Pope’s joint Lutheran service risks ire

Risking the ire of Catholic traditionalists, Pope Francis is to take part in a joint Catholic-Lutheran service in Sweden in October marking the start of the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther’s anti-Catholic Reformation.

The Argentinian pontiff, a champion of inter-faith dialogue, will attend an ecumenical commemoration ceremony jointly organised by the Catholic Church and the Lutheran World Federation in Lund on October 31.

In a joint statement, the two churches said the event would “highlight the solid ecumenical developments between Catholics and Lutherans”.

Luther, a German, is credited with starting the Protestant Reformation in 1517 with writing 95 theses — famously said to have been nailed to a church door in Wittenberg — criticising the Catholic Church for selling forgiveness from sins for money.

It led to a violent, often political schism throughout Europe and Christianity, prompting among other things the 30 Years’ War, the destruction of English monasteries, and the burning of numerous “heretics” on both sides.

Catholic traditionalists have already accused Pope Francis of making too many concessions to Lutherans, particularly in a “common prayer” that both religions will use during the 2017 commemorations.

They say the prayer excessively praises Luther, who was condemned as a heretic and excommunicated. Martin Junge, the LWF general secretary, said such divisions belonged to the past.

“I’m carried by the profound conviction that by working towards reconciliation between Lutherans and Catholics, we are working towards justice, peace and reconciliation in a world torn apart by conflict and violence,” he said in a statement.

Pope Francis, however, has made dialogue with other religions one of the hallmarks of his papacy and the announcement was timed to coincide with the end of the yearly Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. He has already visited the Lutheran church of Rome, the Waldensian protestant community in northern Italy, and Rome’s synagogue. This year he is due to become the first Pope to visit the Italian capital’s mosque. While his predecessors have visited protestant churches, Pope Francis has come under criticism from traditionalists who accuse him of sending confusing signals about inter-faith relations.

When he visited Rome’s Lutheran church in November he said Catholics and Lutherans should seek forgiveness from each other for “the scandal of division”.

They have also contested guidelines issued this month for the “common prayer”. “The Reformation and Martin Luther are repeatedly extolled, while the Counter-Reformation and the Popes and Saints of the 16th century are passed over in total silence,” the traditionalist blog Rorate Caeli said. Theological dialogue between Roman Catholic and Lutherans began in the late 1960s after the Second Vatican Council.