Prof. Dr Dirk Lange, LWF Assistant General Secretary for Ecumenical Relations. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
In this Nicaea anniversary year Dirk Lange reflects on ‘Creeds, Confession, Communion and Call’
In these years, we seem to be overwhelmed with different anniversaries and commemorations. At least for Lutherans, there is a 500th of something almost every year, starting nine years ago now with the Joint Commemoration of the Reformation in Lund, Sweden.
Not all anniversaries are easy. In 2021, in the midst of COVID, we remembered the 500th anniversary of Luther’s excommunication. Though Catholics and Lutherans were able to mark the Reformation anniversary in a festive fashion with Pope Francis himself giving thanks for the gifts that the Reformation brought to the church, the anniversary of the excommunication proved to be a very difficult topic to analyze and present. In fact, an unsuccessful study group ended up not issuing a statement though a special preface was written for the Italian edition of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, noting the anniversary and stating: “We cannot undo the history of separation, but it can become part of our history of reconciliation” (JDDJ Italian Preface).
Singing the faith
In 2022, we celebrated the 500th anniversary of Luther’s first translation of the Bible. In 2024, we began celebrating the 500th anniversary of the Achtliederbuch – Luther’s first collection of hymns, 8 in total, to help lay people (and pastors) sing the renewed faith and thereby catechize them as well! I say we began celebrating because the project that was launched in 2024 – the Global Lutheran Song Book – probably won’t be published until 2026. It gathers new hymns from the 7 regions of the LWF (Africa, Asia, Latin America, Nordics, Eastern and Western Europe and North America) and the 8th so-called region are the songs of the tradition thereby making up not quite the 8 Song Book of Luther but the Song book of 8 regions! And of course, in 2026 is the 500th anniversary of the German Mass, and 2028-2029 is the important 500th anniversary of Luther’s Small and Large Catechisms with it all culminating in 2030 with the 500th anniversary of the Augsburg Confession. Whew! That is a long list and lots of work! Those are quite a number of celebrations and, in a certain sense, though all of them very Lutheran, most of them also had an impact on the whole church of Christ, especially the Augsburg Confession and the catechisms that inspired and provoked other confessions, catechisms, and hymn writing.
Prof. Dr Dirk Lange speaking about the Nicaea anniversary during his recent visit to Iceland. Photo: LWF
Connecting Nicaea to Augsburg
It is interesting to note that “our” beloved Pope Francis (if I may claim him in this way) said a few years ago in an interview that there are two major commemorations coming up for the church. He surprised us by one of those he named: the first of course was not a surprise, it is the one we celebrate this year and which I will speak about at length in a moment: the 1700 anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, the first ecumenical council, in 325. And the second important commemoration that Pope Francis noted is the 500th anniversary of the Augsburg Confession. This statement is remarkable, first of all that the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church would name the 500th Anniversary of the Augsburg Confession as a significant upcoming commemoration but perhaps even more so that he put it alongside the 1700 years of Nicaea as if, in his mind, these two somehow belong together.
Creeds and confessions are inherently linked; in fact, they are both symbols of the faith.
Prof. Dr Dirk Lange, LWF Assistant General Secretary for Ecumenical Relations
Well in fact they do belong together. Creeds and confessions are inherently linked; in fact, they are both symbols of the faith. The Creed is a confession and the confessions are a creed. In the time we have together, I will begin by exploring this connection: What does it mean to take the Creed and confessions seriously today? What does it mean to mark a 1700th and a 500th anniversary? To answer these questions, it will be necessary to look at what it actually means to “confess” and what is a “time of confessing” as the Lutheran Confessional writings describe it? This question must also ask the question of language and interpretation. Finally, I’ll look at what it means for us today, us being the Lutheran World Federation. What is it to be a confessing communion? What is our vocation and witness today?
If you are interested in the full lecture, please contact the LWF communion office.
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