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Alberta Congregation Votes to Leave the ELCIC
With 75 (89%) votes in favour and 9 (11%) opposed St. Peter’s Lutheran Church, Cochrane, Alberta took the second, final step to sever its relationship with the ELCIC…more.

Why I Am Leaving the ELCIC
A long-time friend and supporter of Solid Ground says farewell…more.

Lutherans and Revisionist Theology
Why do Confessional Lutherans and Revisionists come to a different understanding of Grace? The key to understanding Luther's theology is the insight that one simple statement cannot cover all of the truth ("the unchangeable truth of the divine Word", Preface to the Book of Concord). Good holistic theology understands that there is more to the truth than can be said by one doctrine such as the teaching about grace....more.

Bird Flu and the ELCA
Why should we worry about an outbreak of the bird flu in Asia? That is so far away. That would not affect us? Or, could it?
Why should we worry about the action of the ELCA to tolerate cohabiting homosexuals as pastors in the ELCA? Our sister church in the USA, the ELCA, has decided not to discipline its pastors who openly declare to be homosexuals who cohabit with other homosexuals.
Why should we worry? Our ELCIC has an agreement with the ELCA to a free exchange of pastors across the border. Should we be concerned about that?
Frank Pastore raises important questions about the message being sent to our Lutheran youth in light of the action taken by the recent ELCA Churchwide Assembly. He writes:
"How can they do that? I mean, how can the leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA) tell their kids with a straight face not to be sexually active outside of marriage when they've just voted last Saturday to no longer enforce the celibacy requirement for their unmarried staff - both straight and gay? The ELCA and other pro-gay denominations have been ordaining gays for decades. That's nothing new. What's new is that now staff can openly have lovers while on the job and there will be no disciplinary action for violating the celibacy requirement. The message to the kids is loud and clear: We can have sex with our boyfriends and girlfriends, but you can't".
Should we care?...more

ELCA Action Causes Serious Concern in LC-MS
The president of Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LC-MS) has written to his church expressing concern about action taken at the recent ELCA Churchwide Assembly to refrain from disciplining those rostered pastors in same-gender relationships. The LC-MS president's expressed concern demonstrates that the ELCA Churchwide Assembly's action affects not only the unity within the ELCIC but also seriously threatens to further undermine the unity within the Lutheran church community....more

A Lutheran Statement on the Authority and Interpretation of Scripture In the Church
Lutheran CORE is a coalition of pastors, lay people, congregations and reforming groups seeking to preserve within the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) the authority of the Word of God according to the Lutheran confessions. The Lutheran CORE Steering Committee has produced a document, entitled: A Lutheran Statement on the Authority and Interpretation of Scripture In the Church. Even though the statement by Lutheran CORE is addressed to those in the ELCA in the USA, we commend this statement for your careful perusal. The statement reflects also the understanding of those in "Solid Ground" in the ELCIC. The statement is a succinct and lucid statement of the Lutheran understanding of the authority of Scriptures. It also identifies a false ideology which claims contemporary relevance and attempts to incorporate various understandings of Scripture as equally legitimate.

ELCA Lutherans Urged to Accept Gay Clergy
The ELCA's Churchwide Assembly (national convention) on its final day urged its bishops to refrain from defrocking gay and lesbian ministers who violate a celibacy rule, but rejected measures that would have permitted ordaining gays churchwide....more
Also see ELCA press release on this matter.
Follow this link for a response from Lutherans Concerned/North America.
For WordAlone's response follow this link.

Report on Synod Consultation
Celebrations, a publication of the Communications Committee of the Synod of Alberta and the Territories, provides a special report on the synod consultation meeting on "A Way Forward" that took place in Red Deer on July 23rd...more

She's Answering the Call
The Kitchener/Waterloo Record provides this report based upon an interview with the new national bishop elect, Rev. Susan Johnson...more

'Sexuality not up for vote,' says ELCA Reform Group
In a few weeks time, the 10th Biennial Churchwide Assembly (national convention) of the ELCA will be taking place in Chicago, August 6-11. Despite issues related to homosexual behaviour seemingly being "decided" at the 2005 ELCA Churchwide Assembly (sound familiar for those in the ELCIC?), those who advocate for radical change have pushed hard this year in their campaign to overturn ELCA teaching and practice so it is likely that such issues will be raised again at this summer's churchwide assembly in Chicago. According to WordAlone's Board of Directors, those pushing for such radical change in the ELCA's teaching and practice "miss this crucial point: God's will is not determined by assembly vote"…more.

