The Lund Principle is an important principle in ecumenical relations between Christian churches. It affirms that churches should act together in all matters except those in which deep differences of conviction compel them to act separately.
It arises from a question raised by the 1952
Faith and Order
The Faith and Order Commission is an assembly group within the World Council of Churches founded in 1948 which has made numerous and significant contributions to the ecumenical movement.
The commission has been successful in working toward cons ...
Conference of the
World Council of Churches
The World Council of Churches (WCC) is a worldwide Christian inter-church organization founded in 1948 to work for the cause of ecumenism. Its full members today include the Assyrian Church of the East, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, most juri ...
held at
Lund
Lund (, , ) is a city in the southern Swedish provinces of Sweden, province of Scania, across the Øresund, Öresund strait from Copenhagen. The town had 91,940 inhabitants out of a municipal total of 121,510 . It is the seat of Lund Municipali ...
,
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
. After "earnestly request
ngour Churches to consider whether they are doing all they ought to do to manifest the oneness of the people of God", it continued: "Should not our Churches ask themselves whether they are showing sufficient eagerness to enter into conversation with other Churches, and whether they should not act together in all matters except those in which deep differences of conviction compel them to act separately?"
This means that, instead of doing ecumenical things, Christians and churches should try to do things ecumenically, in particular, to do things together which are already a part of their normal life, i.e. to share a common life.
Churches Together in England has created resources to help local groupings of churches to reflect on various aspects o
sharing a common life
References
*
*{{cite book, author=Erwin Fahlbusch, title=The Encyclopedia of Christianity, url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yaecVMhMWaEC&pg=PA277, year=1999, publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, isbn=978-90-04-11695-5, pages=277
World Council of Churches