Author: Amalia Vagts

ELM’s new program, Proclaim, launched this weekend during a gathering of LGBTQ Lutheran rostered leaders and seminarians near Lake Geneva, WI. It was a fantastic gathering of folks from as far away as South Africa and Alaska.

We spent time getting to know one another, learning more about ELM and Proclaim, and learning from the brilliant and ever-entertaining Lisa Larges, from That All May Freely Serve, a movement partner from the Presbyterian Church.

Nearly 60 attendees joined together in worship, conversation, planning, as well as a raucous evening of  Trivial Pursuit, Banagrams, Euchre and Hearts. As Proclaim evolves, you’ll be hearing more about how these leaders seek to renew and transform Lutheran congregations and ministries and serve God’s people by bringing the Good News.

For the Proclaim membership form click here.

Here’s what one attendee shared about the weekend:

“After spending this weekend with other GLBTQ people in the Lutheran church I am strengthened and renewed.  I don’t feel like I am going through candidacy, the call process and the Lutheran church alone.  I look forward to all that ELM can do for me and am excited about an opportunity to serve ELM and Proclaim as well!”

Another person wrote:

“We are building new community through Proclaim, strengthening our witness, empowering our vision, accompanying one another into God’s gracious future!”

Amen.

P.S.  If you are excited about connecting with publicly-identified LGBTQ rostered leaders and seminarians in a synod near you, attendees got very energized about forming regional meet-ups, including the already dubbed Southern group, “Proclaim, Ya’ll!”

Our coalition partners, Lutherans Concerned/North America, issued the following announcement about an upcoming re-broadcast of a program on the Oprah Network featuring The Naming Project.  The Naming Project was founded by Rev. Jay Wiesner, Ross Murray, and Rev. Brad Froslee. The original broadcast received great reviews.

An excerpt from LC/NA’s announcement:

The Naming Project will be part of a program, “Pray the Gay Away?,” being re-broadcast on Friday night, March 11, at 9pm Eastern/8pm Central. This program is part of the Our America with Lisa Ling series of programs.   Immediately following the program will be The Gayle King Hour, discussing the program with Lisa Ling and taking questions from the viewers.

Our America is broadcast on the Oprah Winfrey Network and other cable networks.

For additional information about “Pray the Gay Away?” and to check where on your local cable station, go to http://www.oprah.com/own-our-america-lisa-ling/our-america-blog.html or direct to http://tinyurl.com/PrayTheGayAway.

The Naming Project is a faith-based youth group serving youth of all sexual and gender identities. The primary focus is to provide a place for youth who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning or allied to learn, grow, and share their experiences. In this way The Naming Project is a space in which youth can comfortably discuss faith and who they understand themselves to be–whether gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender…or straight. Learn more about the Naming Project at  www.thenamingproject.org.

IRA Charitable Rollover: Additional Way to Give in 2011

ELM is expanding our vision and programming, and we will rely on the generous support of current and new supporters to do so.  I wanted to tell our supporters about a special way you or your loved ones can give to ELM in 2011.

Late in 2010, the IRA Charitable Rollover provision was extended through December 31, 2011.  This allows the owner of a traditional or Roth IRA to distribute to a public charity up to $100,000 a year without the distribution being included in taxable income.  The distribution counts  toward the donor’s mandatory withdrawal amount.

Individuals with traditional and Roth IRAs can make direct transfers from such plans to ELM or to our endowment, housed at the Lutheran Community Foundation.  Some restrictions apply:

• Individuals must be 70-1/2 or older on the date of the gift (if you aren’t…keep reading for a fun idea!).
• Individuals may give up to $100,000 per year without having to count the distribution / charitable gift as taxable income, but there is no income tax deduction for the gift.
• Charitable gifts must be made outright to the endowment fund by the IRA plan administrator (meaning you direct your IRA manager to send the gift directly to ELM). Lifetime income gifts and gifts to donor-advised funds and supporting organizations do not qualify for this incentive.

Our friends at the Lutheran Community Foundation shared this observation: “Given these parameters, the charitable rollover provision provides the most opportunity for those who must take their required minimum distributions from an IRA, but would prefer to direct it to charity instead. These individuals may have either maxed out on tax deductions or don’t itemize.”

Your gift can be designated where most needed for ELM or could be made to the Lutheran Community Foundation, designated for the ELM Endowment Fund.

Are you thinking, but I’m not 70-1/2 years old? This might be a way for your parents or grandparents to make a special gift to support your passion for Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries. Invite your loved ones to consider a gift in your honor for a special occasion, or just because. For more information about making a qualified charitable distribution from an IRA, please contact your financial planner or Amalia at 563-382-6277.

