Great Stuff — CTCR On The Communing of Infants and Young Children

Witness Mercy Life TogetherFound over on WMLTblog:

 

On 13 September 2014, the CTCR adopted without dissent a document titled, “Knowing What We Seek and Why We Come: Questions and Answers concerning the Communing of Infants and Young Children.” The CTCR also adopted as a supplement to the aforementioned document, “Response to the Request for a Supplement to the CTCR Opinion, Response to “Concerns of the South Wisconsin District Circuits 18 and 19 Regarding Infant Communion” (1997).” Both documents are given in their entirety below.

Among other questions, the CTCR document addresses, “What historical precedent is there for paedocommunion?” Answer: “there is no evidence for a widespread practice of paedocommunion in the earliest centuries of the church’s history.”

In the early days of the Missouri Synod, the Synod’s Constitution while not mentioning an age for confirmation suggested that a minimum of 100 hours of instruction should be given before a person received communion.

The document also discusses the Scripture passages regarding self-examination and notes how even though the Lutheran Reformers were aware that the Eastern churches practiced infant communion, they did not seek to introduce this practice.

The document is well worth the read.

Knowing What We Seek and Why We Come: Questions and Answers concerning the Communing of Infants and Young C…

 

 

Response to the Request for a Supplement to the CTCR Opinion, Response to “Concerns of the South Wisconsin…


 

Another helpful resource on the topic of infant communion can be found here:

Theses on Infant/Toddler Communion” by Professor John Pless.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. You can also subscribe without commenting.