Lutheran Synods

[RileyG]

(posting in fellowship)
Greetings from your friendly Roman Catholic!

In the United States, ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church of America), LCMS (Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod) and WELS (Wisconsin Synod) are the major three Lutheran bodies.

North American Lutheranism (NALC) also exists. Another confessional synod is Mission of Lutheran Churches.

I recently learned there is a Church of the Lutheran Brethren that is pietistic and non-liturgical.

What other bodies are not well so known?

Peace

 

[LizaMarie]

ELS Evangelical Lutheran Synod which is in fellowship with WELS.

 

[RileyG]

ELS Evangelical Lutheran Synod which is in fellowship with WELS.

Thanks for the info!

 

[MarkRohfrietsch]

A few more can be found listed here: Category:Lutheran denominations in North America - Wikipedia

 

[Shane R]

LCMC, which is actually larger than NALC by congregation count, and a number of small Laestadian bodies. Laestadianism was the Finnish form of pietism and the churches they produced can look rather like Amish or Mennonites and have some fairly distinct views of absolution. There are also several small independent dioceses and ministeriums which probably generally count a few hundred to a few thousand people. A ministerium tends to be a group of pastors who have become disenfranchised with some synod or other and formed something more akin to a monastic order than a new synod.

And I forgot the Association of Free Lutheran Churches. Those tend to be liturgically low to quite low. They are actually an old group formed through various disagreements within a couple of the long extinct Norwegian synods. For instance, which of the two schools of Haugeanism was preferable. They've had some success picking up other congregations here and there over the years but have never gotten big.

 

[RileyG]

LCMC, which is actually larger than NALC by congregation count, and a number of small Laestadian bodies. Laestadianism was the Finnish form of pietism and the churches they produced can look rather like Amish or Mennonites and have some fairly distinct views of absolution. There are also several small independent dioceses and ministeriums which probably generally count a few hundred to a few thousand people. A ministerium tends to be a group of pastors who have become disenfranchised with some synod or other and formed something more akin to a monastic order than a new synod.

And I forgot the Association of Free Lutheran Churches. Those tend to be liturgically low to quite low. They are actually an old group formed through various disagreements within a couple of the long extinct Norwegian synods. For instance, which of the two schools of Haugeanism was preferable. They've had some success picking up other congregations here and there over the years but have never gotten big.

Quite interesting! Thanks for the info!