Chicago Catholics, have you purchased an advent calendar for this holiday season? You may wonder what Catholic individual or organization started this grand tradition. The answer will probably surprise you. Advent Calendars are the product of 19th century German Lutherans, and while the season of Advent itself dates back to the 4th century, the Advent calendar to physically count down the days until Christmas is a fairly recent invention that originated with our protestant brethren.
Today’s column is the result of the recent conversation I had with a Lutheran friend of mine. He mentioned that he believes that the devil is an actual being and that evil is present in the world, which contrasted with the beliefs of a theology professor who claimed the devil didn’t really exist and was simply a metaphor for evil. My friend asked other Christians to weigh in with what they believed. My friend is a pretty devout lifelong Lutheran whose father is an ordained Lutheran pastor and whose wife is studying Pastoral Ministry at the Lutheran School of Theology. They live here in Cook County, and are parishioners at St. Philip's Lutheran Church, 1609 Pfinsten Road, in Glenview, Illinois. Although my friend I usually agree on most philosophical, political, and spiritual beliefs, his wife opted that Catholics probably only share 10% of their religious beliefs with Lutherans. This got me thinking. It is incredibly difficult to write a “Catholic vs. Protestant” column to compare beliefs, because the various protestant denominations in the world have almost no shared theology aside from they all hold that the Pope is not the leader of Christianity. However, it’s rather simple to compare the beliefs of Catholicism to the beliefs of one specific protestant denomination. In this case, we’ll start with the original Protestants: the Lutherans. As far as Protestants go, they’re one of the larger group, and chances you know a Lutheran or two around Chicago. So what unites us, and what divides us?
Lutherans, befitting their name, trace their beliefs to the 16th century protestant reformer Martin Luther. Before being excommunicated, Luther was an ordained Catholic priest in Germany, so the Lutherans are a direct offshoot of the Catholic Church. The circumstances that caused Luther to split are very interesting. The Catholic Church had become quite worldly and powerful by this time period, and some of the greatest works of Christian art were produced in that era, including the painting of the Sistine Chapel and the Pieta. The Vatican was extremely powerful and under the Pope’s rule they were very successful in leading Europe as a center of prestige. On the negative side, the Catholic Church also had many corrupt influences at this time. Luther’s basic complaints were quite justifiable – the Bible was not available to most Catholics in their everyday language, and the Catholic church was selling indulgences (remission for sins), even coming up with a slogan of "As soon as a coin in the coffer rings, a soul from purgatory springs". Pope Leo X found himself blindsided by Luther, who was an excellent theological debater and would not back down from his attacks on the Church. The Pope’s solution was to excommunicate Luther, believing this would cause him to fade away as a celebrity. Instead, it just emboldened Luther and he and his followers were now ‘free agents’ (so to speak) to do whatever they wanted without fear of repercussion. Now longer a Catholic priest, Luther even got revenge by marrying a former nun who had also broken with the church. Luther became particularly bitter in later years and denounced the Catholic Church as Satanic and wrote a an anti-Semitic pamphlet called “On the Jews and their lies”
None of Luther’s original complaints are present in the Catholic Church today (the Catholic Bible is readily available in hundreds of languages and no bishop would dream of selling indulgences in the 21st century), but Lutherans remain separated from Catholics and there are many obstacles towards reunion. Unlike Anglicans (another early Protestant group that split directly from the Catholic Church so Henry VIII could divorce his wife), Lutherans have some serious theological disputes that differ from what the Catholic Church teaches. Although Luther thought of himself primarily as a reformer and did not support the “radical reformation” movement that wanted to completely transform Christianity from top to bottom, he did want to “amend” many aspects of the Catholic Church that are considered sacred to this day. The most obvious example is the difference between Catholics and Lutherans on salvation. Catholics hold (as do Orthodox Christians and many other religions like Islam) that people are saved through faith in God AND by their good works on earth. However, Lutheranism teaches that we are saved by “sola fide” (Latin through “faith alone”), and that good works automatically spring from this. Lutherans also believe in “Soli Deo Gloria” (Latin for "glory to God alone"), and thus teach that is improper to offer prayers to saints or the Virgin Mary (although do honor them as model followers of Jesus Christ that human beings should study to be more like them). Lutherans also “simplified” Christian theology and some elements of the Catholic mass as well as portions of the Bible are missing from Lutheran churches. Like all Protestants, Lutherans do not accept the authority of the Pope as Vicar of Christ and Vicar of St. Peter. These theological disputes are one of the reasons why Lutherans have not reunited with Rome, while some Anglican and eastern orthodox congregations have.
