LWF Vice-President and head of the LWF German National Committee, Bishop Kristina Kühnbaum Schmidt, recently traveled to Rome for meetings with Ecumenical partners and the LWF member church in Italy.
The bishop also spoke with Pope Francis after the general audience. Photo: Vatican Media
German National Committee visits Rome
(LWI) - A delegation of the German National Committee (GNC) visited Rome and met with Pope Francis, ecumenical partners, and the leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Italy (ELCI), an LWF Member Church. The delegation was led by Bishop Kristina Kühnbaum-Schmidt, chairperson of the GNC and also LWF Vice-President for Central Western Europe.
Austusch mit Papst Franziskus. Foto: Vatican Media
In a short exchange, she thanked the Holy Father for his important and continuous commitment to the preservation of creation. “I consider the official inclusion of a festival of creation in the liturgical calendar of all Christian churches, as was recently discussed at an ecumenical meeting in Assisi to be a great opportunity to further deepen the theology and spirituality of creation,” said Kühnbaum-Schmidt. In her exchange with the Pope, the chairperson also emphasized the important commitment to peace in the world and to supporting the poor and marginalized.
Bishop Kristina Kühnbaum-Schmidt with the leadership of EKLI. Photo: GNC/ ELKI
Exchange with local member church
Before the meeting with Pope Francis, confidential discussions had already taken place with Kurt Cardinal Koch, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, as well as with employees of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith about the upcoming 500th anniversary of the Confessio Augustana in 2030, the understanding of synodality and Lutheran-Catholic relations on an international level.
During the trip from April 15 to 17, 2024, the Bishop also met the church leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Italy (ELCI) as well as students and scholarship holders of the GNC at the Centro Melantone.
The German National Committee of the Lutheran World Federation (GNC/LWF) represents the eleven LWF member churches with their approximately 10.3 million members in Germany. Ensuring the involvement and participation of these member churches in the activities of the LWF, the GNC in turn also presents the global Lutheran communion in Germany, and supports the LWF in its theological, missionary and diaconal work.
