number four in 1954. There was one article by a Jesuit father named J. Beyer [trans. note: Fr. Jean Baptiste Beyer, S.J., (1914–2002) was a Belgian professor of moral theology and canon law who taught at Louvain and then the Gregorianum in Rome.] on the subject of “Nature et Position du Sacerdoce” — the nature and position of the priesthood. [trans. note: NRT 76-4 (1954), pp. 356–373, continued in the next issue, NRT 76-5 (1954), pp. 469–480.] A little later I received from Una Sancta, the famous ecumenical association in Germany, its periodical of the same name, and there was an article on almost the same subject, which was entitled “Die Stellung des Laien in der Kirche.” The last article highlighted the subject, but did not address it. It spoke of the fatal division into laymen and priests, and emphasized the Catholic doctrine of the universal priesthood, which the Church kat’olon has always embraced. This article talked about lay preaching and lay confession in the Middle Ages and many other interesting things. It thus became a component of the whole study of the Office of some importance in understanding the article in the Nouvelle Revue Théologique, but it shall not <144> be further discussed here. However, the French article should be further discussed. Then everyone has to judge for themselves. At least this much everyone must admit, that the matter is not quite as simple as we often thought.

The question is, then, whether there are three degrees of sacramental nature in the Ministry: deacon, priest and bishop, or whether there are only two, namely deacon and priest. Is the ordination of a deacon a Sacrament, is the ordination of a bishop a Sacrament? Or is only the ordination of a priest a Sacrament?

I now follow this article in the Nouvelle Revue Théologique, which I look at with much eagerness for closer study. We must create a theology of the Office in the Church of Sweden, and here is an interesting starting point. Just as old Herrmann [trans. note: Johann Georg Wilhelm Herrmann (1846–1922), German Lutheran Neo-Kantian professor of theology at Marburg] in his time explained in a rather snooty manner to Gustaf Aulén, [trans. note: Bishop Gustaf Emanuel Hildebrand Aulén (1879–1977) was a professor of dogmatics at Lund University and then in 1933 became the bishop of the Diocese of Strängnäs] when he was a docent in Uppsala, that in Germany they did not have time to deal with such bagatelles as the Church in theology, so for a long time in Sweden they rejected a theological treatment of the Office, perhaps not so much with snootiness as with an irritated fear of waking a sleeping bear. They thought that it was better to be as silent as death, because if we start talking, unpleasant truths would always emerge. These pages do not contain the last word, not even the first, but they possibly humbly prepare a theological beginning for developing a theology of the Office.

Fr. Beyer goes to Thomas Aquinas and Peter Lombard and finds that with them there is no thought of episcopal ordination as a Sacrament. From his review of various instances, it seems to be common, both in the past and in our day, that episcopal consecration is not considered a Sacrament. The priestly ability or power is ontologically exactly the same in the bishop and the priest. The priest can do everything a bishop can do, but in the Roman Church he may not confirm or ordain priests. However, according to Beyer's presentation, this seems to be more a matter of how things were regulated than an ontologically necessary relation. He points to the fact that Pius XII on September 14, <145> 1946 issued permission so that every vicar in his parish may confirm those who, in danger of death, wish to be confirmed. This permission is of course interesting as an elucidation of the question, of which we previously spoke, of whether a priest or bishop may confirm. But it is even more interesting to see that the priest really, by virtue of his ordination, has the ability to confirm, even if he does not have the right to do so. Thus, he is no different in his essence, ontologically, from the bishop. Whether he is allowed to confirm or not, that is a jurisdictional question, a church law question, a question of regulation. It is clear that the priest CAN confirm, and that he received this ability with his ordination, otherwise a permission to confirm would be pointless and unreasonable. Beyer says: “We must draw the conclusion that these interventions by the ecclesiastical authority are nothing more than a regulation of the exercise of the power which the priests have received through their ordination.” Such a concession by the Pope is technically called an indult.

And now it appears that the Pope has on various occasions given such indults not only regarding the question of confirmation but also when it came to ordination. There are papal permissions for priests to ordain both deacons and priests. It must mean that the priest himself, through his ordination, has the ability (förmågan) or the power (kraft) or the potency (makt), or however you want to express it, to ordain, even though he is prevented by ecclesiastical law and discipline from making use and exercising it. It is not the case that the Bishop, through his ordination, gets an ability or power that the priest does not have, the Bishop only gets such a position through his episcopal ordination, that he can exercise his ordination ability, which he already received in his priestly ordination. It is thus about regulation, not ontology.

Here I will now mention some picturesque cases of such papal indults. There rests an ancient atmosphere over them, but they are filled with a completely lively vitality, relevant even today, and one senses the indescribable charm of the Church's timelessness and eternal youth. <146>

Pope Innocent VIII granted the abbot of Citeau, Jean de Cirey (1476–1501), the right to ordain subdeacons and deacons among all his spiritual subordinates, and the same privilege was granted by this pope to the abbots of Ferté, Pontigny, Clairvaux, and Morimond. But there are even older such permissions. The permission to confirm has always been liberally given to priests in the Roman Church until our time. The priest always confirms in the Orthodox Churches.

A rather remarkable bull is the Sacrae religionis, which Boniface IX issued on February 1, 1400. In this bull he gives the abbot of the Augustinians in St Osith Cloister in Essex not only permission to ordain deacons and subdeacons, but also the right to ordain priests, and this right is given without time limit. Now the Bishop of London objected. He cited the so-called Gratian decree, in which the abbots are forbidden, among other things, to visit the sick, administer the anointing, sing public Masses, consecrate altars, and ordain priests. The Bishop of London does not say a word that the Abbot of St. Osith did not have the ability or power to ordain priests. He only states a given rule. The abbot could, of course, sing a Mass, but it was a matter of the rule that he was not allowed to do that. It was the same way with priestly ordination. It was a privilege that the bishop of the diocese had, and regarding that privilege the abbot was not allowed to make any claims. To avoid a dispute with the Bishop of London, Rome revoked the bull after three years, on February 6, 1403. But the consecrations that took place did not become invalid. No theological error is admitted. The whole thing was a political question about peace in the Church.

Pope Martin V gave the Cistercian abbot of Altezellen in Saxony the right to ordain to all degrees, including the priesthood. The bull by which this indult is given has recently been discovered. Its authenticity has not been disputed by anyone.

But even if we have no more authentic documents for such indults, we do have extraordinarily tangible declarations of similar rights, announced at various <147> times. Vasques states in his 1620 Disputationes on St. Thomas’ Summa, that similar rights were given to Benedictine abbots and Franciscan missionaries in India. There are other instances, and those who investigated this matter believe that it is likely that more facts will eventually come to light, which show how often such pardons have been granted. And this permission has not been abolished by the Tridentinum. It still applies today.

