Rev. Robyn Hartwig was baptized at Zion Evangelical and Reformed Church in Lowden Iowa (now part of the UCC) and confirmed at Our Savior’s Lutheran Church in Naperville, IL. She attended Miami University in Oxford, OH, where she majored in secondary social studies education and spent a year studying in Luxembourg. After graduating, she taught high school economics and government and coached cross country and track in Bakersfield, CA. During this time, she sensed a call to ordained ministry and moved to Berkeley, CA, to attend Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary. While in seminary, she completed a cross-cultural experience in Nicaragua, served as a CPE chaplain at St. Mary’s Hospital in San Francisco and completed a year-long internship at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Portland, OR.
After graduating with her Master of Divinity degree in 1997, Pastor Robyn served as director of Learn-ASAP, a non-profit after-school program offering academic support to Southeast Asian refugee youth in Richmond, CA. In the fall of 1998, Pastor Robyn was called to serve as solo pastor of Lutheran Church of Our Redeemer in Sacramento, CA and was ordained there in January of 1999.
After eight and a half years of ministry in Sacramento, Pastor Robyn moved to Portland, OR, where she began developing EcoFaith Recovery Ministries on a part-time basis to help people grow deeper in faith by examining and reforming their relationship to the natural world. This ministry is made possible by the generosity of all who contribute to Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries which enables ELM to fund this ministry. This new ministry is enhanced by Pastor Robyn’s acceptance into the GreenFaith Fellowship, a national program for faith leaders from diverse religious traditions for religiously based environmental leadership.
In November of 2008, Pastor Robyn was called to serve as part-time time associate pastor of St. Andrew Lutheran Church in Beaverton, OR. The primary aspects of her call are preaching, worship leadership, caring ministries and developing small group ministries.
In her free time, Pastor Robyn enjoys drumming, hiking, dancing and bicycling.