{"id":1510,"date":"2011-09-02T16:43:07","date_gmt":"2011-09-02T23:43:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/?p=1510"},"modified":"2011-09-06T13:33:56","modified_gmt":"2011-09-06T20:33:56","slug":"elca-social-statements-more-coming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/?p=1510","title":{"rendered":"ELCA Social Statements: More coming"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It was <strong>widely reported<\/strong> \u2026.\u2026 before the 2011 ELCA Churchwide Assembly in Orlando that the ELCA had decided to <strong>halt<\/strong> development of more <strong>social statements.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>To be sure, the Church Council had recommended: \u201cTo bring no social statements other than <em>Genetics, Faith and Responsibility<\/em> to any Churchwide Assembly until completion of a review of the process for addressing social concerns based on a spirit of communal discernment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But the Assembly modified the Council\u2019s recommendation and voted (680-265) to complete the review process by <strong>November 2012<\/strong> and bring the social statement on criminal justice to the 2013 Assembly as planned and to continue developing the social statement on justice for women. (This statement is slated to be adopted by the 2016 Assembly). Read it <a href=\"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/2006\/pfss1.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>On the one hand,<\/strong> Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson <a href=\"http:\/\/www.elca.org\/Who-We-Are\/Our-Three-Expressions\/Churchwide-Organization\/Communication-Services\/News\/Releases.aspx#&amp;&amp;a=5153\" target=\"_blank\">told<\/a> the Assembly:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;Social statements are important documents for us as a church.\u201d They \u201cguide us as we &#8216;step forward as a public church&#8217; because they form the <strong>basis<\/strong> for both <strong>this church&#8217;s public policy<\/strong> and <strong>my<\/strong> <strong>public speech<\/strong> as presiding bishop.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>On the other hand,<\/strong> Hanson also <a href=\"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/2006\/pfss3.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">stated<\/a> that social statements<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201c\u2026 inform us, but do not bind our consciences or our actions.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Social statements <strong>do<\/strong> and <strong>don\u2019t<\/strong> bind. Get it?<\/p>\n<p>They <strong>may not bind your conscience<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><strong>but<\/strong> in the public square they are promoted as your voice and vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It was widely reported \u2026.\u2026 before the 2011 ELCA Churchwide Assembly in Orlando that the ELCA had decided to halt development of more social statements. To be sure, the Church Council had recommended: \u201cTo bring no social statements other than Genetics, Faith and Responsibility to any Churchwide Assembly until completion of a review of the [&hellip;]<\/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-1510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1510","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=1510"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1510\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1512,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1510\/revisions\/1512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crossalone.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}