Indeed, it is even confirmed. Rome now has its Canon 951 in the Roman Canon Law, where these historical events were codified and given legal validity. In the Roman Church, a priest can ordain a priest, if he has the consent of the Church. It is rumored that this canon shall be used in Russia, where, if it happens, a Roman priest could then ordain another priest. [trans. note: From the Codex Iuris Canonici of 1917 (1917 CIC 951), Chapter 1: On the Minister of Sacred Ordination: “The ordinary minister of sacred ordination is a consecrated Bishop; the extraordinary [minister is one who], although lacking episcopal character, either by law or by special adult of the Apostolic See takes up the power of conferring certain orders.” See 1983 CIC 1012 where this canon was changed so as to limit the minister of sacred ordination to consecrated bishops.]

All of this is quite astonishing. I have said it as sober and understated manner as I could, without any thought of its effect. I have believed that the facts themselves are so captivating that any attempt to spice them up in the presentation would be a little tasteless. All this in itself is quite astonishing. This means that the office of the priest is really the office of the PRIEST, that the priest has the office in its fullness, that the priest, with the consent of the Church and on her behalf, can continue the office. The bishop is, as Beyer very rightly points out, only a higher degree, a higher honor or dignity, in the Office.

It has also been suggested for investigation whether a priests may have ordained priests before Nicaea, which was then not allowed to happen without a special indult. Einar Molland would then have presented a completely normal procedure, as he assumes that St. Irenaeus was not consecrated by the Bishop to the Bishop of Lyon. It is a fascinating question, but much remains to be investigated before we can say anything that has the slightest whiff of certainty in it.

Is this order, as described here, Catholic? It is impossible for me to say. Whether such or similar cases occurred <148> in the Churches of the East is unknown to me and it is important to know if this is the case when talking about the Church's kat’olon. Some signs point to a similar procedure during a certain period in Alexandria, but it would take too long to examine these instances more closely here. Here it must be sufficient to emphasize that such a prominent contemporary theologian as Fr. Congar, O.P., [trans. note: Fr. Yves Marie-Joseph Conger, O.P. (1904–1995), was a professor of fundamental theology at Le Saulchoir in France. He was noted as an ecumenist.] in the treatment of these ordinations, performed by priests, says that if the Church did this, she could rightly have done it. And of course, the indult has always been looked at that way. They have not been regarded as something separatistic, as a sectarian act, as something un-Catholic. Nor has anyone claimed that they were uncatholic. But the question is, whether this has not happened among the Anglicans. Dr. Jalland, [trans. note: Rev. Trevor Gervase Jalland, D.D. (1898–1975), Vicar of St. Thomas the Martyr, Oxford and then lecturer in Theology at the University College of the South West in Exeter.] the famous specialist in the question of succession, known from his distinguished essay in The Apostolic Ministry, [trans. note: Jalland’s essay in The Apostolic Ministry: Essays on the History and the Doctrine of Episcopacy, prepared by the Rt. Rev. Kenneth E. Kirk, was entitled: “The Doctrine of Parity of Ministers.”] would well object and say that Rome has degenerated and allowed a degeneration in the theology of the Office. My highly valued and dear friend, Professor Fairewaether at Holy Trinity College in Toronto, who recently wrote a book about and against the Cambridge theologians' collection “The historic Episcopate”, has vigorously emphasized that the concentration of all power in the hands of the Pope, already in the Middle Ages and even more so in our time after 1871, when all bishops turned into "the Pope's adjutants", and that Rome therefore has a completely corrupted the theology of the office and that one has no reason to be astonished if one finds Presbyterianism in Rome. But I cannot be completely convinced that this is simply true and correct. What is certain is that in many post- reformation practices, people have acted exactly as Rome acted in its indult. And our commentaries and theological treatises, above all the Smalcald Articles, contain much that bears a marked likeness to Canon 951. We arrive at an extremely controversial issue. It is clear that the episcopal line has been increasingly underlined in the contemporary ecumenical debate. But no matter how much you love that line, and I myself do so with all <149> my heart, one cannot close one's eyes to the facts that have been produced here. Beyer says, “The theologian must accept these facts.” And that is exactly what we must do. What shall we do with them? For one thing, we can wait and be patient, it is not necessary to be finished with one's estimation immediately. As long as you do not seek evasions or vague claims or try to wave the problems away with superiority, it is all right if you have to say, “I do not know for certain that what we have here is right." No one has the obligation to know everything. But everyone has a duty to clearly confess their limitation and ignorance, thereby promoting clarity and truth. But in addition to that, we can of course try to get an overview of the situation. We will begin with that task in the next section.

The remainder of the chapter will be published in a final installment: “Bishop and Priest.”

Dipping their toes into the pool of cryptozoology, the ULC guys argue that there are apparently liturgical Lutherans who find their righteousness not in Christ alone (which is now considered “white privilege” in some circles), but rather in their own decision to use traditional hymnody. Of course, they don’t name names, because no such person exists in the real world. But in the realm of ideas, this creature is a strawman.

But where do they say their righteousness comes from?

The following is the continuation of “The Office,” the third chapter in Fr. Gunnar Rosendal’s 1956 book Vårt Katolska Arv (Our Catholic Inheritance), translated by the Rev. Roy Axel Coats of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Baltimore. You can read the first installment here.

The Bishop

Is the Bishop now the source of the Office? Is it so that the Office is a bishop's office, the Bishop has the entire Office and gives deacons and priests a different share of his Office?

That is what I have always believed. About this I have always been convinced. The strange thing is that I never thought that it is called, even in the best Catholic terminology, the PRIEST office, not the BISHOP office. I don't know why I didn't think of that. I believe that it is due to inadequate teaching during the preparation for the Office. Such things were never spoken of. That was not done in Germany at the time, and therefore it should not be done in Sweden. What an incredible amount of German books, as big as the thickest telephone books, I read to be both a candidate and a licentiate! But there was never anything about the Office in them. It was later, when I began my wandering on my own carefully into Anglican theology, that I found books on the subject. And when I found them, there was a form in a mitre, cope, and crozier that overshadowed everything else: the Bishop. I came to be a faithful Episcopalian for decades, because everything about the Ministry was left out in my theological education. The office was a vacuum, which I filled as best I could, and it was the Bishop who got the vacant place. And was this so crazy? If you want to draw a <134> caricature of the episcopal concept of the office, as Gustaf Wingren recently did in Vår Kyrka, one can always do it, but it will be a caricature, and in Wingren's case a talented caricature, and it is not so worthless with talent. The problem is that talented mistakes are far more dangerous than simple craziness, because some people believe that talent and genius are always true. In the relevant article (16/55), Wingren writes: “In short, many priests in the Church of Sweden take the same position against the Swedish Free Churches, as Rome takes against the Protestant churches (including the Swedish Church). This means a permanent inability on our part to express the essence of the gospel. They circle around the Office. An immense number of our church's best and most zealous servants have an image fixed in their hearts. In that image, Rome is placed a little above them. From Rome emanates a disapproval towards us, and from us a disapproval emanates towards the free churches. This is a vicious circle and standing inside it means losing power in relation to Rome's ideal: the whole time they adopt an alien view, which dissolves the meaning of the word they are to maintain. The central concept is and remains the office, as long as they remain in this circle.” This is pleasantly written, but it's a misrepresentation of the situation. I have met possibly up to five people under the age of twenty-five who have had the attitude described, and they have all been laymen. Most of them have become Roman churchmen. No priest that I have not met has such a view of the office. That there would be “immense numbers” of priests with this view seems to be a highly exaggerated claim, to put it politely. When I am unwilling to recognize a Free Church preacher as a priest, that is, a steward of the Word and Sacrament with full apostolic authority, it is not because Rome would disapprove of him. It has its cause in the fact that his denomination lacks a connection backwards, in time, in history, in an incarnate manner <135> with Christ and the apostles. This denomination may have any idealistic connection whatever, it may reproduce the Christian doctrine ever so correctly, yet as a denomination it is new, it is founded in opposition to the Church kat’olon, the Church founded on the apostles and prophets. A new foundation, that is what was sought to be laid, and a new foundation can no one lay. You can reform the only Church that exists, but you cannot found a new one and call the only Church the great harlot or anything else along those lines. Therefore, I can recognize the Free Church denominations, as perhaps very effective and praiseworthy religious associations and their preachers for these associations without any doubt are often exceptionally skilled officials, but any Church’s priest they are not. First because they belong to an association and not the Church. Second, because, as a rule at least, they have no sacramental view of the Sacraments. This came out plainly and clearly, without any controversy, at a weekend in Osby rectory a few years ago. I regretfully spoke that I could not admit that my free church guests had any real presence of Christ's Body and Blood in the Eucharist, since they did not have the Catholic Church's mission to administer the Sacraments, but only the call of a sect or association to do so. To this, one of the participants, a prominent and sympathetic Free Churchman, replied: “Do not be worried about this thing. We do not ourselves believe in any real presence. The Lord’s Supper for us is an ordinary meal, which we eat in memory of Jesus' suffering and death." Baptism is considered to be an act of confession within the Free Church, perhaps not always but often enough. And when the other minor Sacraments are not used, no sacramental kat’olon life remains. Where there is no sacramental life, there are no priests in the catholic sense.