A Pastor's Report to His Congregation
Rev. Ed Skutshek, Pastor of Grace Lutheran, Kelowna provides an insightful analysis of what unfolded at the recent ELCIC National Convention…more

A Reforming Church Desperately Needed After Close Vote on Same-Sex Blessings?
Rev. Peter Mikelic, a member of the ELCIC's National Church Council, is a regular contributor to the Anglican Journal wherein he provides a commentary on Lutheran affairs. Writing in this month's issue of the Anglican Journal, Mikelic provides his perspective on what transpired at the recent ELCIC National Convention. He characterizes those who voted against the same-sex blessings motion at the National Convention as representing a "biased, uninformed and selective scriptural literalism" and a Scriptural interpretation "fuelled by intolerance, discrimination and prejudice - not to mention fear which is at the heart of all homophobia". According to this perspective, Mikelic concludes, "What is desperately needed is a reforming church whose mature self-understanding fosters a fresh, sensitive and insightful moral assessment, without being blinded by its own convoluted history of homosexual vilification and repression".

His statement that the 2006 Eastern Synod Convention "not only approved same-sex blessings on its territory, but also the ordination of homosexuals (both with a majority vote of 73 per cent)" is incorrect as no such vote on the ordination of homosexuals occurred at the 2006 Eastern Synod Convention. Perhaps Mikelic was blissfully thinking ahead as to what will happen at the 2008 Eastern Synod Convention. ...more

A Church at the Tipping Point?
In the wake of the recent convention and the defeat for a second time of a motion related to a local option for same sex blessings, a friend and supporter of Solid Ground expressed the hope that "it will now become a dead issue". On that point, it is instructive to hear the views of those who are promoting this issue in the ELICIC...more

Vancouver Church Votes to Leave the Anglican Church of Canada
St. John's Shaughnessy, a large Vancouver parish church, on Feb. 13 voted
to leave the Anglican Church of Canada and affiliate with a South American
Anglican church, in an ongoing dispute over Christian fundamentals,
including the denomination's more-liberal stance on homosexuality...More
http://www.anglicanjournal.com/100/article/vancouver-church-votes-to-leave-canadian-church/

B.C. Congregation Leaves the ELCIC
With a vote of 98% in favour (one no vote) on January 12, 2008 Mount Calvary, Mission, B.C. completed the two-step voting process required to sever its relationship with the ELCIC. Also, see Pastor Alan Boerner’s address to the Congregational Meeting at the time of the first vote on October 13, 2007.
http://www.solid-ground.ca/a-pastoralansaddresstocongergationmeeting.html
This follows upon an earlier unsuccessful attempt by Mount Calvary to leave the ELCIC after the first vote to leave failed to receive ratification by the required two-thirds majority at the second vote held on February 17, 2007.

Archbishop Gregory Venables of the Anglican Church of the Southern Cone of America, in a letter to the Anglican Network, welcomed retired bishops, Bishop Don Harvey and Bishop Malcolm Harding into his Province...more

Parallel National Anglican Church Launched
An historically monumental event occurred this past week in the Anglican Church of Canada. A parallel national Anglican church was launched on Thursday as the Anglican Network of Canada met in Convention, in Burlington, ON. A leading Anglican theologian has charged that the Anglican Church of Canada has been poisoned by liberalism and is really the cause of the separation which has arisen.

National Church Council Issues Statement on Same-Gender Blessings
Following upon their first meeting since the July 2005 National Convention, where the motion presented at the National Convention regarding the blessing of same-sex unions was discussed, ELCIC National Church Council (NCC) members have issued a news release expressing their perspective on this matter.