Order of St. Luke - History

History

The Order of St Luke was founded in 1946 in the former Methodist Church and holds the status of Affiliate Organization with the Section on Worship of the General Board of Discipleship of the United Methodist Church. The Order was formed under the leadership of the Rev. R. P. Marshall, a former editor of the Christian Advocate. It was dedicated to the cause of liturgical renewal, and led the way in a serious liturgical awakening across the Methodist Church and much of post-war Protestantism. It was inspired partly by the existence of the Methodist Sacramental Fellowship, which serves a similar purpose in relation to the Methodist Church in Great Britain.

A maturing comprehension of liturgical renewal in an ecumenical era has become the guiding vision of members within the Order, just as it has become a dawning concern in the minds of many persons in the Church presently outside the Order. Recent evidence of this emerging vision may be seen in the design of the official worship books of many denominations. The additional emphasis of directed spiritual formation, adopted in 1980, sets the direction in which the Order believes itself called. While it will shun doctrinaire positions, the Order is dedicated to the task of breaking down the barriers of historical ignorance, theological sectarianism and liturgical illiteracy in the Church. The Order has no special revelation about the future of the emerging ecumenical consensus, but will do what it can to encourage the people called Christian to look outward and work toward the greater Church which God is surely gathering for Christ' s sake from a broken Christendom.