No, it is not because of that relationship that the distance between the Free Churches and Rome would be greater than the distance from Rome to us. This distance is of no interest at all in this context. It may mean a lot in ecumenism, but not in terms of our administration of the Catholic <136> heritage. But when it comes to this administration, then it is important to be able to determine in part what this heritage is and in part how we have preserved it. What I now wanted to ask my benevolent reader for is this: Can we agree that for decades what I held as self-evident, namely that the office of bishop with apostolic succession is the very basic substance or source of everything called Office in the Church, so that all office flows, as it were, from the episcopate, which is its fullness, is the Catholic heritage in the question regarding the Office. That there are three degrees in this Office, deacon, priest and bishop, is also Catholic but in this regard quite immaterial. But let us agree, as a hypothesis in any case, that the Catholic heritage stated as a main point implies that the bishop’s office is the very core and most important part of the Catholic office. Have we then preserved this heritage? We have already seen that the Church Order is completely clear on this point. It speaks of the difference between priest and bishop as inspired by the Holy Spirit. It further asserts that this difference must persist as long as the world exists. It also stipulates that a bishop must be consecrated by a bishop with the laying on of hands. This is how the succession is preserved. It is pretty clear. The Church Order everywhere speaks of the Office as a divine order. It is not present in the Church only because someone has to lead. The priesthood is not a vocation like any other. One cannot, if one wants to be faithful to the Church Order, not say that just as some learn to sew clothes and become tailors and others to operate a locomotive and become train drivers, so some learn to preach and administer the Sacraments and become priests. The office is a divine institution, this is asserted in numerous repetitions in Church Order. And this is what the Church Kat'olon teaches about the Office. We can serenely leave the Church Order, pleased in all respects, when we have seen how it administers our Catholic heritage.

Yet there is an article that is always timidly passed over, the twenty-eighth in the Augsburg Confession. We shall <137> linger here in detail. We must sincerely seek to understand what it has to say. We shall seek to read it, without losing hope that it will preserve the Catholic heritage, but by all means without attempting to reinterpret it or force ourselves upon it.

About the Office in general it is said in the fifth article that it has been instituted (institutum est) to proclaim the gospel and provide the Sacraments, “for through the Word and the Sacraments the Holy Spirit is given as through instruments.” The office is then instituted, it is not a human institution made for reasons of convenience. The twenty-eighth article deals with the bishop. This fact alone is quite remarkable. It is clear that it is a matter of just the bishops who existed at the time when the article was written. It therefore does not apply to any new office. This applies to the old office, as kat'olon it remained in the Church from the beginning with its roots in the Apostolic Office. This is important to establish, and it is easy to do. For the whole article talks about the spiritual and temporal power of the bishops, and it was precisely characteristic of the medieval episcopate that it had these two sides. In the criticism of worldly power, which the article contains, there is no difficulty in recognizing the office of the bishop, which received its shape during the Middle Ages, but has always existed in the Church. What is said in the article about the bishop does not therefore apply to any new species of bishops, it applies to the Catholic office of bishop, the one that kat'olon has always been found in the Church.

Now where does this Office come from? The Church, as a whole, without exception, in her doctrine and life ever since the new foundation of the Office in the New Testament held the opinion that the office of bishop came from God. It was a divine institution. What does Article 28 say? [trans. note: see note 12 of A. C. Piepkorn on Rosendal’s interpretation of this in “Suggested Principles for a Hermenteutics of the Lutheran Symbols.”] This is what it says: "The power of the bishop, according to the Gospel, is the power and mandate of God — Postestatem episcoporum iuxta evangelium potestatem esse seu mandatum Dei." The possibilities of reinterpreting these words seem extremely small, they are far too clear, lapidary, free from all <138> complicated and ambiguous statements. But now, for ages, people in the Church have spoken about the Bishop's power using two technical terms. They held, as Melanchthon says in the Apology, vetus partitio potestatis in potestatem ordinis et postestatem iurisdictionis, that is to say, that the Bishop's power consists partly in the administration of the Word and the Sacraments, and partly in a certain governmental power. This governmental power included the forgiving of sin, the rebuking of the ungodly, and excommunication, as well as the administration of worldly possessions. In some cases these possession could be very large. Now then arises in the question in Article 28: How far does the divine office of bishop extend? Does the administration of these medieval feudal rights also belong to the God-given office?