On the other hand, a Catholic visiting a Lutheran Church is likely to find much more they are familiar with than if they went to another Protestant gathering like a Quaker meeting house. While they are fellow Christians, in some cases the only thing Catholics can find in common with various protestant denominations is a shared belief that Christ is our savior and that the Holy Bible is the sacred scripture of our faith. Lutherans, on the other hand, inherited many traditions from Catholicism. The Book of Concord was drafted as the basic guidelines for a Lutheran service, and is still in use with Lutheran churches today. As Luther had been a Catholic priest, it follows the overall flow of a Catholic service so many of the liturgical elements are identical. In fact, the main Lutheran service is still known as "the Mass" in Scandinavian countries. (although not here in the United States). The similarities are clear when witnessing such a service. For example, when I went to a Lutheran wedding, I immediately knew the response to “Let us lift up our hearts” would be “We lift them up to the Lord”, as the same text is used in a Catholic liturgy. Lutherans retain almost all of the prayers and creeds taught by the early Christians, so they also recite the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed, teach the doctrine of the trinity, and that Christ has two natures, so he is both human and divine. Likewise, they retain many other types of Catholic prayer services including matins and vesper services. Most of the important holy days and feast days on a Catholic calendar are likewise on Lutheran calendars, so your Lutheran friends believe in the Nativity, Epiphany, the Baptism of our Lord, the Transfiguration, the Annunciation, Palm Sunday, Easter, the Ascension, Pentecost, Holy Trinity, and All Saints Day. Likewise, the Catholic sacraments of Baptism, Holy Communion, Confession, Confirmation, Matrimony, Anointing of the Sick, and Holy Orders all have equivalents in Lutheranism; although Lutherans recognize only two of them (Baptism and Holy Communion) are recognized as sacraments by them. (Oddly enough, confession is called a sacrament by the Book of Concord and Luther himself called it “the third sacrament”, but Lutherans today reject the idea that it is sacramental) Finally, many of the changes the Lutheran Church has made in modern years are identical to what Catholics have done – both Catholics and Lutherans now hold most of their services in vernacular rather than Latin, and both now use the phrase “Holy Spirit" in place of "Holy Ghost".
One major source of confusion is that there are three major Lutheran denominations operating in the United States today – the ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church of America), the LCMS (Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod) and the WELS (Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod). Unlike Catholics (where even schismatic Catholic groups out of communion with Rome like the Polish National Catholic Church tend to share the same theology as the Roman Catholic Church), these three Lutheran traditions vary greatly from each other on their beliefs – some ordain women and gays, other do not – some practice open communion, others have only closed communion, some teach abortion is a mortal sin and others don’t – yet all claim to be the true successor to Martin Luther. The ELCA is the largest with over 5 million members in the United States, although it didn’t exist prior to 1988 and was formed from a group of various Lutheran denominations merging. Even more confusing, the names of these denominations don’t really reflect their tradition. Despite the ELCA calling itself “Evangelical”, evangelical protestant groups claim it is a “mainline” protestant group and does not practice evangelicalism. The “Missouri Synod” actually originated right here in Chicago, Illinois, and has congregations in all 50 states. (the ELCA is likewise headquartered in Chicago and rivals with the LCMS). The WELS was founded in Wisconsin but also has members around the country, and claims to be the only legitimate Lutheran denomination, claiming both the ELCA and LCMS are ‘not true Lutherans’. They also hold that the Catholic Church is the “anti-Christ”
Despite their vast differences, orthodox Lutheranism is an important force among protestant today because they maintain and agree with Catholics in accepting the authority of the Scriptures, the ancient of creeds of the early Christian fathers, (the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Athanasian Creed), the purpose of God's Law, divine grace, the concept of perseverance of the saints, and predestination. It’s important for Catholics to learn about other types of Christians. The more you understand how they differ and why, the richer an understanding you will have of your own faith.
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