Ordination meetings update for June
Ordination consultation meetings are continuing in the LCA’s South Australia and New South Wales–Australian Capital Territory districts this month (June).
As at press time, most recent consultations had been held at Zion in Berri SA, at Bethlehem in Morley WA, at the NSW District Pastors Conference in Murrumbateman NSW, and at St Petri Nuriootpa in the Barossa Valley SA.
Consultation project officer Timothy Pietsch said 125 people attended the Nuriootpa consultation, with 50 people joining the discussion at Berri, and 35 at Morley. ‘At all of these meetings it has been encouraging to hear the voices of our LCA members, engaging in earnest, insightful and respectful discussions about the possible ordination of women as well as men’, he said.
District bishops and members of the LCA’s Commission on Theology and Inter-Church Relations (CTICR) are attending the meetings, which are being held in each district of the church to consider the CTICR’s draft doctrinal statement on the matter. The commission has prepared the draft at the instruction of the LCA’s 2015 general synod, which requested that it present a theological basis for the ordination of both women and men, and why this need not be church divisive.
‘Naturally there has been a wide variety of views expressed, and there has also been useful feedback for the CTICR to consider when compiling the second version of the draft doctrinal statement’, Mr Pietsch said.
The OWL (Ordination We’re Listening) website at owl.staging.lca.org.au/consultations has relevant materials and details of consultation meetings. Printed documents will be available at the consultations. The draft statement booklet also can be requested from the LCA (email admin@staging.lca.org.au or phone 08 8267 7300).
At press time, the available details of consultations for June and July were as follows:
New South Wales/Australian Capital Territory
• Sat 3 June, 9.00am: St Peter’s Lavington, Albury NSW
• Sun 4 June, 2.00pm: Bethlehem, Wagga Wagga NSW
• Sat 24 June, 9.00am: Immanuel, Lyons ACT
• Sun 25 June, 2.00pm: St Paul’s, St Marys NSW
South Australia/Northern Territory
• Sun 25 June, 2.00pm: Our Saviour’s, Port Lincoln SA
• Sun 2 July, 10.30am: Alice Springs Lutheran Church NT
Queensland
• Sat 8 July, 9.00am: Peace Lutheran College, Cairns Qld
• Sun 9 July, 2.00pm: Immanuel, Buderim Qld
• Sun 16 July, 2.00pm: Good Shepherd, Toowoomba Qld
• Sat 22 July, 9.00am: St John’s, Kingaroy Qld
• Sun 23 July, 2.00pm: Good News, Middle Park Qld (**note new date and time)