It is in the treatment of this question that one sees how clearly the Catholic opinion that the office of bishop was of God and not a human institution was cherished and defended. Proclaiming the Word and providing the Sacraments, that was obviously a divine mandate, but what about the jurisdiction, the governmental power? To this the article replies, that if the bishops have the power of the sword, they have it not by the mandate of the Gospel but with temporal and human right. (Si quam habent episcopi potestatem gladii, hanc non habent ut episcopi mandato evangelii sed iure humano, donatam a regibus et imperatoribus.) Here we encounter two other ancient technical terms: De iure divino and de iure humano. Nor can they be misunderstood. That which God has ordained, that is de iure divino, according to divine right, but that which men have ordained is de iure humano. For example, if a Bishop has been given power over a certain territory by a king or emperor, who is in the indicated place, such worldly governmental power is not from God but from men. “But”, the article continues quite solemnly, “the governing power (jurisdiction) that the bishops have as bishops, in that they have the Office of the Word and the Sacrament and the task of forgiving sins, rejecting teachings that deviate from the Gospel and excommunicating the impenitent without human violence but through the Word, that power the bishops have according to the Gospel or, as they say, de iure divino, by divine right.” (Proinde secundum evangelism seu, ut loquuntur, de iure divino, haec iurisdictio competit episcopis ut episcopis, quibus est comissum ministerium verbi et sacramentorum, remittere peccata, reiicere doctrinam ab evangelio dissentientem et impios, quorum nota est impietas, excludere a communione ecclesiae, sine vi humana, sed verbo.) Here, with all the desired clarity, is listed what belongs to the office of the bishop by divine mandate. There cannot be for a moment a question of whether the office of bishop according to Augustana is something indifferent or superfluous. It is de iure divino. When one quotes Article 14, where it says that no one should teach in the Church or exchange her Sacraments without being rite vocatus, so should one have Article 28 in mind if one wants to understand the fourteenth article properly. If someone were to suggest, which seems most arbitrary, that is is fine to read into both the earlier and the latter passages of the Augustana that a bishop and a priest here would be one and the same, must remember that the German parallel text to the cited place has the following passage: “Und desfalls seind die Pfarrleute und Kirchen schuldig, den Bischofen gehorsam zu sein.” The priests must obey the bishop. Of this it is written in the Latin text that this obedience is de iure divino. It is God's will.

The context with the apostles, indeed a certain degree of identity with the apostles, is evident in this passage. For here it is said that according to God's order we must obey the bishops according to the words in St. Luke’s tenth chapter: “He that heareth you heareth me.” It is a word given to the apostles that is here applied to bishops. The bishops have a certain apostolic grade. Not only a certain likeness but a certain identity with the apostles. This is also occurs with another passage in the same article. Here the power of the bishop is named in conformity with (“according to”) the Gospel and God's mandate. The text continues with an extremely notable reason: “For, with the following mandate Christ sent the Apostles: <140> As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” (St. John 20:21) In the same place, another sending of the apostles is mentioned, namely in the sixteenth chapter of St. Mark's Gospel: Go out and preach. One must notice the remarkable construction of the argument: The Office of Bishop is a divine mandate, because Christ sent his apostles so and so. The apostolic character of the office of bishop clearly lies here. It is catholic doctrine and it is splendidly well preserved.

Bishops exercise their power in that they preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments, and they then handle eternal things, eternal righteousness and the Holy Spirit, which people cannot obtain except through the Office of the Word and the Sacraments. This is a real and particularly strong emphasis on the place of the Office in the saving work of the Church! More of an emphasis on the Office can one hardly think of in a confession than what is found in the Augustana. Let us now seek to summarize and consider the conclusions we have come to at from a fairly thorough examination of its twenty-eighth article.

First of all, it is clear that the Office that is treated here is the kat’olon office of the bishop, the office of the bishop, as it has always been in the Church. Broadly speaking, we face certain criticism of the shape of this Office during the Middle Ages. The feudal governmental power, which bishops have received through the grants of earthly goods to certain bishoprics from kings and emperors, is certainly not rejected as ungodly or unworthy. Yet they are declared to be of a purely temporal and human nature, there is no godly appointment in such an order of things. This criticism does not reject any Catholic doctrine. It is certainly possible to support the opinion of some theologians that even the feudal power of the bishops is from God, but that is not a universal opinion, it is not kat’olon and never has been. The criticism is justified and without doubt in many respects peculiarly Catholic. But apart from this slight and, spiritually speaking, healthy limitation of the power of the bishop, it is claimed that the bishop has his Office and the power <141> of that Office from God. This office is placed in such close relation with the apostolic office, both in its origin and in its practice, that a certain degree of identity between the apostles and the bishops seems to be taught. However, his identity is in no way precisely understood, but as far as it goes it is in well conformed to the traditions in the Church. These maybe are not able to claim to be called catholic, however they have an ancient place in the Church. The importance of the office in the order of salvation is emphasized in an extraordinarily strong way, the necessity of the Office is highlighted in a particularly strong manner. This is our final conclusion. Suffice it to say the Augsburg Confession has preserved our Catholic heritage on this point with unbroken fidelity.

Here, where I sit in the sun on the lawn, it is very close to thirty or over thirty degrees [Celsius], and I therefore want to mention that I came to exactly the same conclusion at the review of Article 28 many times before at significantly lower temperatures, so my closing summary cannot be due to the heat wave. I have often wondered how in the world it happened that the German Churches lost the episcopate, when their lead document that reformed the Churches has such a chief article about the episcopate. It is surely the fact that once the office of bishop was lost, they never dared to bring up Article 28. It is too good. It cannot be true. But that is that. Alas, if the Churches of the Reformation in Germany had been faithful in regards to this—they and our neighboring churches in Norway and Denmark!—so much ecumenical fuss would now be unnecessary! Now I want to repeat again that these Churches are not at all to be compared with the free church congregations. After all, they were not formed in opposition to an existing Church, they arose out of a reformation. This sometimes went astray, but there is an absolute difference between founding a new Church and seeking to reform the only Church and some cases failing. In the last case, it is the same Church that continues to live, and she can be reformed once more and regain what she has lost. In the former case, something new has been founded, the principle of division is established as a principle [knäsatt] <142> and the whole situation is different. Continuity is gone, where a new congregation is formed, but it continues, albeit with weakness, where the one Church remains, however deformed and deficient.

Yet perhaps there is another answer to the questions that can end this chapter? Perhaps we may, at least to some extent, understand why the office of bishop fell away in the Churches of Germany, when we read the next section.

The remainder of the chapter will be published in two further installments: “The Priest,” and “Bishop and Priest.”

This was published August 21, 2018. — Ed.

The form and adornment of the Liturgy have developed in various ways throughout the Church's history, but its basic integrity must always be guarded and maintained. That is to say, the preaching of the Holy Scriptures of the Prophets and Apostles as fulfilled in Christ Jesus, and the administration of His Holy Supper with His Word in accordance with His institution, are ever and always to be the central, controlling, decisive, and definitive factors. The preaching of Christ is always leading to the celebration of His Holy Sacrament, and the administration of His Sacrament always includes the faithful preaching of His Word unto repentance and faith.

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Fr. Gunnar Rosendal (1897–1988), was a Swedish Lutheran priest and a leading figure in the liturgical movement of the Church of Sweden, both publishing many works and leading by example in his parish in Osby. He was also a fierce opponent of “women’s ordination,” as can be seen in this excerpt from his open letter to parliamentarian Jarl Hjalmarson in 1957:

It is, of course, well known that the professors of theology at both faculties had previously taken a dismissive stance toward the idea of women as priests, with roughly the same reasoning as the committee and the overwhelming majority of the holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. […] You seem to argue that while a strong press opinion, the women's rights movement, and the secularized people's opinion demand that women gain access to the priesthood, the church should give it. [...] Allow me, with all the pathos and conviction I possess, to say this: What is prudent is not to abandon one’s convictions and one’s Christian heritage in order to follow the gods of the age. What is prudent is not to seek popularity. What is prudent for the Church is to stand firm by its eternal standard, the Word of God, and by its own order, won through the centuries and now prevailing throughout the whole world, with few exceptions. What is prudent is sometimes so far removed from popularity that it may mean a cross. Christ, the cornerstone of the Church, did not win the approval of His contemporaries. He was crucified. (translation from Frida Mannerfelt, “Digging for Roots: Perceptions of Secularity and Biblical Assemblages in the 1957–58 Public Debate on Women’s Ordination in Sweden” in Biblical Interpretation 34 [2026]:13–36).

