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Lutherans believe in the idea that there should be a single Christian church, and a single Christian faith. This belief is ingrained in the Lutheran confessions, and reflects the history of Lutheranism as a reform movement rather than a separatist movement.
For that reason, a number of modern Lutheran denominations, now largely separated from state control, are reaching out to other Lutheran denominations as well as other Christian denominations.
The largest organizations of Lutheran churches around the world are the Lutheran World Federation and the International Lutheran Council, which include the great majority of Lutheran denominations around the globe.
As Lutherans believe that "good works" are a sign of faith, Lutherans support several charitable organizations, on local and global scales.
The largest worldwide organization is Lutheran World Relief , which focuses on charity work, as well as disaster response.
Thrivent (formerly AAL/LB) and Lutheran Women's Missionary League (LWML) are also important organizations.In the U.S., congregations are grouped into over 20 different denominations. The three largest Lutheran bodies in the United States are, in order of size: the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), the more conservative Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod (LCMS), and the even more conservative Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod (WELS). These denominations provide seminaries, pastoral care, and Sunday School and liturgical materials. Local congregations contribute funds to support them and receive services and materials. Denominations help to start new congregations affiliated with them.
The ELCA is divided into 64 geographical and 1 non-geographical synods. The ELCA has "Full Communion" agreements with The Episcopal Church (named Called to Common Mission), the Moravian Church, the United Church of Christ, and the Reformed Churches in the United States. The ELCA permits the ordination of women to the pastoral office, and is currently studying the issue of homosexuality, and will decide at its 2005 Churchwide assembly whether to bless same-sex marriage and clergy in active same-sex relationships.
The LCMS and WELS each constitute a single synod for the entire denomination. The LCMS and WELS permit only qualified men to serve as pastors, and have affirmed marriage as being between one man and one woman. Neither the LCMS or the WELS permit active homosexuals to serve in the ministry.
U.S. denominations differ on doctrine and practice. Doctrinally the denominations differ primarily based on the degree of authority they place on the written text of Scripture. The ELCA subscribes to the " historical-critical " method of Scripture interpretation, which attempts to interpret the text discounted for the historical, cultural, or scientific limitations or biases imposed by the original writers. Many members of the ELCA believe that higher criticism represents the best efforts of modern scholarship.
The LCMS and WELS follow the traditional " historical-grammatical " method of interpreting the Scripture text, which seeks to understand the text as it is written within the context of history, culture, and language.
English-language publishers of books on Luther and Lutheran theology
Lutheranism is the state religion of several Scandinavian countries in Northern Europe, including Norway, Denmark, Finland and Iceland. In these countries, the churches are supported directly by taxes. With the extension of the European Union, the status of state churches is largely revised; they remain a State Church but win greater autonomy. In Sweden, Lutheranism was the state religion up until the year 2000. The church is no longer supported by taxes, but the fees are collected similarly to taxes. Lutheranism is also prominent in Estonia, and Latvia.
Notably, the European churches have very low attending memberships at the offices; due to the history of those European churches, most parts of them knew persecution during the 17th and 18th centuries. The church attendance on Sunday is not decisive and houses offices are still perennial, particularly in southern Europe. Most people feel it is more important to attend to the lot of conference and training and Biblical studies. So, in northern Europe many attend religious services only for baptisms, confirmations, weddings, and funerals. Confirmation is treated seriously and is usually delayed until the end of the high school courses. The Lutheran confirmation training usually constitutes the largest exposure of Northern Europeans to Christian doctrines.
Except in Northern Europe (see above), very few seminaries are state-supported. Due to large agreements like the Concorde de Leuenberg ( 1962), involving many churches raising from the Reformation the training for students in theology embraces a wide range of theologies including modern and contemporary movements in biblical criticism and theology.
Many major seaports contain an outpost of the Norwegian Lutheran church to provide aid, social opportunities and pastoral care for visiting Norwegian seamen. Few Norwegian Lutheran pastors achieve their pastoral care in foreign countries such as France.
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