Thread by @potamopotos

A THREAD ON WHETHER LAYPEOPLE CAN ABSOLVE SINS

Our Lutheran Confessions retain holy absolution for good reason, it is a means of grace and useful for comforting believers. Augsburg Conf XI “It is taught among us that private absolution should be retained and not allowed to fall

into disuse.”
And this holy absolution is nothing else than the usage of the power of the keys to bind and to absolve sins, “It is well known that we have so explained and extolled the blessing of absolution and the power of the keys that many troubled consciences have received

consolation from our teaching.” Apologia art XI.
Holy Absolution then is a sacrament of the church, ibid., which strengthens and builds up faith by the proclamation of the promises of God.
But not only does the Augsburg Confession restrict the administration of the sacraments

to the ministry, but the very nature of Holy Absolution is the very wielding of the power of the keys, which properly belongs to the church collectively, but is administrated and exercised by the pastor specifically. This is why no individual lay man can excommunicate another

believer. But this power of the keys does not come in a broken fashion, as if one could have it in a half-way manner, able to absolve yet unable to bind. The single power of the keys is to bind and loose, no less no more. One cannot have the one without the other.

Holy Absolution is the very voice of God promising the absolution of all one's sins, spoken through the pastor in God's stead, more or less verbatim CA 25
This can be done, as per Gerhard, because God has chosen to use the ministry as His ambassadors and heralds, with the mandate

to speak on his behalf. Melanchthon also cooperates that by saying "since the Gospel is like a certain kind of domestic ministry, and since this ministry does not curb with bodily force, but only with words, we use the name "keys" to signify the ecclesiastical ministry. So then,

ecclesiastical power and the keys signify the same thing." (...) But jurisdiction is the power to excommunicate those who are guilty of the public offenses and again to absolve them, if they are converted and seek absolution. Therefore, according to the Gospel, ecclesiastical

power properly includes, first, the command to teach the Gospel, to announce the forgiveness of sins, and to distribute the Sacraments to individuals or to many; and second, it also includes jurisdiction, but without bodily force, as we have said" (...) Obedience is also owed to

them in the area of jurisdiction, which they have according to the Gospel, namely, in the investigation of offenses, in hearing witnesses, in legitimate excommunication, etc."
Loci 1535, on "Ecclesiastical Power: The Keys"
The pastor, then, has the jurisdiction of the keys, to

bind and to loose, which is one and the same authority, to absolve and to excommunicate. This jurisdiction is held by no individual lay man and thus cannot be exercised.
When a believer hears the words of holy absolution he can trust them immediately as the very words of God

spoken to him visibly by God's ambassador, to use Gerhard's terminology.
When a lay man shares God's gracious promises and thus he consoles his brother. And though both are efficacious when grasped by faith there is a difference in the immediacy and in the nature of the act, the

former being stronger insofar as it is sacrament and means of grace. As per Gerhard and Melanchthon, the laity is simply unable to confer absolution as absolution presupposes the authority of the ministry by which the minister, in a certain manner, can act on God's behalf. When

the minister proclaims "I forgive you of all your sins" he is acting in God's stead and truly brings about what is said.

Compare this to baptism, which all Christians have the authority to confer. When the baptizer proclaims "I baptize you in the name ..." then he is acting in

the stead of God and is truly a secondary cause of the event taking place.

I think that is a good analogy to holy absolution, which might shed a bit of light on why the laity cannot do that. Because, in the words of Melanchthon, “There is a twofold authority of pastors. The one

is called the ministry by which they impart to us the gospel and the sacraments and announce the forgiveness of sins publicly and privately. (…) The other authority is called jurisdiction. This is certain external judgment of the church which pertains only to manifest crimes.

It is the power to excommunicate and absolve. " no single lay individual has this authority or this jurisdiction, but the pastor does. That is why laity cannot bind and excommunicate as well as absolve.

Let us therefore with ever greater joy seek the great comfort and joy of

Holy Absolution as words spoken by God by His own ministers