2025 Churchwide Assembly

Today we started with a Matins (morning prayer) service. We are singing quite a few hymns from All Creation Sings and they have been beautiful and meaningful. The plenary sessions consisted of either reports from various departments of Churchwide (the Treasurer’s Report for one) or some information about items that will be voted on later in the week.

There were not enough votes on the first ballot to elect a bishop so there was a second ballot today. The voting list was cut from about 34 candidates to 6 and people will get a chance to see and hear them tomorrow.

There was an update on the ELCA’s repudiation of the Doctrine of Discovery. This was a document, a papal bull that goes back to 1452 (before the ‘new world” was “discovered”) where the pope said Europeans could conquer and colonize non-Christian lands. This had terrible consequences for the indigenous peoples of North and South America. Today people were also encouraged to wear red in support of missing and murdered indigenous women.  

We heard reports from separately incorporated ministry leaders including Augsburg-Fortress, the ELCA foundation, Mission Investment Fund, the ELCA Federal Credit Union, Portico Benefit Services and the Women of the ELCA.  

Yesterday, members of Westboro Baptist Church, Topeka, KS staged a protest at the entry to the convention center. We were notified that they would be there so Metro Chicago Synod voting member Vivian Elbe launched a counter-protest. She asked people to donate to Reconciling Works for every minute the anti-LGBTQIA+ group protested and raised over $4,000 for Reconciling  Works.

We received greetings from the Bishops of the Lutheran Church of Namibia and El Salvador.  

At lunch, they had puppies for petting – happiness is a warm puppy. I cruised the Augsburg-Fortress display, ordered some books for the Middle school kids and started a book bag. 

Tonight, there was a pow-wow. Beautiful. It’s also been good to greet people that I have known and now get to see at Churchwide.  

WE HAVE A NEW BISHOP! The Rev. Yehiel Curry was elected today to serve a six-year term as presiding bishop of the ELCA. Curry was elected on the fifth ballot with over 70% of the vote. He is the first Black presiding bishop of the ELCA. Curry eventually became a lay mission developer while he participated in the Theological Education for Emerging Ministries program, which prepares individuals for ordained ministry in the ELCA with a focus on emerging ministry contexts like ethnic-specific, multicultural, rural and inner-city settings. 

The day began with a Bible Study given by Dr. Chad Rimmer of the Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Hickory, North Carolina.  Dr. Rimmer is interested in the intersection of theology and natural sciences, social ethics, climate justice and aesthetics. The theme of the assembly is “for the life of the world” and noted that part of our understanding of that theme if the life of the world to come. The theme of the worship service was peace and featured flying doves (not real ones, see picture).

The ELCA Secretary, Sue Rothmeyer, provided her report. We will elect a new secretary on Thursday. We heard from a Navy chaplain as well. After dinner we received greetings from partner churches, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land and from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada.

The 2026-2028 budget was passed.

A memorial on Israel and Palestine passed with 95% approval, but I will have to provide more information later. I also attended a vigil calling us to recognize and preserve the human dignity of all God’s people, with special attention to migrant, asylee, and refugee communities.

I want to start this message with observations by Bishop Shelly Bryan Wee on Wednesday’s events. She writes much clearer about the message from the Bishop Elect of the Lutheran Church of Jordan and the Holy Land and the prayer vigil than I can. So, from Bishop Shelly:

Bishop-Elect Imahd Haddad of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL) preached to the assembly today speaking to the reality of what is happening in the Holy Land as he wove in the parable of the Good Samaritan. It was a beautiful, reflective, devastating, truthful, gospel-led, prophetic sermon. He also spoke later in the day lamenting the ongoing devastation in Gaza and West Bank. I am grateful that the assembly passed an amended version of the Memorial the Northwest Washington Synod, ELCA brought to the Churchwide Assembly, “Stand for Palestinian Rights and End to Occupation of Palestine.” I am thankful for all the speakers to this Memorial, especially our own Dante Austin. 

At the end of the night, we held a public prayer vigil service to remember and lament those impacted by the current administration’s tactics of fear against immigrants. We were thankful for the many speakers, especially Arizona Representative Yassamin Ansari and Bishop Felix Malpica who sang us out into the world powerfully.

Thursday:  We began with a morning prayer service. The preacher was Rev. Vashti McKenzie of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, who preached a powerful message, calling us to the work of Justice. I urge you to check out the ELCA’s YouTube video of this.  

