500 years after Reformation split, Lutherans, Catholics mark date together

Tuesday is the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, and as many people celebrate what led to the birth of the Lutheran faith, others focus on the unity that is finally developing between Lutherans and the Roman Catholics they split from 500 years ago.

Only in the past 50 years has there been an air of ecumenical cooperation between the two denominations, said Joy Schroeder, a professor of religion at Capital University and a professor of church history at Trinity Lutheran Seminary.

“We’ve discovered new unity. ... In the past, Lutherans, whenever they celebrated a 100th anniversary, they were very triumphalist,” she said. “Very anti-Catholic.”

Today, many Lutherans and Catholics are commemorating the Reformation together for the first time, she said.

“Together, we can hopefully change the world, or at least make the world a little bit brighter,” said the Rev. Suzanne Darcy Dillahunt, bishop of the Southern Ohio Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

This year, Dillahunt started having conversations with the Roman Catholic dioceses of Cincinnati and Steubenville, and she hopes to soon collaborate with the Roman Catholic Diocese of Columbus.

“We talked about what it was our two denominations could do better together than apart,” she said of conversations in Cincinnati. “And that’s a big step.”

It’s a big step because five centuries ago, the Protestants split as a group from Roman Catholicism after Martin Luther expressed disagreement with many of Catholicism’s beliefs and practices and its organizational structure. The split caused wars and persecution, Schroeder said, and today the faiths still differ in certain structural ways. For example, Lutherans ordain women, whereas Catholics do not.

The Roman Catholic Diocese of Columbus noted that it has been discussing beliefs and exploring unity with Lutherans since 1965.

“In these times of great challenges, all Christians are called to conduct themselves as witnesses to Christ’s universal truth,” diocesan spokesman George Jones said in a statement. “It remains our hope that we can continue this dialogue between our two churches and, compelled by our love of Christ and one another, explore ways that we can unite in faith as Jesus calls us.”

In Reynoldsburg, Messiah Lutheran Church and St. Pius X Catholic Church commemorated the Reformation together on Wednesday night, said the Rev. Karl Hanf, the senior pastor at Messiah Lutheran.

It’s not only a Reformation partnership: Congregants of each church participate in worship services and are part of two ministries to serve the community year-round.

Joseph’s Coat of Central Ohio and HEART Food Pantry are two of the ministries that St. Pius and Messiah, plus other worship communities, work on together. Joseph’s Coat offers clothing, household goods and furniture to those in need, and HEART Food Pantry serves the Reynoldsburg community.

Hanf talks highly of Monsignor David Funk, pastor at St. Pius, and the two meet for lunch, he said.

At one point, the two exchanged personal stories of learning about the Reformation. Funk wasn’t told much about it other than that some people broke away from the church, Hanf said. Hanf was told that it was a story of good versus evil, that the good broke away.

“Neither of us were served very well,” Hanf said, adding that children today won’t have a negative perception of the other denomination.

Although many people lament the slowly declining number of Christians in the world — what Hanf calls the end of the era of Christendom — he said it is what led to peace between Catholics and Lutherans.

“We’re no longer competing for members on the block; we’re sharing a vision for what the world should look like,” Hanf said.

As for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, Hanf said that “it’s just kind of a number.”

“The church is a living organism, and that means parts of it are always dying ... and being replaced,” he said. “The church wasn’t reformed 500 years ago; the church is always reforming. It’s always changing because the world we’re responding to is changing.”