Fr. Gunnar’s legacy survives in conservative parts of the Church of Sweden, and so his writings are helpful in understanding the tradition of confessional Lutheranism in Sweden, which obviously has a substantially different history than the Germanic heritages out of which the LCMS was first formed.

Reproduced below is a portion of his 1956 book Vårt Katolska Arv (Our Catholic Inheritance), namely the beginning of the third chapter, in which Rosendal discusses the Office of the Holy Ministry. This marks the first time, as far as I am aware, that this work has been translated into English, and was kindly done by the Rev. Roy Axel Coats of the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in Baltimore, MD. The remainder of the chapter will be published in further installments, and I think it will prove helpful to ongoing discussions regarding Church and Ministry in the LCMS.

Chapter III

The Office

A couple of days after my ordination, I was standing outside the window of the Sydsvenska Dagbladet in Lund, reading the news on a sunny May morning, when a comrade came up to me and asked: "Well, how does it now feel to have the character indelebilis?" It was 1922, liberal theology was in its heyday, and it was in good taste to joke about such things. I fell into the jargon and answered effusively that it did not feel as if, as far as I noticed, I had received the indelible character of the Office. I added that I considered the matriculation degree much more important than the priestly ordination. When I think back now, I must admit about myself that I at least lived as I had learned, because I reluctantly took off my student cap at night, but I wore my kaftan neither day nor night, except when necessity required it. I wanted to be a priest, there was no question of that, I was deeply moved by my priestly ordination, I really longed to work in the Office, but I knew fantastically little about what that entailed. Thanks be to God that I did not need to know that either, any more than a baptized child needs to know that he is baptized. Quite right! I was very childish.

I came to Väsby vicarage at the end of May, and yet today I can see with my inner sight how the warm air rippled over the fields around the church village's heavy foliage and pointed church tower, and I also remember that I first walked past the prästgard in the belief that it was a large herregård, so magnificent it was. The indescribable summer beauty of Kullabygd, which still enchants me in this moment of memory and recollection, <124> filling me with silent jubilation, subdued me, and I timidly wished: "If I could stay here!" When I came into the parsonage dining room, the doors stood open out the garden, the crowns of the apple-trees rested like white drifts motionless in the sun between the huge, tall chestnut hedges out on the plain, and driven beyond all bounds of self- control, I cried out rapturously: "Here I stay." I understood also that this was my missive, only to that was tacked on that Höganäs was also my missive, and the question was, would I be allowed to live in Väsby. Around my two years in this parsonage there will always be a shimmer of complete poetry in the experience and a warmth of affection in existence. The vicar and Mrs. Hallén were wonderful, R.I.P. But when, immediately after the Mass, I changed into my lion-colored summer suit to go out on one of my countless bicycle trips in the countryside, which were always as absorbing and alluring as painful in my inability to to write down what I saw and felt, Mrs. Hallén sometimes shook her head with concern and said: "Do you really like to be a priest?, you are so quick as to take off the koftenetten." She was the first, I think even the only one, I heard use this old-fashioned diminutive, and I do not think she herself knew that she was preserving an old usage from generations of priests, where kaftan meant the foot length cassock (prästrock) and koftenetten meant the knee length kaftan.

No, the theology of the Office was completely unknown to me, except to the extent that I read a little about it, though very little, in practical theology. It took a long time before it became a problem for me. I do not know myself how it happened that I started to be curious. But I became just that, I hungered for knowledge, I asked and no one could answer, I groped and searched and finally found. And when I had found, I came to a peace and a joy that made me think that all questions about the Office were somewhat answered, only details remained, and they were of little weight. The view I was eventually able to express and which I embraced with the warmth of my whole heart <124> and with the approval and delight of my whole mind, I could express in a single word: The bishop. Many years passed before I came to read the Church Fathers—how can I help it, no one taught me. But when I found in the Apostolic Fathers the expression “ubi Episcopus, ibi ecclesia”, “where the Bishop is, there is the Church,” I thought that I, as rarely before in my life, understood what Socrates meant by recollection. I thought of that sentence, that I formed myself, as a confession of my innermost conviction, long before I encountered it in the first doctor fathers of the Church. Article XXVIII of the Augsburg Confession, which others either neglected or passed by with a little embarssment, became for me a holy place. In all the editions of the confessional writings, whether in Swedish, in German, or in Latin, which I got into my possession, I passionately underlined this passage. This article became half a bright intellectual joy and half a devotional text for me. As the years went by, I became able to briefly and concisely state my view on the Office. And when one can state one's convictions that way, it is always ripe and clear. My formula read like this: The Bishop is the only one who has the whole Office, from him all others get a greater or lesser participation [delaktighet] in the Office. I was convinced, without a shadow of a doubt, that this was the only possible Catholic conception of the Office. Of course, I was not unaware that other views existed, but folly is all over this fallen and darkened world so why should folly not be found in views about the Office? They did not concern me. I was convinced that the Church of Sweden, but unfortunately not all Swedish priests, stood on a solid Catholic foundation, and that this foundation extended just as far as the sentence formulated above. This sentence could need an addition for the uninitiated: No one is really and truly a bishop, who is not consecrated by a Bishop in the apostolic succession, so that without interruption the consecrated are bishops right down to the apostles. Here the succession <126> problem emerged, but it was a problem only for those other churches, not for the Church of Sweden.

In this belief and perception I lived until I came into contact with Tom G. A. Hardt.

So what did he have to say? He said: "A priest can ordain a priest." Now I understand that for the second time on this page, dear reader, you think this is an anticlimax, you say that I cannot be so ignorant that I have not heard that claim before. Right, right and true! I have, but then the spokesmen has always claimed to be defending the case of Protestantism or Lutheranism or Calvinism or the Free Church, and I have listened respectfully and attentively with courtesy, but frankly without much interest. Now it was something completely different. Tom G. A. Hardt claimed that he made the case for catholicity, that his statement was the Church's own kat'olon, that it was the WHOLE Church's meaning and view that he expressed. And he sent me a copy of the Nouvelle Revue Théologique, and I don't want to reveal the point here, but that much was clear, that the whole proof was Catholic, kat'olon. If I did not want to lock my bishop in and shut myself out of an inevitable theological debate, unless I chose isolation from Catholic thought, I must think through the question of the Office once more. And that is one of the reasons why this book was written. It has been a lot of fun to write these sunny, hot July days among the tall lindens and flaming lupins and with the view of the close-cut lawn down to the vicarage terrace. If the book were to be dedicated to someone, it should be to Tom G. A. Hardt and Gustaf Wingren, mentioned in alphabetical order, who both inspired it.

