As recounted in From Conflict to Communion, jointly produced by the Lutheran World Federation and the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, the Reformation was an academic dispute that careened into a division of the church.
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It's hard to read this without thinking what might have been. . . . if everyone had stopped, quieted, breathed, listened, talked, disputed, clarified, taken a decade off to sort through the issues. What then?
Source: Peter Leithart - "Careening Toward Division", First Things, 10 Jan 2017, https://www.firstthings.com/blogs/leithart/2017/01/careening-toward-division