Reaffirming the importance of “spiritual ecumenism,” Burghardt stressed that “liturgy and prayer can turn us around, shape us anew, reorient us differently towards one another and to the suffering world.” Yet prayer and theological reflection, she said, must remain closely connected to diakonia and public witness. “Is this a time,” she asked, “when our solidarity with the suffering neighbor and the distressed creation may open up a new hermeneutical framework for our doctrinal and theological reflection?”
Speaking of the full communion agreements that have been achieved between Lutherans and Anglicans in different parts of the world, Burghardt noted that “visible unity does not necessarily mean institutional unity,” but rather “koinonia between our churches,” as the WCC document ‘The Church Towards a Common Vision’ spells out. She mentioned the Porvoo agreement between some Lutheran and Anglican churches in Europe (including her own Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church), as well as the Waterloo Declaration between Anglicans and Lutherans in Canada and the ‘Called to Common Mission’ agreement between the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Episcopal Church in the U.S. as examples of this shared communion.
We evangelize, [….] together, not for the sake of the church, but that God’s immeasurable goodness and God’s good intent for all people and all creation be known.
– LWF General Secretary Rev. Anne Burghardt
Through these agreements, Burghardt said, “living traditions are shared among different church families” while, at the same time, maintaining “their special spiritual and theological ‘accents’.” The notion of “differentiating consensus,” developed in the Lutheran-Roman Catholic dialogue, “points in the same direction,” she added, and led to the signing of the Joint Declaration of the Doctrine of Justification in 1999, now affirmed by five world communions (Lutheran, Catholic, Anglican, Methodist and Reformed).
This consensus statement, the LWF leader said, “seeks implementation on the local level, as local, neighboring parishes, rather than living in isolation or occupied only with themselves, turn to each other to proclaim Jesus, to share Jesus, to engage in the world out of love for Jesus and to do so together.” In that ecumenical dynamic, she concluded, “we evangelize, [….] but we do it together, not for the sake of the church but that God’s immeasurable goodness and God’s good intent for all people and all creation be known.”
In the remaining days of the gathering, Anglican church leaders, alongside the ecumenical participants, will continue to explore what visible unity signifies and how it is already being lived out in hospitality, generous discipleship and joint witness to the gospel in the world.
LWF/P. Hitchen