His announcement of the decision proceeded at a measured pace. In addition to the actual decision itself, which would come at the end, his presentation covered all the possible approaches, as his consistory saw them and upon which it had advised him, as well as the points debated in the colloquy.
There was the option of appointing an orthodox minister to both churches, allowing them to exclude those unwilling to subscribe, without reservation, to the Formula of Concord and unaltered Augsburg Confession, from communion;
There was the option of appointing an orthodox minister to both churches, but requiring them to admit such persons to communion;
There was the option of appointing an orthodox minister to one of the churches and a Philippist to the other;
There was the option of establishing a parity arrangement, in which one group used the church facility for part of the time and the other group used the church the remainder of the time, each group having its own minister;
There was the option of appointing Philippist ministers to both of the churches—who would, it was assumed, be willing to admit Lutherans of all theological views to communion.
* * *
The count evaluated the advantages of each option—carefully. Ed Piazza was a little surprised by some of the analysis. Nobody else who had spoken at the whole colloquy thus far had, for instance, addressed the question of just how far any given arrangement would require the Grantville parishioners to walk in order to attend church.
Clearly, the count said, the first option would be preferred by the theologians from Tuebingen and Wittenberg and, indeed, by those of Jena, as well as by the clerical members of the consistory of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt. However, in his capacity as Landesvater, advised also by the lay members of his consistory, he found that his duty to ensure the provision of religious services to so many Lutheran immigrants, displaced from their former homes by this tragic war, was more important than the maintenance of the strictest orthodoxy. He did not feel that he could agree to an arrangement by which St. Martin’s and St. Thomas would not be open to them.
Steadily, Count Ludwig Guenther moved through the points. He had, he said, concluded that on the basis of experience with applying parity between Catholics and Lutherans for using the churches in certain German Imperial cities, the arrangement was most inconvenient for all concerned and led to ongoing, persistent, disputes and ceaseless controversies. Such an arrangement would be very difficult to administer.
The whole parity idea was new to Ed. He’d never heard of any such thing. But once more he pulled to the front of his mind the general maxim that in the 1,000-plus little political entities that made up the Holy Roman Empire, any imaginable arrangement probably existed somewhere.
Yeah, Ed thought, contemplating Tino Nobili’s probable reaction to any such proposal if it were instituted at St. Mary’s. I can see how it might cause ceaseless controversies.
Tino was one of the crosses he had to bear. If Opus Dei had ever invited Tino to join, he would have been honored to accept. Tino’s kids had already finished CCD classes by the time Ed took over as chairman of the parish education committee; his grandchildren hadn’t been old enough yet. Ed breathed a short prayer of thanks for God’s infinite mercies and brought his attention back to the count.
Who, clearly, had moved on quite a space while Ed’s mind was wandering.
“Thus, in the matter of the faculty appointments at both of the Grantville schools that our consistory is currently subsidizing, given that the teaching of religion to children prior to the age of confirmation rarely demands more than a good knowledge of the Shorter Catechism, we will not require more than a willingness to subscribe to the Augsburg Confession, with no specification as to altered or unaltered.”
Ed looked around the room and saw young Muselius smiling brilliantly. And, why not? He had just been told that he was going to keep his job. Carol Koch had formed her thumb and forefinger into a circle. Gary Lambert’s face was completely impassive.
“In regard to the ministerial appointments…” The count paused.