The community Thanksgiving service

Our local ministerial association met recently to flesh out
the details of the annual community Thanksgiving service. The meeting is always
a riot, but it deals with some tense theological questions too.

Depending on how you count, there are five to ten churches
in our town of about 1,000 people. We had one more pastor-type attendee at this
year's meeting than last--a congregation has split off from the ELCA parish and
intends to join the new North American Lutheran Church (NALC). We welcomed the
new congregation with open arms at our meeting--what a great opportunity to
share in community ministry--but seeing this new congregation participate will
be very painful for some in the ELCA parish.

Questions of liturgy always come up--what to use, what not
to. If we use an affirmation of faith that's not creedal but taken straight
from scripture, can everyone speak it? The Catholic priest inquired about the
best way to lead a call to worship without a printed liturgy. I was surprised
to learn that not everyone assumed that the scripture readings read publically
would be the same passages from which I preached. (I drew the short straw this
year.)