As we gather for our 2021 assembly, it’s a good time to reflect our collective experience in a pandemic year. We’re proud to provide these updates from your synod and our many ministry and mission partners.
We’re adding reports as we receive and process them. Review them on our 2021 assembly report page and this collection of blog posts.
Presiding Bishop Elizabeth Eaton shares her annual synod assembly letter. View in this post or as PDF in English or PDF in Spanish.
View the annual update from Lutheran Advocacy Ministry Arizona.
As our world fundamentally shifted this year, so did our campus ministry! Our U of A students completed about 95% of their classwork online—-which often left them isolated and exhausted by screen time.
Therefore, we shifted our programming to shorter discussion groups online about various faith topics AND added Thursday “take-out/patio” dinners. The beautiful Arizona weather allowed for socially-distanced outdoor meals the entire year and our new community to thrive.
Portico Benefit Services is a holistic benefits ministry serving those who serve — from rostered ministers and their families to staff at social ministry organizations.
View a video message from our regional representative, Andrea Arey, as well as a written update.
The ELCA’s Peace Not Walls campaign works for peace and justice in Israel and Palestine. How has COVID-19 impacted the local Lutheran church in the Holy Land? How has Augusta Victoria Hospital dealt with COVID-19? Watch this video to learn more.
Thank you for being a ministry partner! Your prayers, direct synod gifts, and encouraging your leaders to go to seminary are all ways you participate with us in the important mission of equipping future pastors, deacons, and non-rostered faith leaders for the work they are called to do in congregations, hospitals, schools, community organizations, and more.
To our friends and partners in the Grand Canyon Synod, where Mosaic provides services out of Phoenix, Prescott and Tucson:
During the challenges brought by the COVID-19 pandemic, we at Mosaic shared a consistent message with those we support, our workforce, donors and volunteers: Hope Beyond Measure.
During the year-long pandemic, MIF provided assistance to investors who needed immediate access to their funds and to borrowers who needed flexibility with their loan payments. Their update is full of stories, videos, and investment information.
We collaborated with our ministry partner, the ELCA Federal Credit Union, to offer expedited loans for congregations, ministries and individuals, as well as Paycheck Protection Program loans for congregations and ministries to keep employees on the payroll and continue operations.
Lutheran Social Services of the Southwest shares their 2021 update.
Most of us have experienced tremendous hardships this year, and Las Vegas was also hit incredibly hard by the pandemic. However, at LSSN we didn’t step back we stepped up. Since March 2020, we have served nearly 70,000 Las Vegans through our food pantry distributions, and the need is increasing.
Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service acknowledges it has been a difficult year for all of us.
Despite restrictive policy changes and the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, however, LIRS has remained committed to our biblical mandate to welcome the stranger.
Living Christ Lutheran Church, Flagstaff, shares their profile in Living Lutheran as their 2021 update.
Rev. Adama FAYE, president of Église Luthérienne du Senegal (The Lutheran Church of Senegal) sends greetings in this 2021 update.
Rev. Roberto Federico Trejo Haager, Pastor President of Iglesia Luterana Mexicana (ILM, Mexican Lutheran Church), sends greetings and blessings to the members of the Grand Canyon Synod.
Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Chandler, shares their 2021 update.
Our ELCA Foundation planners, Lisa Marie Higginbotham and Josh Kerney, share a video update on how making a plan can change the world. Contact Lisa Marie here. Contact Josh here.
Grace Lutheran Church, Phoenix, shares their 2021 update.
In the Congregation Transition Team’s report, Dr. Jerry Kingston, Rev. Doris Nolan, Rev. Patricia Reed detail how the synod entered into a collaborative partnership with the Rocky Mountain Synod in our ministry to congregations in transition.
Celebrating their fifth anniversary as a financial ministry of the ELCA, the ELCA Federal Credit Union is open to every ELCA member, synod, congregation and ministry—and their employees.
In this update we hear how in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, as congregations and ministries closed their doors, the Credit Union responded swiftly to growing needs for financial assistance.
Emmanuel Sudanese Lutheran Church, Glendale shares the gifts of song and praise in their 2021 update.
Amidst the changing landscape of the pandemic, California Lutheran University shares how over 4,000 students learn virtually or in hybrid classrooms in several different centers in California.
A member of the Network of Colleges and Universities of the ELCA, Cal Lutheran equips graduates who are called and empowered to serve the neighbor so that all may flourish.
In his 2021 update, Rev. Miguel F. Gomez-Acosta, Director for Evangelical Mission and Bishop’s Associate for Congregational Vitality, reflects on the abundant generosity and innovation in a year like no other.
Brian Flatgard, Director of Communication, reports on a very busy year of communications for our synod.
View this fresh 2021 introduction to Spirit in the Desert Retreat Center in Carefree, Arizona. Through interviews with staff, guests and friends, viewers learn what is unique about the retreat center, and why Spirit in the Desert is a holy place where people experience the love of God, joyful hospitality and renewal of their callings in the world.
Myrna Wells-Ulland, President of the Grand Canyon Women of the ELCA, shares their 2021 update in a letter and video message.
In her 2021 update, Rev. Jacqueline Pagel, Bishop’s Associate for Candidacy and Faith Formation, gives a brief overview of the different ways ministry intersected as we grow the our synod into a great place to express the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Paul Gryniewicz, Synod Council Vice President, asks what it means to be church in a year of accelerated change in his 2021 update.
View the 1517 Media Annual Report as a PDF.