The International Lutheran Council is a worldwide association of confessional Lutheran denominations. It is to be distinguished from the larger Lutheran World Federation, which is an association of the more theologically moderate to liberal Lutheran churches, all of which are in full communion with one another as a condition of membership. Unlike the LWF, the member church bodies of the ILC are not required to be in church-fellowship with one another, though many of them are. The organization was constituted in 1993 at a council held in Antigua, Guatemala, although it traces its roots back to theological conferences held in many locations during the 1950s and 1960s.
Member bodies of the ILC hold "an unconditional commitment to the Holy Scriptures as the inspired and infallible Word of God and to the Lutheran Confessions contained in the Book of Concord as the true and faithful exposition of the Word of God."
The Council has thirty participating churches as of 2007. Among its larger members are the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Brazil, and the Lutheran Church—Canada. Altogether, approximately 3,450,000 adherents belong to ILC member churches.
The Council's Chairman is Bishop Hans-Jörg Voigt Independent Evangelical Lutheran Church, Germany. The Executive Secretary is the Rev. Dr. Albert B. Collver III, Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. Delegates to the ILC meet every two years.
The organization has not accepted the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification, an agreement reached by the Catholic Church's Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and the Lutheran World Federation, in 1999.