2007 Southeastern Minnesota Synod Assembly
Called Into God's Marvelous Light...To tell the story!
2007 Synod Assembly > News > Short Recap

2007 Synod Assembly Recap (short)

Highlights from the 2007 Southeastern Minnesota Synod Assembly:
June 8-9, 2007
"Called into God's Marvelous Light…To Tell the Story!"

About 550 voting members and visitors gathered at the Mayo Civic Center in Rochester for the 2007 Synod Assembly June 8-9, 2007. Bishop Harold Usgaard led the Assembly through Worship, prayer, study, and business matters during the 20th annual Assembly.

In the election of a bishop, Bishop Usgaard was reelected on the first ballot, receiving 374 votes, well above the 330 necessary for reelection. Bishop Usgaard received a standing ovation from the voting members. In response, Bishop Usgaard commented “The Lord be with you” and noted how important this message is for us and for the world.

An ever-present part of this Assembly was the celebration of 100 years of Lutheran Campus Ministry in the United States.  In the Southeastern Minnesota Synod, Lutheran Campus Ministry has a presence at Minnesota State University-Mankato and Winona State University.

In recognition of this important milestone, Lutheran Campus Ministry led the closing worship service Friday evening using the popular Holden Evening Prayer Service. Rev. Dr. Siemsen also led the two sessions of Bible study for the voting members. Also a part of the celebration, the Friday evening meal concluded with a birthday celebration and the Saturday morning worship dedicated its offering to Lutheran Campus Ministry.

The third and final year of the synod's current strategic plan emphasizes sharing the faith. As part of that emphasis, those asked to give prayers, several presenters, and other speakers included bits of their own faith stories. The Bible study also focused on how we can tell the story.

Part of every Assembly is the worship. This year's Assembly worshiped throughout the gathering. Besides frequent prayers and hymns, there was a morning prayer service on Friday, a service of Holden Evening Prayer Friday night, and worship with holy communion on Saturday morning.

The video report from Bishop Mark S. Hanson emphasized our church network is spread around the world doing work on our behalf, doing ministry in places we can’t even imagine. Mission Support is what provides the infrastructure that allows our church to respond in awareness, and service, building bridges for peace with justice. The ELCA needs leaders of faith to work in the world.

This report is available at www.elca.org/mosaic/thanks2007.

Bishop Usgaard also reported on the work of the synod going on right here in Southeastern Minnesota. He also challenged people to do more saying, "That is what I hope we can do in these coming years, identify areas in which people of faith can make an impact."

Bishop Usgaard's report is available at www.semnsynod.org.

The Assembly approved six resolutions, including a resolution to form a Youth and Family Ministry Task Force; to encourage congregations, with the help of their conferences, to provide financial support for seminarians; for congregations to financially support new mission sites; to approve the 2008 Minimum Compensation and Benefits Guidelines, which departed from previous yearly proposals by suggesting a range of salaries to be voted on every other year; to advocate in Minnesota to End poverty; and to increase congregational support to the ELCA World Hunger Appeal. A resolution to call for conferences to only be required to meet in years when there is an election of voting members to the ELCA Churchwide Assembly or whenever unusual matters require a meeting failed.

Full text of all resolutions is on the synod website, www.semnsynod.org.

Special thanks to the Rev. Scott E. Olson and Barb Anderson for contributing to this report.

More detailed information about the 2007 Southeastern Minnesota Synod Assembly, including full news stories on all that happened, is available at www.semnsynod.org (click on "Assembly" on the left).