We have been informed that Ning is no longer going to provide free sites. Since our Ning site has not received much use, we will be shutting it down rather than paying for the site. We have created a Facebook page that we hope will serve a similar purpose as this site. Thanks for those of you who have shared something with us in the past.

Bishop Robert Driesen

Pastoral Letter

from Bishop Robert Driesen





August 27, 2009



My dear brothers and sisters in Christ:



The recent actions regarding ministry policies taken by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America assembled in Minneapolis have resulted in deeply-felt but varied responses. Immediately following the positive vote that now will permit persons in same-sex, life-long, publically accountable relationships to be rostered in this church, a number of voting… Continue

TRINITY FAITH MILESTONES HYMN (see below for explanation)

(tune: “Go, My Children, with My Blessing”, With One Voice #721, Evangelical Lutheran Worship #543)

First and last verses by Jaroslav J. Vajda © 1983 Concordia Publishing House; All rights reserved.

Additional milestone verses by Beth Ann Lechtenberger Stone © 2006, written for Trinity Lutheran Church, McClure, Pennsylvania.



1. (original verse one—Baptism)

“Go, my children, with my blessing, never… Continue

Rather than upload all of my photos to this site, here's my Facebook photo album of the Gathering:

Peace, Chip

A poem of mine was posted on Lutheran Forum.org at the beginning of the month. I've been asked to share it with you. Thanks!

http://www.lutheranforum.org/articles/clint-schnekloth/prayer_for_the_celbritys_purgatory/

As one who grew up as the internet expanded into private usage, but also one who studied the modern semi-Luddite prophet Neil Postman, I would add this:



if one spends all their time online looking at cat pictures and snarky weird news, then sure, the medium has been of little use.



If however, we use sites like this, youtube, etc... to genuinely share ministry, and communicate methodologies. I see little difference qualitatively from the many newsletters that come through… Continue

This is a wonderful site. There are so many wonderful things that can be done on a site like this. It is exciting that we are using advanced technology for our ministries. I feel that technology should not be looked upon as a curse but as another blessing from God.


Pastor Ricky Phillips

MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Ning...who can keep up with it all? We're going to be glued to our PCs 24x7. I understand that one technology/technique eventually surpasses another for many good reasons, but it seems like we are entering territory that Jacques Ellul foresaw decades ago - technology rules us. The pace of change bothers me. I don't like it. Yet here I am. Go figure!

Glad you are here, Greg. Our hope is not primarily to add still another social network to cyberspace but to provide a place online where we can share resources with each other, as well as ideas, best practices, etc. Ning makes it easy for us to do this without having to create something ourselves. We intend to have a link to this network on our new synodical website.