Gender and Women’s issues; Feminist/Mujerista/Womanist Theologies

[1] Christine Emba, in an insightful Opinion piece published by the Washington Post in July of 2023, presented a fascinating cultural problem that has been overlooked and underestimated by many in this country.[i] It has to do with a crisis of masculinity as a result of changing cultural and social values, a more expansive view […]

[1] This issue of JLE gives congregations an opportunity to host two kinds of adult education discussion.  The first, is to consider the possibility of non-violent parenting.  Reading Kathleen Gallagher Elkin’s essays on the Household Codes of Ephesians, participants might consider what it would mean to rethink the way we expect the use of force […]

Introduction [1] As the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America deliberates a possible social message on child abuse and child protection, it is vital to ground the commitment to protecting children in core teachings that make explicit the implications for child protection.[1] This article addresses six core theological and ethical themes—baptism, spiritual practices, ecclesiology, diakonia, mission, […]

Introduction: ELCA assembly resolution on child abuse [1] At the 2022 ELCA Churchwide Assembly held in Columbus, Ohio, the delegates approved the Memorials Committee’s recommendation that “the Church Council consider authorizing development of a social message on child abuse and protection.”[1] [2] In recommending this action, the ELCA Memorials Committee acknowledged “there has been no […]

[1] I recently had a conversation with my friend, Rachel, who is in the midst of parenting three small children. Her oldest son is especially rambunctious; at 7 years old, he is full of questions, ideas, feelings and most especially, energy! My friend loves her son and sees all his many gifts. He is a […]

[1] In December, Christians, especially those in the United States, tend to think a lot about children. Part of this is, of course, theological.  Christmas is the celebration of the incarnation of God as an infant.  Fragile as any child, the maker of the stars was, at his birth, unable to support his own head.  […]

Introduction [1] [1] Holy Communion matters for Lutherans. It is central to who we understand ourselves to be as Christians. Lutherans believe and teach that the Lord’s Supper is not simply bread and wine eaten in a reenactment of the Last Supper, but, as Martin Luther teaches in The Large Catechism, “it is bread and […]

[1] Let me begin by underscoring that this is a book to be bought and read. Mary Streufert is the Director for Justice for Women, ELCA at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. In this volume she calls for “multigendered language and images for God … unhinging Christian language for God from almost entirely masculine […]

[1] This issue of Journal of Lutheran Ethics brings up a number of distinct topics for consideration and discussion all under the theme of Gender Identity, Gender Expression and Sexuality and the larger ethical question: How might we help our neighbor flourish as the person God intends them to be?  The following sets of reflection […]

[1] Martin Luther’s doctorate in theology, earned at the University of Wittenberg on October 19, 1512, granted him, as it did to all who earned the degree, the license to uphold church teaching and preside over disputations by either writing the theses in one’s role as “opponens” or to participate in them as “respondens.” Luther […]