It’s been a period of “historic services” in the life of the Lutheran church. And feeling somewhat like Forrest Gump, I’ve been blessed to end up at most of them. And with each service, I’ve felt a wave of gratitude and renewal and faith in the Lutheran church as time and time again people have come together to stand up against insidious and damaging discrimination within the Church and throw open the doors of the church to LGBTQ people.  These services have been a blessing to all who witness them.

And somehow, yesterday’s service of Reconciliation, Restoration and Reception at St. Francis Lutheran Church felt wholly new.  This is the congregation that, along with First United Lutheran Church, stood up years ago to injustice and spiritual violence in the church when they called lesbian pastors Ruth Frost and Phyllis Zillhart and gay pastor Jeff Johnson, despite a policy barring them from doing so. These congregations issued these calls because they were in the midst of an AIDS crisis and needed the LGBT community to know how truly welcome they were. They issued these calls because they knew that the policy barring partnered lesbian and gay pastors from serving was unjust.

Twenty years later, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in American agreed with them. After a period of conversation and discernment the Sierra Pacific Synod issued an invitation for them to return. St. Francis Lutheran Church voted unanimously to once again join the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

At the beginning of a powerful service, Bishop Mark W. Holmerud knocked on the door of the church and was received by the current congregational president and the president serving at the time of St. Francis’ expulsion. These leaders welcomed the bishop. And in an important and moving sermon, the bishop welcomed the ELCA home. You can view the full sermon here.

This is a day of grace for the whole church. How could a congregation that had been forcibly removed from a denomination because they followed the gospel and not a discriminatory policy fraught with human failing decide to return? Why would they? Because God can lead us to places we would not go ourselves. As Paul writes in Ephesians: “For Christ is our peace; in whose flesh both groups have been made into one, who has broken down the dividing wall, that is, the hostility between us.”

Through Christ, we are all welcomed home.

If you cannot attend in person, join us virtually on Sunday as St. Francis Lutheran Church, expelled in 1995 after calling lesbian pastors Rev. Ruth Frost and Rev. Phyllis Zillhart, is restored as a congregation of the ELCA in an historic and unprecedented service.

Click this link at 3:00 pm Pacific Time on Sunday, February 27, 2011 to join the service.

Here is a link to a great article about the journey of St. Francis Lutheran Church.

We’ll “see” you there!

44  wonderful folks gathered at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Northeast Portland, OR last Sunday night to talk about ELM and Portland-based EcoFaith Recovery.  It was an inspiring and energizing time!

We gathered around a drum circle and shared in an incredible buffet of local and sustainable food prepared through the “Simply in Season” groups initiated as a partnership between EcoFaith Recovery and St. Andrew Lutheran Church in Beaverton, OR.  Following the music and meal, we shared stories of the exciting ministry going on through EcoFaith Recovery and updates from ELM. EcoFaith Recovery has launched a number of programs, including Table Talks that bring folks together for conversation about the environment, Green Spirit, a spiritual support group for those seeking recovery from  cultural  addictions that hurt the earth, and the Simply in Season groups: The primary resource is the  cookbook and its accompanying study guide for small groups published by the Mennonite Church.(Remember the “More with Less” cookbook? This is the next incarnation of that book.)  Group members meet in one member’s home to share recipes prepared using the cookbook. There is even a Simply in Season  cooking class  for kids!

It was wonderful to create and deepen connections between people who came because of ELM, and those who came due to EcoFaith Recovery, and especially those who just came out to learn about both groups! I left feeling just amazed by this “rainforest” ministry going on…life leading to life (thank you Bishop Brauer-Rieke, who gives a wonderful talk about the “rainforest” church).

EcoFaith Recovery began with a concept grant from ELM in 2009 and continued with an additional grant in 2010. We are blessed to be continuing to fund this growing ministry in 2011, thanks to support from our wonderful donors. Pastor Robyn is an ELCA pastor today because the ELM roster was there to support her ministry when she didn’t see a future in the church as a publicly-identified lesbian called to ordained ministry.

You support ELM. ELM supports Robyn. Robyn supports EcoFaith Recovery. And EcoFaith Recovery is renewing the church. What a joy for all of us to be a part of this!

We share in the good news included in the following press release  from St. Francis Lutheran Church…

SAN FRANCISCO – FEBRUARY 13, 2011 – St. Francis Lutheran Church, which was removed from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in 1995 after ordaining a lesbian couple as its pastors, has taken the final vote required to rejoin the ELCA.

