Religion: Busy Lutheran Week

The largest Lutheran body in the U.S.— the 2,500,000-member United Lutheran Church in America—wound up its 22nd biennial convention in Atlantic City last week. In a busy round of meetings, the 700 clerical and lay delegates:

¶ Approved a merger with three other Lutheran denominations—the 605,000-member Augustana Evangelical Lutheran Church, organized in 1860 by U.S. citizens of Swedish birth or ancestry; the 36,000-member Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church (Suomi Synod), founded in 1890; the 24,000-member American Evangelical Lutheran Church organized by Danish missionaries in 1872. The move to merge, said United Lutheran President Franklin Clark Fry, was a "historic and momentous decision."...