News continued
Member charged with theft Prosecutors say the former church council president of St. John Lutheran, Saginaw, Mich., embezzled at least $100,000 from 2011 through 2015. George W. Pike, 70, allegedly stole money from the trust fund and was charged in February with embezzlement, as well as single counts of forgery and uttering and publishing a forged check with intent to defraud. Those two charges carry 14-year maximum penalties. The congregation’s website noted: “The suspected embezzlement has been an unfortunate situation, but we are grateful it came to light. We have been cooperative with the authorities and we anticipate full restitution.”
Souper Bowl competition Inspired by Super Bowl 50, the ELCA Rocky Mountain, North Carolina and South Carolina synods competed to raise funds for ELCA World Hunger. The teams and their supporters raised more than $70,000, with “Team Denver” bringing in $35,621 and “Team Carolina” following with $34,672.
WELCA presidents gather
Megachurch closes North Heights Lutheran Church, Arden Hills, Minn., once
numbered among the nation’s biggest ELCA congregations, is shutting down, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune (March 8).
The church, along with a sister congregation in Roseville, Minn., had 7,600 members at the beginning of the century. “Then a noisy civil war, in which breakaway members created a ferocious website posting internal church documents, led first to the closing of the original building and finally the shutdown announcement on Sunday,” the paper reported.
The director of the Alliance of Renewal Churches, the network with which North Heights affiliated after breaking away from the ELCA, had no comment.
North Heights was a congregation of 500 around 1960 when Morris Vaagenes, pastor, arrived. By 1999 he had built it to more than 7,500, with another 1,500 attending regularly at two sites. Pages on the church website that once listed a staff of more than 80 are empty.
The Star Tribune’s religion editor described the church at the time as one that “can wield incredible influence within the [ELCA].” Within a few years, however, the church broke off from the ELCA over the denomination’s more liberal stance on homosexuality.
The church’s lead pastor, Mindy Bak, in an interview last summer blamed the church’s troubles on sexism, but financial and programmatic mistakes were also cited.
For more news, see
livinglutheran.org.
Jean M. Wilkinson-Heard, Women of the ELCA president for the New Jersey Synod, asks questions about the July 2017 Triennial Convention and Gathering during the organization’s Conference of Presidents meeting Feb. 19-21.
10 APRIL 2016
Elizabeth McBride, WELCA
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