The Plenary session began with Bishop Eaton’s report.  One of the things she said is that while Lutheranism is declining in Europe and North America, it is growing in Africa. There are 13 million Ethiopian Lutherans, more than in North America and the average Lutheran is African and probably a woman. We celebrated Bishop Eaton’s 12 years of service. The next task was passing amendments to the ELCA constitution.

At lunchtime there was a presentation by a Samud (steadfastness), formerly Peace not Walls. The suffering is real, not only in Gaza which we hear about on the news, but in the West Bank where there are numerous checkpoints making it difficult for people to get groceries or visit the doctor. Jewish settlements continue to be built squeezing Palestinians and making it more difficult to get access to scarce drinking water.  

Back in the Plenary, there was a second ballot for Secretary. Then we heard from ecumenical partners. The first speaker was Rabbi Rick Jacobs. He stated that while recognizing the suffering in Gaza, some of the language in the measure on Palestine we had just passed, was not helpful. It points to the difficulty of trying to solve these hard issues and the need to have all people affected at the table. 

We then heard from Dr. Mohammed Elsanousi from the Islamic Association of America, Bishop Dennis Madden, a Roman Catholic who participated in the Lutheran-Roman Catholic Dialogs, Bishop Vashti Murphy McKenzie from the African Methodist Episcopal Church and Father Nicholas Kazarian from the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese in America. We also heard from the Bishops of Norway and Poland. 

The next topic was about the Nicene Creed. This year is the 1700^th anniversary of the first ecumenical council of Nicea which gave us the foundation of the Nicean Creed. The western church addition of the words that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son was one of the things that caused the first church division around the year 1000. (The Orthodox said that this put the Holy Spirit in a lower place than the Father and Son.) Dialog between the Orthodox Church and the Lutheran World Federation has led to an understanding that these words are no longer church dividing.

There was another ballot for secretary, but no election.

The last order of business concerned additional changes the ELCA constitution.

For dinner I joined our synod and members of the Milwaukee Synod (they are our companion synod in the United States) for an outstanding Mexican meal.

Friday’s Plenary began with hearing remarks from the 7 candidates for Secretary.  The Social Statement, Faith and Civic Life and the implementing resolution were debated and passed.  More amendments to the ELCA Constitution were passed and then the 3^rd ballot for secretary was held.  There was no election so 3 candidates moved forward.  

We saw a video from Lutheran Disaster Response.  LDR works with other agencies and comes in by invitation.  Also, LDR doesn’t leave until the job is done:  LDR is still in New Orleans.

It took 5 ballots, but Lucille (CeCee) Mills was elected for a 6-year term as Secretary of the ELCA.  Mills has served as an assistant to the bishop in the ELCA North Carolina Synod since 2019. Previously she served as an interim pastor, as program associate for African Descent Ministries with the ELCA churchwide organization in Chicago; and as pastor of Rejoice Lutheran Church, Chesapeake, Va.  She received a TEEM (Theological Education for Emerging Ministries) certification from Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Columbia, S.C., in 2002.

There was a period of discussion on amendments to the document, Human Sexuality: Gift and Trust, and a couple of amendments were passed, but it was decided that more needs to be done to finalize the document.  This document provides guidance for pastors, deacons and those persons training for those positions.  It was first published in the 1990s and there have been a lot of changes since that time.

There was quite a long debate on the section on ministry in the ELCA Constitution.   Much of the discussion was around a section that attempted to increase access to positions for those people that have traditionally been overlooked or ignored.  However the attempt was done from a position that assumed those people need to be “special.”  Many spoke that they did not want to be special, but simply treated by everyone else.  The amendment was defeated.

Friday concluded with Evening Prayer in the Assembly Hall and a banquet celebrating Bishop Eaton and Secretary Rothmeyer’s service.  

The day began with our final celebratory worship service.  I was honored to be selected as a communion minister and ended up at Bishop Curry’s station.  There were twirlies with long red and gold ribbons and doves, inspiring music and just beautiful.  

We went back into the meeting hall for the final Plenary session.  The Assembly passed some more amendments to the Constitution, but sent the resolution on Artificial Intelligence back to Reference and Council.  CeCee Mills was installed as Secretary of the ELCA. There were many rounds of appreciation.

The next Churchwide Assembly will take place 7-11 August in Des Moines, IA.

After the Assembly was over, I joined my friend Rahel and a couple of other members from the Upstate New York Synod to tour St. Mary’s Cathedral, then we went to lunch at a Pizza place.  

Churchwide Assembly is inspiring, can be exciting, disappointing and exhausting.  Sunday I plan to attend worship at Grace Lutheran.  I thank you all for the opportunity to be a congregational observer.

Check out this video from Bishop Shelley Bryan Wee.