Quo Vadis Romani?i
You can hardly avoid the news headlines about the Roman Catholic church and its current crisis of sexual abuse by its clergy. There is something new about the crisis almost every week. Recently the editors of the New York Times called for the clerical reform of that church (see New York Times [September 13, 2018]: A30).ii Dr. Gene Edward Veith, Professor Emeritus of Concordia University-Wisconsin and Provost Emeritus at Patrick Henry College -- where he also served as Professor of Literature, has written a number of helpful blog articles on the subject at his blog "Cranach."iii I won't repeat Dr. Veith's reporting or analysis here.
What should members of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LC-MS) and other confessional Lutherans think about this scandal? In one sense , it is none of our business. Allegations have been made, charges have been filed, and it is the business of the respective state and/or federal courts to sort this all out, find out who is guilty of what, and punish evildoers after due process. It is not our business in the church to predict, second-guess, or criticize what the courts will decide.
But in another sense, we should be praying for the victims of abuse, the Catholic church, and especially her laymen. For all the disagreements that Lutherans have with Catholics, we recognize that they are Christians. Like us, they confess the three ecumenical creeds. Like us, they believe that Holy Baptism makes the baptized "a new creature, an adopted son of God, who has become a partaker of the divine nature, member of Christ and co-heir with him, and a temple of the Holy Spirit." ivLike us, they believe that bishops, priests, and pastors have the power to forgive all sins.v Like us, they believe in the inerrancy of Scripture.vi The sixteenth century Lutheran reformers made clear that, with respect to their rejection of false doctrine and practice in the Roman church and others, it was not their intent to mean the innocent laymen in those churches, i.e., "those presons who err ingenuously and who do not blaspheme the truth of the divine Word, and far less do we mean entire churches inside or outside the Holy Empire of the German Nation."vii
In yet a third sense, the problem of celibate clergy sexual abuse is part of our ongoing business as "confessional Lutherans" for five hundred years. "Confessional Lutherans" are those pastors, congregations, and laypeople who make the writings of the Book of Concord their personal confession of faith. "Confessional Lutherans" agree with all the confessions and writings in the Lutheran Book of Concord (1580/1584).viii They agree that all of the doctrinal content of the Book of Concord is in full agreement with the Scriptures. Pastors and congregations agree to this when they join the LC-MS as members.
Where in the Lutheran Confessions are there complaints about the aberrant sexual behavior of celibate clergy? None other than the primary confession of the Lutheran church, the Augsburg Confession of 1530 (hereafter abbreviated as AC)! AC Articles 22 to 28 are preceded by the title "Articles about Matters in Dispute, in which an Account is Given of the Abuses which have been Corrected [in our Lutheran churches]". The "matters in dispute" which the Lutherans corrected where: 1) giving the wine in the Lord's Supper to the laymen (AC 22); 2) the marriage of priests (AC 23); 3) the Lord's Supper (AC 24); 4) confession and absolution (AC 25); 5) prescribed fasts and proscribed foods (AC 26); 6) monastice vows (AC 27); and 7) the authority of bishops and other higher clergy offices (AC 28). In the case of the present crisis in the Roman Catholic church, the issue was thoroughly and Scripturally addressed in AC 23, 27, and 28.
When the Catholic party refused to budge in response to the Augsburg Confession, Philip Melanchthon wrote another confession in 1531 known as the "Apology of the Augsburg Confession." Its articles that dealt with the present crisis correspond to the AC, and are Apology 23, 27, and 28. A bit later, Martin Luther himself published his confession known as the "Smalcald Articles" (1537). These articles deal with the same issues as the Augsburg Confession and Apology, and for the present crisis are: Part II, article 3 on monasteries; Part II, article 4 on the papacy; Part III, article 11 on the marriage of priests; and Part II, article 14 on monastic vows. Appended to the Smalcald Articles was the "Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope" (1537) that dealt with the authority of bishops and other higher clergy offices.
Even before Luther and the Lutherans spoke out this subject, there were rumblings throughout the Holy Roman Empire. In the 1438 reform treatise "The Reformation of the Emperor Sigismund," the author exposed the bishops' illegal practice of taxing "celibate" priests who lived with concubines. Then he wrote: "Would it not be better to adopt the customs of the orient [i.e., Eastern Orthodoxy] ... and allow priests to take wives? Christ himself never forbade marriage. It seems to me that great evils have arisen in the western part of Christendom since Pope Calixtus imposed the rule of celibacy...Many priests have lost their livings [i.e., income] because of women [i.e., the concubines]. Or they are secret sodomites. All the hatred existing between priests and laymen is due to this.ix The German people and princes continued to protest to the Vatican in Rome about these and other issues in the later 15th century, until they wre taken up as part of the Lutheran Reformation in the 16th century.x
All throughout my thirty-four years of ministry, Roman Catholic laymen have told me privately that they disagree with their church's tand on clergy celibacy. They believe that priests who want to be married should be permitted to do so, without penalty, and have children too. They don't understand why their church is so stubborn on this point. Neither do I.
Yours in Christ,
i The title is Latin. It means "Where are you going, Romans?"
ii See the same article here: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/13/opinion/pope-catholics-sexual-abuse.html; accessed 9-20-18.
iii See
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/09/the-catholic-sex-abuse-scandal-is-bigger-crisis-than-the-reformation;
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/09/what-percentage-of-catholic-priests-have-been-abusive;
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/09/the-beliefs-of-sexual-abusive-priests;
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/09/get-ready-for-the-defense-in-the-catholic-sex-abuse-scandal;
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/08/pope-francis-charged-with-lifting-sanctions-on-abuser;
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/08/homosexuality-the-priest-sex-abuse-scandal;
and http://wwww.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2018/08/grand-jury-accuses-301-priests-of-child-sexual-abuse; accessed 9-20-18)
iv Section 1265 in Catechism of the Catholic Church (New York: Doubleday, 1995), 354.
v Catechism of the Catholic Church, 408 (Section 1461)
vi Catechism of the Catholic Church, 37 (section 107)
vii The Book of Concord, ed. Theodore Tappert (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1959), 11 (paragraph 22 of the Preface to the Book of Concord).
viii You can read the entire Book of Concord online here: http:/www.bookofconcord.org. If you want your own copy of the Book of Concord, go to Concordia Publishing House with this search address: https://search.cph.org/search#w=book%20of%20concord.
ix Gerald Strauss, ed., Manifestations of Discontent in Germany on the Eve of the Reformation: A Collection of Documents Selected, Translated, and Introduced by Gerald Strauss (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1971), 14.
x Strauss, Manifestations of Discontent in Germany, 3-63.