At its annual meeting on Sunday, the 141-member congregation ratified its approval of a new constitution, formalizing a decision to reunite that was made last July. Before rejoining the ELCA, St. Francis had to make minor changes to its own governing document. Members approved the new constitution in October, but the final ratification had to wait for Sunday’s meeting.

St. Francis will celebrate its return to the national church in a special worship service on Feb. 27, when it will welcome Bishop Mark Holmerud of the ELCA’s Sierra Pacific Synod. Members of the media are welcome to attend this event, which will take place at 3 p.m. in the historic St. Francis sanctuary at 152 Church Street.

The return of St. Francis to the ELCA comes at a time of historic change in the national church following a series of votes at the 2009 Churchwide Assembly that changed policies relating to sexual minorities in the church and its clergy. Scores of ELCA congregations have taken steps to leave the national church in protest over those votes. With 4.7 million members, the ELCA is the largest Christian church in the United States to allow lesbian and gay clergy with partners to serve its congregations.

In 1990, St. Francis called the Rev. Ruth Frost and the Rev. Phyllis Zillhart as its pastors, breaking an ELCA rule that forbade churches from calling gay or lesbian pastors unless they had taken a vow of celibacy. The church was put on trial along with First United Lutheran Church of San Francisco, which had called a gay man, the Rev. Jeff Johnson, as its pastor. The ELCA found both churches in violation of the rule and suspended them. After a five-year grace period, both were removed from the ELCA on Dec. 31, 1995.

At the 2009 Churchwide Assembly, the national church repealed that discriminatory policy toward gay and lesbian clergy. Since then, many gay and lesbian pastors, including Frost, Zillhart and Johnson, have been welcomed into the ELCA’s roster of approved clergy. The congregation of First United Lutheran Church is still discerning its future path.

At the Feb. 27 celebration, photographers and video crews will be allowed inside the sanctuary in select locations while the service takes place. The Rev. Robert Goldstein, pastor of St. Francis, and other participants will be made available for interviews following the event.

St. Francis Lutheran Church is located near Church and Market Streets, across from Safeway. Parking permits will be available for media, and the church is easily accessible via public transit.

About St. Francis Lutheran Church

Formed in 1964 through the merger of Lutheran churches founded by Danish and Finnish immigrants, St. Francis Lutheran Church is open to people of all backgrounds and sexual orientations and has been ministering to San Francisco’s lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities since the 1980s. Visit St. Francis on the Web at www.st-francis-lutheran.org.

Paul W. Egertson, former ELCA bishop, and beloved advocate for the inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer people passed away at his home yesterday following a heart attack.

For the past two years, Paul has been serving as a member of ELM’s board of directors, the Covenant Circle.  He will be deeply missed.

We will share a longer tribute to Paul in the coming days.  In the meantime, we ask for your prayers for Paul’s beloved spouse, Shirley Egertson, their sons, and extended family.

In the forward to a collection of essays by Joel R. Workin, Paul wrote,

“When Joel died, all of us cried, and I was blessed.  It was one of those experiences you recall when reading lines like those in Robert Browning Hamilton’s poem, Along the Road:

I walked a mile with Pleasure;

She chattered all the way,

But left me none the wiser

For all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow

And ne’er a word said she;

but oh, the things I learned from her

When sorrow walked with me!”

Paul, thank you for your amazing life and for your endless love and tireless advocacy for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people. You have blessed us.

A memorial for Paul Egertson was held Saturday, January 15 at 1:00 p.m. at Samuelson Chapel at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, CA.

Join other Lutheran publicly-identified lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) rostered leaders for a time of renewal, community building, and professional development. We are planning a fabulous weekend and want you to be there! This event is hosted by Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries.

The retreat will be held at the George Williams College Retreat Center on beautiful Geneva Lake in Wisconsin.

The retreat is for all Lutheran publicly-identified LGBTQ rostered leaders, those seeking to be rostered, and seminarians. Partners are also invited to attend.

Early-bird Registration: $225.  After Feb 1: $260.

ELM practices travel equalization (a lovely but complicated process). We will share travel costs, so please budget approximately $260 for travel.  Please note: there is a free shuttle to the retreat center from the Milwaukee airport.

Scholarships are available. The application is due by Jan. 31. Announcements will be made as soon as possible upon receipt of application. Scholarship recipients will be excluded from the travel equalization pool, but scholarship funds will not be applied toward travel. The application is available here.

Please note, this retreat will be public and your name and photo may be used in connection with the retreat. If you have questions or concerns about privacy, please contact ELM Executive Director, Amalia Vagts at director@elm.org.

Please visit www.elm.org for more information about the retreat, travel equalization, and to register online.