The proposed Concordat of Agreement between the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is supported by two-thirds of the respondents in a survey the ELCA sent to congregations and individuals.

According to The Lutheran, ELCA's monthly magazine, only 13 percent of the 500 selected congregations which received the questionnaires responded, along with 41 other groups and individuals.

ELCA's research department called the response rate "disappointingly low," and said that while the replies aren't statistically reliable, they "do provide an understanding of how Evangelical Lutheran Church in America leaders and members evaluate the proposals, which parts are strongest and weakest, and how the proposals might be improved.

Congregations also were sent a questionnaire about support for full communion with three reformed churches - the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the Reformed Church in America, and the United Church of Christ. That response was only 12 percent, with 58 percent of those who replied favoring the proposal.

Under the Concordat of Agreement [TLC, April 21], ELCA and the Episcopal Church would enter into full communion, meaning sharing of the Eucharist and interchangeability of clergy. The Episcopal Church's General Convention and the ELCA's General Assembly are scheduled to vote on the matter during the summer of 1997.

In other results of the questionnaire concerning the Episcopal Church, 87 percent of the ELCA respondents said Episcopal ordained ministries are authentic, 64 percent supported common future ordinations of ELCA and Episcopal clergy by bishops of both churches, and 63.8 percent supported exempting future Episcopal clergy from subscribing to the Augsburg Confession, the chief doctrine of the ELCA.

Among the negative comments received were uncertainty about the necessity of ELCA's adopting the historic episcopate, the role and status of bishops, and the exemption of Episcopal ordinands from subscribing to the Augsburg Confession.

In a related development, a joint commission of the ELCA and the Northern and Southern Provinces of the Moravian Church in America recommended that the two churches establish communion by 2000. The commission, which has been involved in dialogue for five years, concluded that there are no church-dividing issues between the two churches.