| Lutheran Church in Great Britain | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Classification | Christian |
| Orientation | Protestant |
| Scripture | Christian Bible |
| Theology | Lutheranism |
| Polity | Episcopal |
| Bishop | Paulina Hlawiczka-Trotman |
| Associations | Lutheran World Federation Lutheran Council of Great Britain Porvoo Communion |
| Region | Great Britain |
| Origin | 1961 (as the United Lutheran Synod) |
| Congregations | 11 |
| Official website | http://www.lutheranchurch.co.uk/ |
TheLutheran Church in Great Britain (LCiGB) is a smallProtestant Christian church in the United Kingdom. The LCiGB is a member church of theLutheran World Federation and ofThe Lutheran Council of Great Britain, the umbrella organisation for severalLutheran churches in Great Britain, many of which are chaplaincies or congregations that are closely related to Lutheran churches in other countries. The LCiGB is also a member of thePorvoo Communion ofAnglican and Lutheran churches in Europe. It is, in common with many Lutheran churches,[1] led by a bishop and a council of lay members and clergy elected at its annualsynod.Tor Berger Jørgensen, former bishop of theDiocese of Sør-Hålogaland in theChurch of Norway, was received as the fourth bishop of the LCiGB on 6 October 2019.
TheEnglish Reformation did not follow the Lutheran pattern, but was instead largely influenced by ideas stemming from theReformation in Switzerland and its parallel inStrasbourg. It is well known thatHenry VIII did not favour the Lutheran cause. However, there were some English adherents of Lutheranism. A group of theologians at theUniversity of Cambridge, which met at the White Horse tavern from the mid-1520s and became known as 'Little Germany', was influential. Its members includedRobert Barnes,Hugh Latimer,John Frith andThomas Bilney. ArchbishopThomas Cranmer was initially influenced by Lutheran theology. He visitedAndreas Osiander inNuremberg in 1532. TheFirst Prayer Book of Edward VI (1549) was arguably Lutheran in content. However, theSecond Prayer Book of Edward VI (1552) was published along Swiss Reformed lines and theChurch of England became part of theReformed tradition in Protestantism. The first Lutherans living in Britain after the Reformation were therefore not local people, but largely foreign merchants.
The first officially sanctioned Lutheran congregation, organised in 1669, received aroyal charter in 1672 fromCharles II. This charter gave the mostly German congregation the site of the former church ofHoly Trinity the Less in theCity of London which was destroyed in 1666 in theGreat Fire of London. The foundation stone of the new Holy Trinity Church was laid on 21 November 1672 and the completed building was dedicated one year later onAdvent Sunday 1673. The church was usually known as the Hamburg Lutheran Church because many of its original members were sea merchants associated with theHanseatic League in Germany. The church survived until 1871 when it was demolished to make way forMansion House underground station. In addition,The Queen's Chapel of the Savoy, aroyal peculiar and thus not subject to a bishop's jurisdiction, hosted the German congregation ofWestminster. It was granted royal permission to worship in the Savoy Chapel when it separated from Holy Trinity the Less. The new congregation's first pastor, Irenaeus Crusius (previously an associate at Holy Trinity the Less), dedicated the congregation on the 19th Sunday after Trinity 1694 as theMarienkirche or in English as the German Church of St Mary-le-Savoy. Both congregations still survive.
In the English-speaking lineage, Holy Trinity the Less was succeeded by St Anne's Lutheran Church which worshipped at the Anglican church ofSt Anne and St Agnes from 1966 to 2013 in theCity of London. The German-speaking congregation now meets inCambridge.[2] St Anne's now worships at the Anglican church ofSt Mary-at-Hill, also located in the city.[3] The German Church of St Mary-le-Savoy now exists as part of the united German congregation of St Mary and St George.[4] The congregation now meets in the chapel within the International Lutheran Student Centre inBloomsbury, London.[5]
All Lutheran congregations in Britain were originally ethnic churches that worshipped in various national languages and most that remain still function on ethnic-linguistic lines. The LCiGB was founded as the English-speaking United Lutheran Synod in April 1961 by four congregations in London,High Wycombe,Corby, andHothorpe Hall. These congregations were mainly founded by European immigrants, but now worshipped in English. In 1978, it changed its name to the Lutheran Church in Great Britain – United Synod. In 1988, the words 'United Synod' were dropped from its name. From 1961 to 2000, the LCiGB was led by adean who had episcopal functions, but was not a consecrated bishop. In 2000, it adopted a fullyepiscopal polity when Walter Jagucki was consecrated as the first Bishop. In 2013, the LCiGB was accepted by the presiding bishops of the Porvoo Communion for full membership,[6] and it was admitted into the Communion when bishop Martin Lind signed the Porvoo Declaration in September 2014.[7]
In 2024Paulina Hlawiczka-Trotman was ordained as the only bishop of the Lutheran Church in Great Britain; as she was from Poland, this made her the world's first female Polish Protestant bishop.[8]
There are 11 congregations in the LCiGB as well as three chaplaincies. Although the LCiGB originated as an English-speaking church, it now holds services in several languages. Services are conducted in English (inBirmingham,Bradford,Corby,Harrogate,Leeds, Liverpool, London,Manchester, andNottingham), Chinese (in London),Polish (inBradford, Edinburgh,High Wycombe, London,Manchester, andReading),Swahili (in London), with a Nordic congregation inLiverpool worshipping inSwedish,Norwegian and occasionallyFinnish andDanish. In addition, the LCiGB is active in university chaplaincies atBirmingham University (University of Birmingham Chaplaincy),Leeds University, andLeicester University (University of Leicester Chaplaincy).
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