Title: Pennsylvania Lutherans Celebrate 250th Anniversary ELCA NEWS SERVICE August 21, 1998 PENNSYLVANIA LUTHERANS CELEBRATE 250TH ANNIVERSARY 98-30-171-ET/CL ALLENTOWN, Pa. (ELCA) -- Partee Boliek traveled from Phoenix, Md., to Allentown, Pa., on a Saturday morning because he knew his ancestors seven generations back received Holy Communion from the hand of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg. Two hundred and fifty years ago, in August 1748, Muhlenberg brought together representatives of 10 Lutheran congregations gathered in Philadelphia and organized the first Lutheran church body in North America. Boliek came to celebrate the anniversary of that founding event. The festivities, which attracted more than 235 people to Muhlenberg College here Aug. 7-9, used lectures, music and drama to re-cast Henry Melchoir Muhlenberg's credo "the church must be planted" as "roots for new plantings." Muhlenberg is one of 28 colleges associated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America . The Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Adjacent States provided the earliest American roots of what is now the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The formation of the Ministerium was controversial because some pastors and lay leaders decried bureaucracy, but Muhlenberg believed congregations needed to band together for strength and support. Members representing those 10 congregations led the procession at the anniversary's final worship. "A twisted cord of many threads will not easily break," Muhlenberg often said. The event began with an address by The Rev. H. George Anderson, presiding bishop of the ELCA, read by the Rev. Roy G. Almquist, bishop of the ELCA's Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod. Anderson was unable to attend the event. "Muhlenberg's arrival in America lies closer to Columbus' arrival here than to our own day," Anderson said, putting the observance into historical perspective. "Fortunately," he mused, "no one ever tried to use the label 'Muhlenbergers.' They do sound tough, don't they?" Anderson identified "confessional loyalty, an ordered ministry and a common hymnal" as characteristic of the "Muhlenberg tradition." Noting that "our task may not be so different from his," Anderson said Muhlenberg worried about religion's "loss of status" in recent years, the mobility of people, and members who didn't live up to Christian ideals. Anderson said he was "more than a little curious" about the emergence of the phrase "'the Muhlenberg tradition.' ... It seems to have surfaced more recently when mergers began to make various traditions more self-conscious and nervous abut losing their identifies. ... I ask you: is 'the Muhlenberg tradition' really a code-word, a rallying point for former United Lutheran Church in America members who take their liturgy straight, who deplore the current state of Fortress Press, and who miss going to the church house in New York? One has to be careful of this nostalgia because time can indeed 'make ancient good uncouth.' " The ELCA is the product of a number of mergers bringing together a variety of traditions. "We continue to wrestle with diversity from the past at the same time that we struggle to embrace even more diversity in our members," Anderson said. "These diverse strands of tradition can entangle us; or they can strengthen us," he said. According to Anderson the "most insidious challenge" the ELCA faces as a church is the danger of losing its soul because "surveys show that many of our members see Christianity merely as a `lifestyle choice,' a way of satisfying spiritual needs that money can't buy otherwise they would buy it." The Rev. John H.P. Reumann, retired New Testament professor of the Lutheran Seminary at Philadelphia, told the gathering that Muhlenberg "seldom founded a congregation, but he gathered existing isolated groups into a supra-church." Other speakers at the symposium moderated by the Rev. Robert J. Marshall, former president of the Lutheran Church in America, included the Rev. Darrell H. Jodock of Muhlenberg College; Susan W. McArver of Lutheran Southern Seminary, Columbia, S.C.; and Cynthia A. Jurrison of the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago. Drama and music each played a role. A play, written by John Trump, Columbia, S.C., and set in a roadhouse near Philadelphia, portrayed Muhlenberg and Pastor John Casper Stover debating whether a synod should be formed. An original hymn, "Word of Wisdom, Word of Wonder," with text by Herman Stuempfle, former president of the Lutheran Seminary at Gettysburg (Pa.) and music by Stephen Williams of Muhlenberg College, was greeted at the anniversary celebration with a standing ovation. The gospel choir of Calvary Lutheran Church, West Philadelphia, Pa., led the music at the closing service. The Rev. Barbara Berry-Bailey, Trinity Lutheran Church, Germantown, Pa., set the final tone: "Faith is the assurance that although the church of 1998 or 2098 may not look like the church of 1748, it is God's church and lives not to glorify Henry or us but God." Material for this story was provided by the Rev. Edgar R. Trexler editor of "The Lutheran" magazine and Carolyn J. Lewis, a free-lance writer for the magazine. For information contact: Ann Hafften, Director 1-773-380-2958 or [log in to unmask] http://www.elca.org/co/news/current.html