I think this is a great topic -- there are so many areas that can be explored for understanding what happened and where we are, as well as rethinking and recapturing great aspects of the tradition that were lost.
For example, here are two big topics I'd love to hear some reflection on:
1) I understand that at least one of the predecessor bodies (prior to LCA) had the Histoic Episcopate or Apostolic Succession. I've met several fine, old pastors ordained by bishops who had this excellent and now lost mark of the church. I'm thinking it was the Augustana strand? Maybe not, but I'd love to hear who did and why it was kabashed.
2) A great thesis, I think, could be done on the relative ecclesiologies and theologies of the ALC vs LCA - not in compettiton, just comparison. For it seems to me I was always told that the ALC was more conservative and the LCA more liberal. However, from historical perspective - the limited view I have -- it seems that the finer point is that, as we know, the ALC was more congregationalist and LCA more hierarchical. As such, it seems to me and I would love to hear some discussion on this -- the ALC was actually more susceptible to cultural shifts and trends as a congregationalist polity because each congregation could, in many ways, go their own way (a bit overstated, I know, but without central authroity and oversight whose interpretaton is correct?). The LCA, on the other hand, with its structure of bishops and some sort of palpable unity would actually slow down the integration of cultural shifts and preserve more of the tradition (truly conservative in the sense Luther and even Christ were).
What say you? I'm leaving for camp today, so I'll probably not have access to this discussion til Friday night, but I still would love to hear some thoughts!
To quote from George M. Stephenson's
Religious Aspects of Swedish Immigration: A Study of Immigrant Churches, "the Augustana Synod was considered a daughter of the Church of Sweden, with which the latter organization had intercommunion and very intimate fellowship," however Stephenson highlights the oft stormy relationship between the Augustana and the Church of Sweden through which an apostolic success would have been passed on from Old World to New. There were several Augustana pastors in the 19th Century who were ordained in the Church of Sweden, many were not. As Stephenson also notes, "the bishops of the 'mother' church understood that the synod did not have the 'historic' episcopacy in the form it existed in Sweden and that there was no likelihood that it ever would."
So, it's possible that an old Augustana pastor had the "historic" episopacy, but it was not evidently a widespread or required practice of the synod.
As to your second point, Stephenson sheds some light from the Augustana perspective, however, he was writing in 1932 when the synod was still quite conservative, though in fractious debate and competition with the Norwegian Synod. Sometime after this the more liberalizing tendencies began to come more to the forefront, but I am not sure how, when, or where these became dominant and passed on to the LCA.
