[Press Release] New horizons for Strasbourg’s Institute for Ecumenical Research

But the Institute has also had its share of challenges in recent years, with shrinking financial resources and questions about its purpose and goals in a digital and increasingly interconnected world. “The activities of the Institute are designed to support the LWF’s ecumenical work alongside its member churches,” said Interim Director Prof. Dirk Lange, who also serves as LWF Assistant General Secretary for Ecumenical Relations.  

“At the recent board meeting, we tried to define what is specific to the work of this Institute, not looking back to the past, but looking ahead to what it can be,” Lange said. “It was clear to all of us that a renewed focus on implementation and reception is key to awakening and nurturing an ecumenical consciousness across all LWF member churches. We will work on connecting those churches with the wider trajectory of our shared Lutheran confessional heritage, which is profoundly ecumenical,” he added.

Networks for scholars and young ecumenists 

Among the new directions that board members have set for themselves is the establishment of a network of research scholars in all seven LWF regions in the hope of widening the ecumenical horizon and including perspectives that have been not always been heard in past decades. A first meeting of the group is scheduled to take place in Strasbourg in the second half of 2027.

A second key initiative is the development of a network to support young ecumenists, including those who are already serving on LWF’s dialogue commissions. A first encounter of this group will be held as a new ‘Summer Seminar’ in 2027. The online seminars that have been running in recent years will be revised and offered again in the spring of 2027, directed towards both ordained and lay people with a strong ecumenical commitment in their home churches.

The Institute also plans to hold a conference on episcopal ministry in 2027, inviting member churches to “review, discuss, and rethink” a statement issued by the LWF in 2007 on Episcopal Ministry within the Apostolicity of the Church. The conference will ask “important questions about ministry in light of today’s ecclesial and ecumenical landscape,” Lange said.

Noting that the Institute celebrated its 60^th anniversary in 2025, he added: “Today, it enters into its next 60 years, looking ahead to the anniversary of the Augsburg Confession, connecting confessional witness and ecumenism, listening and involving LWF member churches in working towards unity, one of the four founding pillars of the LWF.”