Evangelical Lutheran Church In America

The nation's largest Lutheran denomination Friday reversed a long-standing ban on the appointment of non-celibate gays to the clergy, becoming the second major Christian group in a month to liberalize policies governing who may minister the faith. Leaders of the 4.6-million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, meeting in Minneapolis, gave local congregations the authority to choose ministers or lay leaders who may be in "lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships."

The nation's largest Lutheran denomination Friday reversed a long-standing ban on the appointment of non-celibate gays to the clergy, becoming the second major Christian group in a month to liberalize policies governing who may minister the faith. Leaders of the 4.6-million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, meeting in Minneapolis, gave local congregations the authority to choose ministers or lay leaders who may be in "lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships."

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America says a 12-member discipline committee has been appointed to rule on charges made against two San Francisco congregations for ordaining three homosexuals. The committee has 45 days to complete its findings.

The nation's largest Lutheran denomination opened debate Monday over a proposal to allow noncelibate gays and lesbians to serve in the clergy. Leaders of the 4.7-million-member Evangelical Lutheran Church in America are expected to decide during their weeklong Churchwide Assembly in Minneapolis whether to alter existing policy, which requires gays and lesbians in ministry to remain celibate. The new policy would permit local congregations, if they wanted, to choose ministers or lay leaders who were in "lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships."

All 11,000-plus congregations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America will soon receive a mailing from a new evangelical umbrella organization, which says its mission is to revive the liberal mainline denomination. The mailing from the Great Commission Network is targeted for late September and will include the network's mission statement.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America reports its first membership gain in nearly a decade. The Lutheran body said its overall membership rose in 1990 to 5,240,739, an increase of 1,959. The denomination, created in a 1988 merger, said the last gains by predecessor bodies occurred in the early 1980s. Most mainline Protestant denominations have been declining in membership for 25 years.

Two prominent prospective nominees for presiding bishop of the newly uniting Evangelical Lutheran Church in America have said they will not be available when the constituting convention is held April 30-May 3. Author-historian Martin E. Marty of Chicago and Luther College President George Anderson of Decorah, Iowa, said this week they didn't want the post.

The eight seminaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America face a financial crisis, says the Rev. Roger W. Fjeld, president of Wartburg Theological Seminary in Dubuque, Iowa. He told a meeting here that the seminaries are working as a "network" to increase endowments and take other steps to overcome the crisis and keep the seminaries vital.

America's largest Lutheran denomination elected its first female bishop, a Midwestern woman who became the second female chosen for such a post in the history of worldwide Lutheranism. The Rev. April Ulring Larson, 42, was chosen late Friday as bishop for a four-year term of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's synod, or region, based in La Crosse, Wis., the denomination announced Saturday.

It's no secret that clergy don't take their jobs for the money, but a new report shows that more than half of Lutheran pastors are being paid even less than church guidelines suggest. The survey of pastors in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America found an average salary of $45,838. The low pay is creating problems for retiring clergy, according to the church's Board of Pensions. Because a portion of a pastor's salary is designated for his or her retirement, low salaries mean low pensions.

A national meeting of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America rejected a proposal Friday that would have allowed gays in committed relationships to serve as clergy under certain conditions. The measure would have affirmed the church ban on ordaining sexually active gays and lesbians but would have allowed bishops and church districts called synods to seek an exception for a particular candidate if that person was in a long-term relationship and met other restrictions.

Victims of a former Lutheran minister who sexually molested boys won a jury award of nearly $37 million Thursday, bringing the total payout in the case to about $69 million. The case involving former minister Gerald Patrick Thomas Jr. is the most serious to hit the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which has about 5 million members, and has drawn comparisons to the worst abuses committed during the Roman Catholic molestation crisis.

Defying their denomination's rule against active homosexuals in ordained ministry, three Lutheran congregations have appointed two gay men and a lesbian to serve as pastors in Hollywood, San Bernardino and Minneapolis. The first of the three ministers, the Rev. Jennifer Mason, 41, is scheduled to be installed Sunday at Central City Lutheran Mission in San Bernardino, followed by the installation of the Rev. Daniel M. Hooper, 56, at Hollywood Lutheran Church on May 2 and the Rev.

The top bishop in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America was elected president of the Lutheran World Federation at the group's meeting in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Rev. Mark Hanson was elected to a six-year term. Hanson, who will remain as head of the 5.1-million-member ELCA, was elected on the first ballot in a 267-111 vote, beating out the Rev. Susan C. Johnson, vice president of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada.

The official youth office of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has voted overwhelmingly to accept gay and lesbian members, even as the church remains divided on its policies on human sexuality. More than 300 delegates to the Lutheran Youth Organization voted by a 91% margin Wednesday to welcome people of all sexual orientations and to be listed as a "Reconciling in Christ" organization with Lutheran Concerned, an independent group of gay Lutherans.

Congregations should not allow the issue of human sexuality to split the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the denomination's head bishop said. The Lutherans' 5.1 million members face a challenge to "talk openly with one another, to disagree with one another about human sexuality and, more particularly, the place of gay and lesbian people in our congregations and ministry," Mark Hanson told a conference of pastors. The Rev. James M. Childs Jr.

The top bishop in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America was elected president of the Lutheran World Federation at the group's meeting in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The Rev. Mark Hanson was elected to a six-year term. Hanson, who will remain as head of the 5.1-million-member ELCA, was elected on the first ballot in a 267-111 vote, beating out the Rev. Susan C. Johnson, vice president of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada.

The biennial assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America took a firm stand against abortion, condoning it only as "an option of last resort." The delegates, meeting in Orlando, Fla., voted 905 to 70 for a policy stating that abortion is acceptable only when the life of the mother is endangered, when the fetus is so abnormal it would soon die or in the cases of rape or incest. The delegates also urged U.S. economic pressure on Israel to stop Jewish settlements in Arab territories.

It's no secret that clergy don't take their jobs for the money, but a new report shows that more than half of Lutheran pastors are being paid even less than church guidelines suggest. The survey of pastors in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America found an average salary of $45,838. The low pay is creating problems for retiring clergy, according to the church's Board of Pensions. Because a portion of a pastor's salary is designated for his or her retirement, low salaries mean low pensions.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America decided to undertake its first major study about whether to endorse the morality of homosexual relationships. The study will include an examination of whether the church should accept gay and lesbian clergy who refuse to take a vow of celibacy. The project will involve the Chicago headquarters staff, the church's bishops, its 65 synods, and colleges and seminaries.