It’s been a little over a year since the 2018 ELCA Youth Gathering in Houston, yet the significance of this event for the 31,000 Lutherans who attended and for those…
For First Lutheran, St. Paul, Minn., caring for people who don’t have a safe place to live or who are living in poverty is as important to its mission as…
Everyone may march to their own beat, but one ELCA congregation is fostering an exquisite togetherness through the ancient, spiritual and meditative practice of the drum circle. “Music can create…
Mark Erson’s complex and innovative ministry can best be understood by a single photo he took in Edinburgh, Scotland, during a visit to the city’s famed artistic Festival Fringe. It’s…
It’s not unusual to have a calendar on a wall, but the one facing worshipers at St. Barnabas Lutheran Church, Plymouth, Minn., is a colorful array of stained-glass windows outlining…
People fleeing for their lives, surrounded by walls of flame. The fury of Mother Nature tearing through everything in its path. Those who have managed to get out safely wondering…
I had just finished leading a workshop for deployed Navy service members in which I offered suggestions for reintegrating into life in the U.S. A young man, probably no older…
No person is an island, the English poet and cleric John Donne noted four centuries ago—and neither are ELCA congregations in Hawaii. “People think there is this body of the…
As assistant cross-country coach Anna Sorenson pounds the pavement with her team of runners, conversation helps the miles pass more quickly. Between her words of encouragement, Sorenson hears about the…
It started with an invitation. Eleonore and William Thuemmel were waiting for a table at a popular restaurant in The Villages, Fla., where they live. They weren’t in a hurry—William…
Actions speak louder than words. That familiar sentiment echoed in Nancy Smith’s mind when she was thinking of ways to help the children in her congregation’s after-school program understand Jesus’…
David Isaacson of Fargo, N.D., has an eye for eggs. Ceramic, stone, wooden, etched, paper, painted or plain, the retired pastor has been collecting and giving away eggs at Easter…
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