Yes, Gustaf Wingren comes into the field of view, because his debate in Svensk Kyrkotidning with Jan Redin and his later contributions on the ecumenical question in Vår Kyrka are efficient causes behind large parts of this book. At first I was just thinking of writing an entry in Sveriges Kyrkotidning with the title "Our Catholic Heritage," but it was more fun to write a book, and you have more space and can speak freely. Though it was awful to begin with, I must say, the pleasure of going on has been special. Therefore, though I did not put a dedication on the title page, I take the opportunity to heartily thank both the professor and the student for inspiration and opposition, for benefit and pleasure, for stimulation in thought, will and feeling.

And now I think it is best to think about the outline of this chapter. First I must talk a little about what apostolic succession is, then I will explain Article XVIII of the Augsburg Confession. Then we come to the thrilling question: Can a priest ordain a priest? Lastly, I shall attempt a summary, a synthesis, a consensus of the two points of view, but do not expect too much from it. This chapter will probably be mostly analytical, the synthesis may have to wait. But I can try, without needing anything else.

The Apostolic Succession

<128> One could divide the Churches of Christendom into two groups: Those who possess the succession and those who have lost it. Those who have lost it, as a rule, seek in their theology to prove that it works just as well without succession. They are often deeply hostile to the idea of apostolic succession, and they do not infrequently declare that they would not accept succession at all, even if they were offered it. And it turns out to be quite true. Many events in church life these last decades, since the succession came up for debate, show how anxiously a part of the churches make peace with succession. One cannot regret enough these judgements of an ecclesiastical inferiority complex, even if one does not consider the apostolic succession to be the only legitimate connection between the apostolic church and the Church in our days.

The form of apostolic succession is the unbroken laying on of hands from the days of the apostles to our time, so that a line of bishops stands through the centuries in a series, with the apostles as the first in the series and the newly ordained bishops of our day as the last in this series. If this chain of laying on of hands has been broken somewhere, if a single bishop in the series is absent and replaced by a priest, the form of succession is broken and the content of the succession is spilled. Continuity is no longer at hand. The one who was ordained by someone other than the bishop was never fully catholically ordained himself, and the one he ordains is never fully catholically ordained either. Only the bishop has the power to consecrate and the capacity to consecrate. If a person who is not a bishop performs the consecration, then the consecrated person is not kat’olon a bishop. This also means that all priests who are ordained <129> of this man, are not kat'olon priests. They will not be catholic priests, they become deficient priests, doubtful priests.

This is short and sharp and pointed, so pointed that I myself protest the doctrine of the succession. Few things can set the mind racing more than a truly in-depth debate on this question. Those who have the succession can sometimes become intolerable in their complacency, and there is no reason to defend this, because even the priest, who without the slightest doubt stands in the succession, can have every reason to beat his chest in remorse and correction and humiliation, and a Church that has preserved and highly values the succession, may have so many flaws that it makes complacency not only ridiculous but downright tragic. But since this has been said, and since it has been added to that that there are churches without succession which compel us to humble admiration and devoted acclaim, then of course it must also be admitted that it is a very strange manner of asserting oneself, when they reject gifts which could remedy a deficiency in the constitution of the church. In Denmark, it has long been an extremely easy matter to introduce the apostolic succession from Lund for the easy price of a second-class round trip ticket between Lund and Copenhagen. Even the distances between Oslo and Karlstad are, geographically speaking, not a deterrent. It is apparently other kinds of distance that create the difficulty. And I would like to say that, in all modesty, that distance cannot be approved from a catholic point of view. That the Church in Denmark and Norway lost the succession in the fifteenth century, no one in these countries can help today, but on the other hand, it can be helped that resistance is raised, when succession is offered on several occasions in our time. That is the unreasonable thing. If it is now found to be catholic, that the continuity of episcopal consecration must be maintained, why not restore it, if you want to continue to be a Catholic Church, which the Churches of Norway and Denmark both are and want to be. It may seem pretentious to say what I have dared to say here, but our catholic heritage must be defended, preserved and, where it has been lost <130>, be reinstated. That is why these pages are written, and if I am not allowed to claim this, even when it concerns concrete situations, I might as well refrain from writing at all. In any case, what has been presented is not an attempt to show off. Neither as an individual priest nor as a priest in the Church of Sweden do I have reason to feel superior, but the truth, the catholic truth, must be said.

Let us now in a couple of pages analyze apostolic succession! What is its innermost thought? Its deepest content is this: The Church is a living organism, which preserves its continuity, its connection with the past. The church begins in the eon of the new testament with Christ being made man , she is the body of Christ, she is historical, because the incarnation was a historical event, and moreover timeless and eternal, because the incarnation was the SON OF GOD being made man [mandomsanammelse]. The church is therefore GOD's presence here and now, but on the other hand God's HERE AND NOW. If one says that the Church is only God's constant creation senkrecht von oben [vertically from above], one denies the historical, the human nature of Christ, the horizontal line of the cross. If one makes the Church a merely human institution, you have denied that it was God who was made man, the vertical line of the cross. The succession expresses in an outstanding way the organic, living context of Christ made man. “As the Father hath sent me, so send I you.” In the same way, with the same purpose, as the Father sent his Son to earth, vertically, the Son sends his apostles into the world, horizontally. The historical context in the ordination of the apostles and their successors, the bishops, cannot be dismissed as superfluous. It can just as easily be rejected as insignificant and unnecessary, as Baptism can be rejected. The Church has always valued succession, and why should we reject any gift of grace? How can we reject someone, however lowly they may be, that the Church has found to be of importance over the centuries? Even if more could be said without including formulas that have already been covered, it seems to be enough <131> as motivation for the restoration of the succession, where it has been lost, and its careful preservation, where it already exists, to show that it is an incomparable means of continuity, the living, organic continuity of the Church, and that it is a gift of grace.

Now, however, it is undeniable that there are more ways of preserving continuity than succession, even if it is the best. To be, to BE the same Church, as the apostolic one, and not a newly founded community or a later created association, is of course the essential, the crucial, factor. The Pentecostal movement is a new denomination, it is no Church. The Danish Church, even without succession, is undeniably the same Church as the ancient Apostolic Church. It is the continuation of this Church in Denmark. This cannot be denied. And this identity, this continuity, is of course the crucial factor. If it is missing, there can be no question of connection. All denominations founded in opposition to the one true Church, the one that has connection with the apostles and is therefore apostolic, they are not Churches, whatever else they may be. Nor can they be called Church. Rather the Church is at hand where there is the remembrance of the incarnation. And this connection can be expressed in many ways. So the agreement in the canonical writings of the Bible is a sign of Catholic continuity. That the great Sacraments are used, that Confession is kept alive, that the three ecumenical confessions are preserved, these are all expressions of continuity and identity with the Church, as it was founded by Christ on the apostles in the New Testament era, even though she existed long before. The better this continuity is preserved, the stronger the connection is with the WHOLE Church, the Catholic Church, the more Catholic a Church is. I have often heard Anglican theologians explain that a Church is either Catholic or non-Catholic, the degrees do not exist. I can not think like that. There are non-Catholic denominations, such as the Pentecostal movement which, however, have splashes and patches of the Catholic heritage—of course!—and there are <132> more or less Catholic Churches. The Church of Denmark is Catholic, because it is identical to the one Church, but it is less Catholic than the Anglican Church, which in turn is not as Catholic as the Orthodox Churches, which I would think are the most Catholic Churches in the world. Succession does not belong to the esse of the Church, so that where there is no succession, there is no Church. The succession belongs to the Church's bene esse, to her good order, her fullness and prosperity.

