{"id":1444,"date":"2011-05-02T11:43:06","date_gmt":"2011-05-02T18:43:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/?p=1444"},"modified":"2011-05-02T14:13:42","modified_gmt":"2011-05-02T21:13:42","slug":"the-%e2%80%9creal-lutheran-view%e2%80%9d-about-mary-one-moment-please","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/?p=1444","title":{"rendered":"The \u201creal Lutheran view\u201d about Mary? One moment, please!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201c\u2026.Mary prays for the Church, and the saints do, too [?]\u2026.I no longer get bent when I hear of prayers to Mary\u2026.since she and the saints do pray with and for the Church.\u201d\u00a0 According to Russ Saltzman<\/a>, this is the \u201creal Lutheran view,\u201d what Lutherans \u201cactually\u201d and \u201cofficially\u201d hold. [1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Just one moment, please!<\/p>\n

As we all know, authorities great and small can be cited to bolster almost any claim. But \u201cofficially\u201d is something entirely different.<\/p>\n

What Lutherans \u201cofficially\u201d hold has been unanimously spelled out by the Lutheran members of the official Lutheran\/Roman Catholic Dialogue in the United States.<\/p>\n

After six years of careful study, they concluded:<\/p>\n

\u201cNormative Lutheran teachings, collated in the Book of Concord<\/em> in 1580, are based on the CA, Ap, and SA, which affirm commemorative veneration of the saints and Mary, but reject any invocation of them<\/strong>.\u201d [2]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That\u2019s the \u201creal Lutheran view.\u201d [3]<\/a> \u201cOfficially.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
\n[1]<\/a> Pastor Russell Saltzman, \u201cFlying Hosts and Consecrated Weevils,\u201d First Things, <\/em>April 28, 2011. Saltzman, formerly ELCA, now NALC (North American Lutheran Church<\/em>), is representative of the Evangelical-Catholic leanings of the NALC.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Lutherans and Catholics in Dialogue VIII<\/em>, Eds. H. George Anderson, J. Francis Stafford, Joseph A. Burgess (Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1992) 33 (\u00b638) (emphasis added). (CA 21; Ap 21: 9-13; SA 2, 3, 25-28). See also p. 36 (\u00b640g):<\/p>\n

\u201cIn speaking of the Christian dead, Lutherans trust the witness of Scripture and the hope of the resurrection, but do not find scriptural support for encouraging or requiring the invocation of saints who have died or of Mary to intercede for us.\u00a0 Prayer, Lutherans have insisted, must come from faith and faith must rest on promise.\u00a0Since Scripture makes no explicit promise in this regard, the practice can have no sure basis (Ap 21:10) and could trouble consciences if required.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Further, Luther:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen physical and spiritual benefit and help are no longer expected, the saints will cease to be molested in their graves and in heaven, for no one will long remember, esteem, or honor them out of love when there is no expectation of return\u201d (Smalcald Articles 2, 3, 28; Book of Concord<\/em> [Tappert edition] 297).<\/p>\n

\u201cLet the dear saints rest where they are\u2026.Let them be, and let God take care of them. We can neither know nor understand how they live in the world beyond. That world is quite different from this one\u201d (WA 17, 2:255).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

[3]<\/a> We concur that Mary is to be honored as the \u201cGod-bearer\u201d (theotokos, <\/em>Council of Ephesis 431 A. D.) and commend Luther\u2019s magnificent Magnificat, which praises God\u2019s grace toward Mary rather than Mary herself. For a comprehensive survey of the literature, see Eric W. Gritsch, \u201cThe Views of Luther and Lutheranism on the Veneration of Mary,\u201d Lutherans and Catholics in Dialogue VIII <\/em>(235-48).<\/em> See also the study prepared for the Lutheran\/Roman Catholic dialogue, Mary in the New Testament: A Collaborative Assessment by Protestant and Roman Catholic Scholars <\/em>(ed. R. E. Brown, K. P. Donfried, J. A. Fitzmyer, and J. Reumann; Philadelphia: Fortress; New York: Paulist, 1978).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201c\u2026.Mary prays for the Church, and the saints do, too [?]\u2026.I no longer get bent when I hear of prayers to Mary\u2026.since she and the saints do pray with and for the Church.\u201d\u00a0 According to Russ Saltzman, this is the \u201creal Lutheran view,\u201d what Lutherans \u201cactually\u201d and \u201cofficially\u201d hold. [1] Just one moment, please! As […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1444"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1446,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1444\/revisions\/1446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}