Almost 50 years ago

"On January 25, 1959, at the Roman Basilica of Saint Paul outside the Walls, Pope John XXIII announced his intention of convoking a council of the church to open its windows, as he put it, to let in fresh air. The ultimate goal of the council was to be Christian unity. After nearly four years of extensive preparation, the council met in four sessions from October 11, 1962 to December 8, 1965 and was a momentous event not only for the Roman Church but for all of Western Christianity. . .

. . .the Second Vatican Council . . showed the Church of Rome to be not the monolithic monarchy many thought it to be but rather a living body capable of remarkable change, renewal, and renovation--a model for the rest of Christianity. Moreover, the churches of the Reformation, and Lutherans especially, saw in the working and the documents of the council an acceptance of basic principles of the sixteenth-century Reformation:

• the primacy of grace,
• the centrality of Scripture,
• the understanding of the church as the people of God,
• the use of the vernacular language.

It was as if the Lutheran Reformation had made its point at long last. Indeed, some Lutherans observed that the place in the modern world where the principles of the Reformers were most clearly at work was the Roman Church. . ."
Commentary on the Lutheran Book of Worship; Lutheran liturgy in its ecumenical context, by Philip H. Pfatteicher, (Augsburg Fortress, 1990) p. 1

Yes, it certainly was an optimistic time, since even today 50 years later many Lutherans will not worship together or share in Holy Communion with another synod. And there are some of us old time transfers (1976) from other denominations (Church of the Brethren and Presbyterian in our case) who wish someone would close the windows or maybe lower them for a year or two--at least in terms of tinkering with our Sunday service. We were just getting the hang of the LBW (or as we non-liturgical types call it, the green book, which replaced the red book, Service book and hymnal) when the mid-week informal/contemporary service at UALC migrated to a spot on Sunday morning back in the 80s, and now has pretty much taken over. Only a few stubborn old timers who enjoy complex theology in their hymns, a real choir, confession of sins, and creeds show up for the two traditional services (out of 9). However, if you read Pfatteicher's book, LBW really isn't so traditional after all but reflects constant change over two thousand years, beginning with a bunch of rag-tag, frightened Jewish Christians gathering after Jesus' resurrection to follow his instructions, "Take and eat; this is my body given for you. Do this for the remembrance of me."