Have we in the Church of Sweden preserved the apostolic succession? First, what do our confessions say? The three ancient creeds are wholly silent about this, of course. Article XXVIII of the Augsburg Confession implies the succession, but it is not directly mentioned. Only when we come to the Church Order do we find it clearly stated that the succession must be preserved and must be preserved in the Church of Sweden. The difference between the bishop and the priest is de jure divino, of divine institution, it is “undoubtedly issued by God the Holy Spirit and so the episcopacy was generally approved and accepted throughout Christendom and has since remained so and must remain so, as long as the world stands.” The difference between bishop and priest is here stated to be of divine origin, and therefore note well: THEREFORE this order was universally adopted, CATHOLIC, kat'olon, throughout the world. It is also necessary. So much is said about the office of bishop. The Bishop's duty includes, “that he shall ordain in his diocese.” He is the one who has the duty to ordain and the ability to ordain [vigningsuppdraget och vigningsförmågan]. And then how will he himself be consecrated [vigas]? The Church Order does not leave us in the dark about this: “He shall in the cathedral or wherever it is suitable for him, by another bishop, one or more, be publicly consecrated by the laying on of hands.” Bishop consecrates bishop, there is no doubt about that. Furthermore, it is said that no one may exercise the office of priest unless he has been ordained through prayer and the laying on of hands, because thereby the Holy Spirit is given. Indeed, it would be very reckless if someone wanted to despise the laying on of hands and prayer, “especially as it has been this way all the way back to the time of the apostles.” The Church Order <133> stands guard over the Catholic heritage found in the succession, therefore we must not be in doubt. Nor has anyone disputed that the Church of Sweden has in practice preserved the apostolic succession. Even Roman writers like van Haag and Reformed writers like Hoffmann concede this. In this respect, the Church of Sweden stands among all other Catholic Churches as equals. It is cause for great gratitude but not at all for arrogance.

The remainder of the chapter will be published in three further installments: “The Bishop,” “The Priest,” and “Bishop and Priest.”

As with every other vocation, the pastor has many “jobs.” He is, of course, a preacher and teacher, a Seelsorger (provider of soul care), he administers sacraments, he is to set an example for his flock, and depending upon his particular call, may have other “jobs,” such as administration, chaplaincy, classroom teaching, serving as a missionary, etc.

But when it comes to consecrating the elements of Holy Communion, pastors have one job. That job is to unite Word to element. It is our one job. The problem is with innovation. Some guys feel like they have to do object lessons, change the words around to make them more “special,” or move the elements for the sake of convenience.

Guys, as celebrants, you have one job!

Of course, there is variation, but between pretty narrow guardrails. This is, after all, very important. We don’t want something so important to be subject to errors of commission or omission. So there is a checklist for the celebrant, and it is actually very easy. It appears under the heading “The Words of Our Lord,” and appears on five pages in LSB: 162, 179, 197, 209, and 217. The checklist is easy to follow. It includes a minimalistic script of the exact words, and two red rubrics indicating where the sign of the cross is to be made.

It really is that simple.

If you want to add ceremony to the bare minimum, you have the freedom to do so. But not all ceremonies are equal. Does your ceremony confess the miracle of the Mass, that is, the supernatural Presence of God incarnate in the body and blood, in the mystery of the sacramental union? Are you being reverent, and confessing, by your conduct and actions, that heaven has literally come down to earth? Are you trying to do something new and innovative and entertaining, or are you following a well-trod path of our fathers in the faith who have gone before us? Are you just trying to get the Sacrament over with, or are you drinking in this miracle and rejoicing in the gifts? And what are your actions teaching? What does your body language catechize about what is going on? Are you sending a mixed message between your words and your actions?

Now, concerning the celebration of the Service of the Sacrament, there are common sense things that are not spelled out, and shouldn’t have to be. But maybe they do. You need bread and wine (not grape juice). You need a receptacle for each of them. The bread may be put into a ciborium or on a paten. But it has to be somewhere where the pastor will speak the verba and make the sign of the cross over them. That requirement is built into the “checklist.” The wine also has to be in some kind of vessel, whether already poured into a chalice or being held in a flagon. The use of individual cups is an issue for another day. But at bare minimum, you need a container for bread and a container for wine. And you need a surface (a table?) to place these receptacles on for consecration. They need to be in close proximity to the celebrant. For just as “is” means “is,” so too does “this” mean “this.”

And you need a celebrant. Per Scripture and our confessions, according to the divine example of how God calls and sends (“apostello”) certain men (apostles) into the holy office, certain men are today set apart and put into order for this ministry of Word and Sacrament. They are ordained ministers. The celebrant is a pastor. He cannot delegate these words to a layman (male or female) in the choir, to the school principal, to a lay assistant, or to the congregation to speak together. One job, guys. Do your job! Don’t pawn it off on others who are not authorized to do it. You’re not smarter, more innovative, or more leadershippy than Jesus. You have one job. You are not in charge. Maybe we need an organization called the Pastoral Followership Institute. Our Lord called the apostles with the invitation: “Follow Me.” So do your job and follow and respect your Boss.

The celebrant may be vested elaborately, or simply, but per our confessions to which we all voluntarily adhere out of love and submission to one another (at least most of us), barring some extraordinary circumstance, he is vested. After all, he is standing in the place of Christ. He is offering a sacrifice of praise (not a bloody, propitious sacrifice) in the Holy of Holies. Our confessions refer to this sacrifice as “eucharistic” (meaning, a thank-offering). Vestments for ministers leading worship in the Presence of the Lord is not a human invention, but rather a divine preference. God likes vestments, and even mandated their use when it was completely unreasonable - while the Israelites were wandering in the desert. So vest. But once again, there is plenty of leeway within the guardrails. Not all vestments will be identical, just as there is Christian freedom regarding the level of ceremony in different congregations. To just trash all ceremony and all vestments is an abuse of that Christian liberty, and indicates a lack of love and unity in our synod.

The celebrant must intone the Words of Institution clearly. That is not an option. That is not an adiaphoron. He may sing them (as Luther did, writing the Gospel-based chant tone that is found in LSB DS3, page 197), or he may speak them. But don’t mumble them. Don’t rush through them like an auctioneer. Don’t monkey with the words. Don’t personalize them. They are to be recited. They are not your words. They are “the Words of our Lord.” The celebrant is only the King’s minister - he is not the King. So read the King’s proclamation. It doesn’t need your help. It’s not about you.

The celebrant is consecrating only those elements in his proximity, and he indicates which ones these are. Gestures such as motioning with the hand, making the sign of the cross, opening and closing containers, and the use of linens on the altar help to clearly communicate which elements are being consecrated. And unclear communication is no communication.

