Winding down? Not Just Yet…
As far as I can tell, just about everyone is home from the Youth Gathering by now, but that doesn’t mean the experience is over. For one thing, the ELCA’s Gathering website makes it easy to catch up on everything...
The hands and feet of faith
“God’s Work. Our Hands.” And feet. This is what the hands and feet of some ELCA teens looked like midway through their service project planting wetlands grasses 75 miles south of New Orleans. The outreach was part of the 2009...
Doing God’s dirty work
During the 2009 Youth Gathering in New Orleans, these 16-year-old youth from Holmen, Wis., had one of the messiest service projects — which they embraced with enthusiasm. They planted wetlands grasses in a muddy area 75 miles south of New...
A change of heart
When I first met Patrick Allen, he was sitting in a hotel lobby, quiet and unhappy. He’d come to New Orleans for the 2009 Youth Gathering looking forward to helping with Hurricane Katrina relief efforts. On work project day, his...
“You have been God’s hands”
Clarence McGee, a wiry man in knee high boots, shoveled dirt with the precision of a cake decorator. In a graveyard where bodies are stacked upon bodies, he had no room for error. Graves are only four feet deep and...
LutherTube: Soundbites
Courtesy of LutherTube: Soundbites from New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, New Orleans City Councilwoman Cynthia Willard-Lewis, and ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson.