MONTANA SYNOD ELCA
  • Home
  • Faith Formation
    • Faith Formation
    • Lay Pastoral Associates
    • NRIT >
      • Jessica Crist Scholarship Fund
  • Montana Synod Information
    • Montana Synod Information
    • About
    • Staff
    • Directories
    • Changing Climate Taskforce
    • Stewardship and Mission Support
    • Synod Council
    • Gift Policy
    • Clusters
    • Staff Blogs >
      • Laurie Jungling - From the Bishop Blog
    • Ecuminical & Interfaith Partners
    • Partner Ministries >
      • WELCA News
    • ELCA >
      • ELCA Statements
  • 2023 Assembly
  • Congregations
    • Congregations
    • Future Church
    • Transitions
    • For Congregations
    • Disaster Response Resources
    • Constitution
    • Sexual Misconduct Policies
  • Leaders
    • Leaders
    • Coaching in the Montana Synod
    • For Rostered Leaders
  • News & Events
    • News & Events
    • 2022 News Archive
    • 50-40-10 Women's Ordination Anniversaries
    • Events Calendar
    • Archive >
      • 2021 News Archive
      • From the Bishop Blog - Jessica Crist
      • Synod Assembly Archive
      • Quincentenary
      • South Africa 2015
      • Bolivia Recap Blog
    • Multimedia
  • Contact Us

That they may all be one

5/13/2015

0 Comments

 
In these weeks before the Synod Assembly, I am using this space to share with you some of the items and issues that we will be dealing with at our Assembly, June 5-7. Last week I wrote about New Hope, the congregation from Great Falls that we will be officially welcoming into the Montana Synod as our newest congregation.

This week I am going to write about renewing our ecumenical commitments as a Synod. In 1973, the mainline Protestant and Catholic denominations in Montana came together to form the Montana Association of Churches. MAC held prayer services and workshops focusing on Christian Unity, sponsored Community-based campus ministry, brought in speakers and workshops, developed position papers and lobbied, had a rural ministry program, was a leader in challenging hate groups.

The model on which MAC operated in the first decades of its existence was no longer helpful in the last decade. So MAC's leadership, under the direction of ELCA Pastor Pete Erickson, spent about a year redesigning MAC, to meet the realities of both church and society in this decade, and into the future.

The redesigned MAC welcomes judicatories (like the Montana Synod), congregations, individuals and ministries into membership. The Montana Synod, as an existing member of "the old MAC," is "grandfathered" into the new MAC. But we will be affirming our ecumenical relationship at the Assembly, voting officially to join the new Montana Association of Christians. That's right. The name has changed, but the acronym has remained the same.

Why are we doing this? Ecumenism is central to who we are as ELCA Lutherans. Locally, nationally, globally we are deeply involved in ecumenical councils, associations, relationships. In the Montana Synod we have been involved in MAC since the beginning ( in the days of the ALC and the LCA.) and we have been similarly in loved in the Wyoming Association of Churches, providing strong leadership despite the fact that we have only five congregations in Wyoming.

We are publicly affirming our membership in MAC as a way to show ELCA support for ecumenism, and to encourage congregations, ministries and individuals to join MAC. We are stronger together than we are apart. We live in a part of the country and in a time in which religious adherence is low. To be identified publicly as Christians who respect one another, who work together for justice, and who profess Christ is a good thing.

 

I look forward to being with you on June, and to affirming with you our membership in MAC. And I hope that many of you will decide to join MAC yourselves, as congregations, ministries and individuals.

 

Jessica Crist, Bishop.

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Bishop Jessica Crist

    Bishop of the Montana Synod of the ELCA
    2007-2019

    Archives

    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014

    Categories

    All

1221 24th Street South - Great Falls, MT 59405-5034  [Phone] 406.453.1461 
© 2023 Montana Synod, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
  • Home
  • Faith Formation
    • Faith Formation
    • Lay Pastoral Associates
    • NRIT >
      • Jessica Crist Scholarship Fund
  • Montana Synod Information
    • Montana Synod Information
    • About
    • Staff
    • Directories
    • Changing Climate Taskforce
    • Stewardship and Mission Support
    • Synod Council
    • Gift Policy
    • Clusters
    • Staff Blogs >
      • Laurie Jungling - From the Bishop Blog
    • Ecuminical & Interfaith Partners
    • Partner Ministries >
      • WELCA News
    • ELCA >
      • ELCA Statements
  • 2023 Assembly
  • Congregations
    • Congregations
    • Future Church
    • Transitions
    • For Congregations
    • Disaster Response Resources
    • Constitution
    • Sexual Misconduct Policies
  • Leaders
    • Leaders
    • Coaching in the Montana Synod
    • For Rostered Leaders
  • News & Events
    • News & Events
    • 2022 News Archive
    • 50-40-10 Women's Ordination Anniversaries
    • Events Calendar
    • Archive >
      • 2021 News Archive
      • From the Bishop Blog - Jessica Crist
      • Synod Assembly Archive
      • Quincentenary
      • South Africa 2015
      • Bolivia Recap Blog
    • Multimedia
  • Contact Us