The celebrant is the steward of the mysteries. Once the elements are consecrated, he is to oversee what happens to all of them. He is responsible. He is to distribute the sacred body and blood. If an accident happens, he is to reverently address it. If there are reliquiae left over, he is to either consume them, or reserve them. He may not simply abandon them. For once again, what does that teach? And what kind of respect does that show our Lord. The elements of Holy Communion are sacred. They are not props for your show. It’s not a show. It’s a miracle that happens by God’s grace and mercy.

So there are things not to do:

Don’t introduce elements other than bread and wine. Don’t separate the elements to be consecrated on multiple tables or in the hands of the parishioners. Don’t consecrate elements only to leave them behind. Don’t introduce confusing additional ceremony to the consecration, like an object lesson - especially something that hints at Old Testament sacrifice like a slab of meat on the altar. Don’t monkey with the words, altering them, making them sound spontaneous, or being folksy.

And there are things to do:

Above all, be reverent. It is a confession that God has miraculously met you where you are, and you confess His Presence. Be mindful. Avoid the temptation to go on autopilot. Speak or chant clearly and with volume. Be aware of the spiritual warfare that is happening around you, and be cognizant of the saints and angels in heaven who are with Jesus, and thus with you. Don’t hurry. Feel free to show reverence by genuflecting, elevating, and ringing bells - though these are not necessary ceremonies. Nevertheless, they point to the miracle of Christ’s Presence. If you flub the words, start over.

You should commune yourself first, then any other clergy or assistants, and then the people who come to the rail, “Let the deacons, according to their order, receive the Holy Communion after the presbyters, from the bishop or from a presbyter” (AC 24:38). I realize that’s not a law, but what makes you think you know better than the church fathers, hundreds of years of Best Practices in the church, and our confessions (that we all supposedly subscribe and submit to)? How about a little humility? Distribute the elements reverently. Don’t rush. Once again, the first principle is to be reverent. Above all, be mindful of the Divine Presence - and the rest should follow. Reverently account for all of the consecrated elements, whether you consume them or reserve them. Cleanse the vessels (reverently!) of any consecrated elements. When it is appropriate to do so, reverently re-set the vessels on the altar and make sure it looks as close to perfection as possible. Isn’t that the least you can do for Jesus in light of what He has done for us? If our Lord could neatly fold his own linens after the resurrection (John 20:7), we can be respectful concerning what goes on at our altars - before, during, and after the miracle.

Give thanks to our God and King who comes under our roof though we are not worthy (Matt 8:8). But we are made worthy, because the Lamb is worthy (Rev 5:12)! Rejoice in the vocation that God permits you to do. Never take it for granted.

You have one job, guys. And how glorious it is! There is no greater privilege.

By Michael A Kiener

Note: Michael Kiener put together an outstanding downloadable PDF called Reverent Worship: What It Is and Why It Matters, “an educational resource for congregations and those exploring Lutheran liturgical worship.” What follows is his introduction to it. — Ed.

I am a layman—an elder in a confessional Lutheran congregation—and what follows is the story of how a few questions in the pew grew into a small resource.

For a season our congregation was served by a vacancy pastor, Rev. Dr. Mark Nuckols, and his conduct in the Divine Service was unlike anything I had seen before. He genuflected at the confession of sins. During the Nicene Creed, at the Incarnatus—at the words “came down from heaven and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit”—he genuflected, and then at the words “and was made man,” he lowered himself further still, placing his right hand upon the floor and bowing his head toward the ground; and at “And the third day He rose again according to the Scriptures,” he rose. At the Pax Domini he made the sign of the cross with the host and the chalice; never a drop was spilled.

It was not the beauty of performance, but the beauty of confession. Here was the whole Gospel of the Incarnation preached without a single word—the eternal Son of God humbling Himself, descending, taking on our flesh, and rising again for us. I remember thinking that a man who could not hear one syllable of the Nicene Creed would still have known precisely what was being confessed. The body was saying what the mouth was saying. Every movement pointed away from the man and toward Christ.

Not everyone received these practices the same way. The questions that arose were, in fact, the very ones this document later takes up—whether such reverence is “just for show,” whether the movements distract from the Word, and whether any of it is required or simply a matter of taste. What was new to the congregation was not so much the liturgy itself as the manner in which it was offered. That is, the reverent movements that accompanied it. I believe—and I say it with all charity, and, I hope, with the best construction—that the unease was born not of ill will but of unfamiliarity. These were things many had simply never been taught to understand or never saw before, including myself. Where a thing has never been explained, it is no fault to wonder about it.

Luther’s explanation of the Eighth Commandment teaches us to “defend [our neighbor], speak well of him, and put the best construction on everything.” I wanted to keep that commandment in two directions at once. Toward our vacancy pastor, it meant defending his reverent conduct: his gestures were not showmanship but confession, and I only wish that more pastors carried themselves with such reverence during the Divine Service. Toward members, it meant that their questions were sincere and deserved a patient answer rather than a rebuke. It seemed to me that the kindest and most faithful response to those questions was not defensiveness, but instruction.

So I began to gather the “why.” I started where the Church always starts—with Holy Scripture, which does not leave reverence to taste but commands it:

“... let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire” (Heb. 12:28–29).

From there I followed the thread to the bowing and kneeling of the Psalms, to the Lutheran Confessions, and to the fathers in the faith. What began as notes for a conversation or two became “Reverent Worship — Why It Matters.”

The document is meant to be a resource for laymen and, where a pastor finds it useful, a teaching aid for his flock. It simply explains: what the body is doing in the liturgy and why; the difference between the Sacraments our Lord has instituted and commanded (though not exhaustive) and the salutary ceremonies the Church has developed to surround and adorn them; and, above all, that reverence is confession—not decoration, and never a show. When we bow, kneel, or sign ourselves with the cross, we are not performing. We are confessing with our bodies what we believe in our hearts: that the living God is truly present among us to serve us with the forgiveness of sins, life, and salvation.

I shared the finished piece with Rev. Larry Beane, whose writing on reverent worship had been a huge help to me from the beginning. To my surprise, he thought it worth passing along, and the editors have kindly agreed to make it available here for any who might find it useful. I am thankful for that kindness, and for the invitation to set down this backstory.

My hope is a simple one, and I offer it for those who love reverent worship and those who question it alike. May those who treasure the historic liturgy hold it out to others with patience and love, never with contempt for the one still learning to see it. And may those for whom these practices are new receive them as what they are: not the preference of any party or person, but the Church’s long confession of Christ, offered with reverence and awe before the God who comes to save us. If the pages that follow help even one person to see—as a deaf man might see—Jesus Christ being confessed in every bow and every bended knee, then this little resource will have done its work.

Our family made our yearly hajj to one of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra's family concerts this past Sunday. These are family friendly, one-hour affairs and many of them have been quite good. It's a rite of passage in our home: you get to start coming along when you turn four.

Sunday's event was advertised as a Beethoven-fest with special emphasis on Symphony No. 5. But, alas, someone invited Ron Burgundy.

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