[Claud]

Now we do not count Holy Marriage, for instance, as a sacrament. Certainly marriage is instituted by God. And it even is a picture of the relationship of Christ and his Church. But it does not confer forgiveness. Marriage may *require* forgiveness ;-) but it does not *bestow* it.

Informative explanation, thank you pastor. We Catholics would heartily concur with the criteria of sacraments as being instituted by God and being visible signs. Whence this criteria about "each delivers the forgiveness Christ won for us on the cross" though? Obviously, with that criteria it makes sense why matrimony would not be considered a sacrament by Lutherans...but I'm curious about how that criteria came to be held as definitive...it's one we don't share.

[Charles Henrickson]

The main difference between Lutherans and Roman Catholics on the Sacraments is not on their NUMBER but on their USE. And here we see a manifestation of THE chief difference between Lutherans and Roman Catholics, namely, in the article of JUSTIFICATION, "the article by which the Church stands or falls" (articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae). This was the chief issue in the Lutheran Reformation and it underlies all the Lutheran reforms of the Mass, Penance, etc.

The central question has to do with the proper distinction of the Law and the Gospel. Is the big thing about the Sacraments what *we* (priest, pre-Vatican II; people, post-Vatican II) are doing for God (i.e., Law) or is the big thing what *God* is doing for us, freely, for Christ's sake (i.e., Gospel)?

This is a huge question, and I don't really have the time right now to get into it in depth. But this is a brief way of getting at the heart of the matter.