Posts in Bishop Hutterer
Bishop Hutterer: Welcoming Uncertainty
Bishop Hutterer: Welcoming Uncertainty

As Bishop, one of my main goals is to work with all of you to change and grow our church. The year 2020 has been wildly successful in implementing change, far more than anything we could have initiated on our own.

As church and people of faith, we have a huge advantage over most organizations and individuals. Our “product” is eternal and unwavering. The love of God, the good news of Jesus Christ, and the fruits of the Holy Spirit do not cease with the seasons of the world or the actions of humankind.

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Bishop Hutterer, LettersBrian FlatgardBishop Hutterer LettersComment
Faith communities urge voters to cast their ballots with climate in mind
Faith communities urge voters to cast their ballots with climate in mind

Highlighted in the Arizona Republic, Bishop Hutterer was one of four Arizona faith leaders from diverse traditions who spoke at an online panel last week in Phoenix about how different faiths address human responsibility to the environment.

“From our Lutheran tradition, we have this idea of care of creation, the interdependence of each one of us, and the fact that without caring about creation, we have actually denied our neighbors,” Bishop Hutterer says in the article in Arizona Central. “Our lives depend on the life that surrounds us.”

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Bishop Hutterer, News, In the News, Z AdvocacyBrian FlatgardBishop Deborah K. Hutterer, Ecumenical and Inter-Religious Relations, Interfaith Power & LIght, Climate ChangeComment
Bishop Hutterer: Our next season of being church
Bishop Hutterer: Our next season of being church

I encourage every congregation and ministry of our synod to take advantage of this disorienting time to intentionally ask God questions.

For the life of God’s beloved world, how can we more fully become the church the Spirit needs us to be? As the Body of Christ in our time and place, what conversations, partners, and resources help us explore the future we are being called to embrace?

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Letters, Bishop Hutterer, Grand Canyon SynodBrian FlatgardBishop Hutterer LettersComment
Bishop Hutterer: Awaiting the Spirit
Bishop Hutterer: Awaiting the Spirit

It has been a while since I wrote about in-person gathering for worship. I was waiting for certainty before I grabbed my pen. I was waiting for clarity from the federal government and the CDC, from health scientists, and from our state health departments and governors. I waited for a common-sense consensus amongst the citizens of our nation. I turned to the books of wisdom in the Old Testament, hoping for a revelation.

I am still waiting.

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Letters, Bishop Hutterer, Grand Canyon SynodBrian FlatgardLutheran Campus Ministries, LCM NAU, LCM ASU, LCM U of A, Bishop Hutterer LettersComment
Bishop Hutterer: In-person worship in a time of unknowns
Bishop Hutterer: In-person worship in a time of unknowns

We all want to go back to in-person worship. We also want to be safe. We want our neighbors to be safe. Many have asked me when we can gather for in-person worship.

In a time of so many unknowns with so much at risk, I feel it would be ill-advised to project yet another date. As we decide when to proceed, I suggest we wait for the CDC guideline of a “downward trajectory of documented cases within a 14-day period.”

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Bishop Hutterer, Letters, Z Covid-19Brian FlatgardCOVID In-person gatheringComment
GCS Council and Bishop recommend extending no in-person gatherings
GCS Council and Bishop recommend extending no in-person gatherings

As we journey through this Easter season, we are beginning to hear the question: when can we gather again?

In the midst of changing restriction policies across the three states of our synod, when and how will we worship in person as church? Some ask with concern, hoping that we not gather in person too soon. Others ask with excitement, because they miss the face-to-face community.

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Bishop Hutterer, Letters, Z Covid-19Brian FlatgardComment
Bishop Hutterer: The Church continues
Bishop Hutterer: The Church continues

Recently I heard a story about a Lutheran woman from the United States traveling through eastern Europe years ago. As she talked with a group of locals, it came up that she was Lutheran. One woman in the group told the American, “I know who you are.”

The European woman went into her house and came out with a quilt. She showed the American woman a label sewn onto the quilt which gave the name of an ELCA church who had made and donated it. "I was once in a refugee camp and had nothing,” the woman said. “You gave this quilt to me.”

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Bishop Hutterer, LettersBrian FlatgardComment
Bishop Hutterer: Being church in a time of pandemic
Bishop Hutterer: Being church in a time of pandemic

This Lenten season we live in a time of pandemic. We also live in a time of rapid change. Coronavirus—ignoring the human boundaries of nation-states, class, culture, race, and religion—spreads with the exponential inevitability of a mathematical formula.

As we struggle to understand the virus and its effect on our daily lives, we also wonder how best to be church together. We are a church whose practices literally go hand-in-hand with sharing the virus.

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Bishop Hutterer, Letters, Z Covid-19Brian FlatgardComment
Lenten dialog between southern AZ Catholics and Lutherans
Lenten dialog between southern AZ Catholics and Lutherans

When the 500th anniversary of The Lutheran Reformation took place in 2017, the Vatican and The Lutheran World Federation issued a joint statement and study document, “From Conflict to Communion.” (View online or as PDF.)

A series of Lenten dialogs is our local participation in that endeavor to build ecumenical understanding and cooperation. Three Wednesday morning sessions, from 10:30 am to noon, will take place in March, with Bishop Hutterer and Bishop Weisenburger attending some of the dialogs.

  • March 11, 2020 @ Lutheran Church of the Foothills

  • March 18, 2020 @ St Cyril of Alexandria Catholic Church, featuring Bishop Weisenburger

  • March 25 @ Dove of Peace Lutheran Church, featuring Bishop Hutterer

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Bishop Hutterer, Kino ConferenceBrian FlatgardDove of Peace Tucson, Lutheran Church of the Foothills TucsonComment