Church of Sweden - Theology

Theology

King Gustav I Vasa instigated the Church of Sweden in 1526 during his reign as King of Sweden. This act separated the church from the Roman Catholic Church and its canon law. In 1572, the Swedish Church Ordinance became the first Swedish church order following the Reformation.

The Church of Sweden became Lutheran at the Uppsala Synod in 1593 when it adopted the Augsburg Confession to which most Lutherans adhere. At this synod, it was decided that the church would retain the three original Christian creeds: the Apostles', the Athanasian, and the Nicene.

In 1686, the Parliament of Sweden adopted the Book of Concord, although only certain parts, labelled Confessio fidei, were considered binding, and the other texts merely explanatory. Confessio dei included the three aforementioned Creeds, the Augsburg Confession and two Uppsala Synod decisions from 1572 and 1593.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, a variety of teachings were officially approved, mostly directed towards ecumenism:

• 1878 development of the Catechism,
• the Uppsala Creed of 1909, preparing for Eucharistic communion with the Church of England,
• the constitutions of World Council of Churches (WCC),
• the constitutions of Lutheran World Federation (LWF),
• Church of Sweden's official answer to the "Lima document",
• a Council of the Bishops Letter in Important Theological Questions,
• the 1995 Treaty of Communion with the Philippine Independent Church.

In practice, however, the Lutheran creed texts play a minor role, and instead the parishes rely on Lutheran tradition in coexistence with influences from other Christian denominations and diverse ecclesial movements such as Low Church, High Church, Pietism ("Old Church") and Laestadianism, who locally might be strongly established, but who have little nation-wide influence.

During the 20th century the Church of Sweden oriented itself strongly towards liberal Christianity and human rights. 1957 the church assembly rejected a proposal for ordination of women, but then the parliament changed the law in spring 1958 and forced the church assembly to accept the new law in autumn 1958. Since 1960, women have been ordained as priests, and since 1994, men who oppose collaboration with women priests have not been allowed ordination. A proposal to perform same-sex weddings was approved on October 22, 2009 by 176 of 249 voting members of the Church of Sweden Synod.