Catholics and Lutherans sign accord on key divisive issue

Catholics and Lutherans yesterday signed an accord resolving a key disagreement dating back to the Reformation almost 500 years ago. In a move church leaders hailed as an important step towards Christian unity, representatives of the Catholic Church and the World Lutheran Federation signed a joint declaration on justification, or how to reach salvation.

Catholics have traditionally believed that people's actions can influence whether they can be saved while Lutherans held that salvation is based on faith alone. Exactly 482 years after Martin Luther sparked the Reformation by nailing his 95 theses to a Wittenberg church door, the two churches buried their differences on the issue at an ecumenical service in the southern city of Augsburg.

"Together we confess: By grace alone, in faith in Christ's saving work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit, who renews our hearts while equipping and calling us to good works," the document says.

The agreement, which was reached after almost 30 years of theological wrangling, is careful not to condemn either Luther or the 1562 Council of Trent, which laid the basis for the modern Catholic Church. And church leaders acknowledged that the document does not cover all that either church teaches about the doctrine of justification but encompasses a consensus about the basic truth of the issue.

"For the first time in centuries we are treading common ground. With the signing of the joint agreement of justification we are emphasising agreement where 469 years ago there was a rift: in the relationship between God and mankind, and mankind and God," said Bishop Christian Krause, president of the World Lutheran Federation.

In Rome, Pope John Paul II welcomed the accord as "a milestone on the difficult path towards the restoration of full unity among Christians". But some theologians complain that, by focusing on a relatively arcane, 16th century dispute, church leaders are ignoring more important differences such as the issue of women priests.

A recent decision by Catholic bishops to withdraw from state-funded pregnancy counselling services has created tension between the churches in Germany. Some Protestant Church leaders fear that the bishops' decision could strengthen the hand of politicians who wish to end the system whereby the state collects taxes on behalf of the churches.

Some German Protestants were annoyed by the Vatican's recent decision to declare a special indulgence for the year 2000, a move they claim flies in the face of yesterday's declaration. But Dr Manfred Kock, chairman of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany, welcomed the accord, which he said would affect all the main Reformed churches.

"It marks a significant coming together of all the reformed churches and the Roman Catholic Church on a central question of Christian teaching," he said.