At her 2022 Convention in Edmonton, Lutheran Church-Canada (LCC) commended the document produced by the Commission of Theology and Church Relations (CTCR) entitled A Lutheran Response to Contemporary Issues (LRCI) to the members of the LCC for further discussion and reflection. Central to the concern of LRCI was the proper relationship of the Two Kingdoms, Church and State, with each other and the place of the Christian in his vocation to live within each of these realms.

The immediate concern was the challenges posed by the COVID pandemic and the various restrictions mandated by the state over the life of the church, but also addressed were ongoing issues such as laws that criminalize confession of the church’s Biblical stand on same-sex marriage, homosexuality, and the like 1 Such further “civil discussion and charitable and fraternal understanding of others’ perspectives” clearly desired, encouraged, and hoped for by LRCI was long stifled and frustrated by the COVID restrictions of movement, travel, and gathering, and so the convention was eagerly anticipated as a place where such could finally take place. The numerous overtures submitted reflected widespread concern on such issues throughout the Synod. Unfortunately, the time constraints of the convention, where attention was required for so many other pressing matters, and that overtures on COVID matters were left at the very last hour of its last session, prevented profitable and necessary discussion. The commendation of LRCI to the Synod offers an opportunity for further careful debate on these issues, and this paper is intended to contribute to that discussion.

Recognized by LRCI (and therefore also acknowledged by the convention and Synod) is that these issues involve the interrelationship of not just the two estates of Church and State. In addition , there is also a third estate to be considered, the Family,2 and all three estates are instituted by God and under His authority, with specific jurisdictions through which God works His will in the world, involving challenges brought forth by the COVID pandemic and other trends in our modern society.3 From the beginning, the CTCR document rightly expresses as the paramount concern the church’s ongoing ministry of Word and Sacrament, that “some of those precautions” enforced by the State “have stifled Word and Sacrament ministry and other Christian and LCC faith practices, traditions, and rituals.” Furthermore, LRCI resolutely states as central and nonnegotiable that “we rigorously defend the premise that God’s Word must have free course even in these days.”4 We firmly agree with these basic assumptions asserted by the LRCI. Still, at the same time, we find statements from LRCI need and can profit from a more precise and expanded explication of the Biblical basis for each of the three estates, their institutions from God and roles given them, and the distinctions and relationships which they have with one another without which one cannot speak clearly about such estates nor understand how to live appropriately within them in the face of the challenges of our time. This paper is intended to contribute to addressing these matters.