c. 2005 Religion News Service
ORLANDO, Fla. _ Millions of Lutherans will be able to sing a new song _ actually some 300 new songs _ to the Lord in an updated worship book that offers more options for contemporary worship and less emphasis on exclusively masculine images of God.
The Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America gave the proposed new prayer book and hymnal a thumbs up by a 740-250 vote Wednesday at its biennial meeting. The action allows church officials to make final revisions to the new volume scheduled for publication in October 2006.
Not everyone was happy. Some delegates said the church had been too distracted with sexuality issues to give full attention to the worship book. Others protested a “totalitarian” process in eliminating male imagery for God from worship.
The changes in the language about God “will be like a poke in the eye with a sharp stick” to many in the church, said Larry Kallem of Iowa.
Before the final vote, proposals to keep the current Lutheran book of worship, which was published in 1978, and to delay any action until 2009 were overwhelmingly turned down.
Then, after two hours of debate, delegates gave sustained applause for the approval of work on the new book that attempts to be open to different cultures and new musical styles. It will offer alternatives such as “Holy Eternal Majesty, Holy Incarnate Word, Holy Abiding Spirit” for the male-dominated Trinitarian image of “Father, Son and Holy Spirit” in prayers during Sunday services.
“This is an important moment,” said Bishop Marcus Miller of the Northeastern Ohio Synod, which has some 93,000 members in 208 churches. “I’m happy. I’m convinced it will be a great blessing to the church.”
The book still must be approved by the denomination’s Church Council.
Churches are not required to use the book. But it is expected to make its way into the pews of most of the 4.9 million-member denomination’s nearly 10,600 congregations, either when it first comes out or as local churches gradually replace their old worship books.
Church leaders say the new book is faithful to the best of Lutheran tradition, while updating worship for today’s church, which includes women bishops, contemporary “praise bands” and a desire for greater ethnic and racial diversity.
Among the more controversial proposed changes, gender-neutral language is substituted or offered as alternatives in many places for male pronouns for God or masculine images referring to humanity. For example, a line in the Apostle’s Creed would substitute the phrase “God’s only son” for “his only son” in a reference to Jesus. In some hymns, words like “king” are eliminated in favor of the more direct word “God.” In other cases, such as the song “How Great Thou Art,” the masculine imagery is left in because the church decided change would be too disruptive.
Denise Leslie, a delegate from Hope Lutheran Church in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, said using language for God that includes women is important because “when you hear gender-neutral, things suddenly become more clear and comfortable.”
Others questioned the change. “Has diversity trumped our Lutheran heritage?” asked Gervaise Peterson of Minnesota.
MO/JL END RNS
(David Briggs writes for The Cleveland Plain Dealer.)
