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2007 Ministry Report of the Southeastern Minnesota Synod, ELCA

Copy and paste the text below into your annual report, or use the following files:

  • PDF - Color (1.37 MB) or black and white (31.9 KB)

  • TIFF (picture file) - Color (1.9 MB) or black and white (730 MB)

  • JPG (additional picture file) - Color (2.76 MB) or black and white (2.36 MB)

  • Need it in another format? Katie Livingood with your request. Hard copies are being mailed to each congregation.

Each of our 184 congregations has been called to faithfulness and servanthood. But as a synod, we dare to believe that God can touch even more lives. In the year 2007, together we:

  • Hosted a summit for 29 congregations in partnership with congregations in the Central Diocese of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania and 13 congregations with partnerships in the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Colombia

  • Supported 34 candidates from our synod studying at seminaries and welcomed 9 new candidates into seminary training

  • Sent mission gifts of over $80,000 to Tanzania and almost $40,000 to Colombia

  • Gathered $150,000 for flood relief in Southeastern Minnesota

  • Ordained 7 new pastors

  • Raised almost $150,000 from 60 of our congregations for ELCA missionaries around the world

  • Gathered 200 synod pastors and associates in ministry for a theological conference

  • Supported 54 Congregations in the midst of pastoral staff change

  • Gifted Luther Seminary over $100,000

  • Welcomed 300 church council leaders from our congregations for an afternoon of training and sharing

  • Provided over $125,000 for Lutheran Campus Ministry in Minnesota

  • Trained 7 pastors and lay leaders in Natural Church Development

  • Offered over $40,000 to a variety of ministry partners: church colleges; Minnesota Council of Churches; Lutheran Coalition for Public Policy in Minnesota; Christ Through Hands Ministry for the Deaf and Blind in Faribault

  • With 600 congregational voting members in synod assembly, committed to a synod-wide ministry strategy for children, youth, and family ministries; congregational support for seminary students; a focus on poverty and hunger in the coming year; and funding for mission congregations in our synod

  • Awarded: 3 scholarships of almost $3,500 apiece for seminary education; the Wacholtz Rural Scholarship of $1,500; 3 awards from the synod endowment fund of $1,500 a piece toward education debt retirement for new pastors

  • Sent 27 voting members to the 2007 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, including, for the first time, a youth and a young adult

  • Offered gifts of over $1,160,000 to the ministries of the churchwide ELCA

And how much more we have done together in this holy calling. Thank you for your support, for your partnership, in 2007. I do believe the mission of our Lord is enhanced as we work together.

Shalom,

Bishop Harold Usgaard