Posts in News
Ordination of Dan Potaznick
Ordination of Dan Potaznick

The Ordination of Dan Potaznick will take place at 1pm EST, 10am MST/PDT, 11am MDT, on Saturday, March 18, 2023 at Upper Dublin Lutheran Church (411 Susquehanna Road, Ambler, Pennsylvania, 19002. Bishop Deborah K. Hutterer will preside and Rev. Timothy B. Johansen of Temple Lutheran Church in Havertown, Pennsylvania will preach. Click here to watch the livestream or archived video on YouTube.

Your prayers and presence are requested. Rostered ministers are invited to process, color of the day is red. Dan is our synod’s new Director of Generosity and Strategic Development.

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Grand Canyon Synod, NewsBrian FlatgardOrdinations and InstallationsComment
High Country Conference Spring Gathering is Mar 25, 2023
High Country Conference Spring Gathering is Mar 25, 2023

Members of all Grand Canyon Synod congregations and ministries, including active and retired leaders, are welcome to our online spring gatherings.

Our final gathering is the High Country Conference Spring Gathering: Saturday, March 25, 2023, 11:00 AM – 1:30 PM at Christ Lutheran Church in Sedona.

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Grand Canyon Synod, NewsBrian FlatgardCactus Conference, Capital Conference, Fiesta Conference, Northeast Valley Conference, Rio Salado ConferenceComment
A Binational Young Adult Gathering
A Binational Young Adult Gathering

A Binational Young Adult Gathering is taking place Saturday, 3/18/2023, 10am-4pm. More information and registration @ donorbox.org/events/419139. Meet at 10am at Carl’s Jr. (105 5th St., Douglas AZ 85607), to cross to Agua Prieta, Sonora.

Come learn about service, justice and faith on the U.S./Mexico borderlands with other young adults from the U.S. and Mexico.

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Grand Canyon Synod, NewsBrian FlatgardImmigration and Refugees, Ecumenical and Inter-Religious Relations, Tucson Borderlands Young Adult Volunteers, Youth and Young AdultComment
[re]imagine Lent: 3/14/2023
[re]imagine Lent: 3/14/2023

The daffodils in the courtyard at the Synod Office started poking through the ground this week. Seems a little early to me, but these beautiful green shoots are just one more reminder that this world is bigger than this moment. It’s bigger than the war in Ukraine, it’s bigger than hateful legislation, hungry people struggling to get out of poverty, and my own brokenness.

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Grand Canyon Synod, News, Leader ResourcesBrian Flatgard40 40 40 Lenten Challenge, 2023 LentComment
Reinterpreting John 9 
Reinterpreting John 9 

The healing of the blind man in John chapter 9 is one of my favorite healing stories in the whole Bible.  I love this story because in this story Jesus confronts and rejects the common belief that disabilities are somehow caused by sin. 

I commend to you the book A Healing Homiletic: Preaching and Disability by Kathy Black.  Kathy Black is an ordained Methodist minister who has served as the chaplain at Gallaudet University and pastored two churches for deaf persons.

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ELCA, NewsBrian FlatgardDisability Ministries, ELCA Disability MinistriesComment
Nourishing community and cultivating joy in Federal Way, Wash.
Nourishing community and cultivating joy in Federal Way, Wash.

If you visit the Saturday-morning farmers market in Federal Way, Wash., you might see Kay (Kyong Yon) Mattingly smiling and dancing with her friends from Dasom Bi-Cultural Cooperation, a ministry of Light of Grace Lutheran Church. The ministry hosts a booth with a variety of Korean goods for sale, but the members also seek to bring joy to those around them – and create it for themselves.

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ELCA, NewsBrian FlatgardHunger, ELCA World HungerComment
Roma refugees from Ukraine face racism, discrimination
Roma refugees from Ukraine face racism, discrimination

Mariia Simian, from Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is living through war for a second time. Just three years old when World War II tore across Europe in the 1940s, she says the memories haunt her.

“I remember everything,” she says. “I often remember. My mother hid our whole family from this horror wherever she could – in the basement, in fields behind the house – because the Nazis were looking for Roma.”

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ELCA, NewsBrian FlatgardLutheran Disaster Response, Russia and Ukraine WarComment
ELCA World Hunger's 40 Days of Giving 2023: Week Three
ELCA World Hunger's 40 Days of Giving 2023: Week Three

In Ghana, water scarcity threatens the lives and livelihoods of nearly 90% of the population. Even in urban areas, more than half the people lack access to clean, safe water. In developing countries such as Ghana, almost 80% of illnesses and deaths are caused by water-borne diseases, which in turn are driven by people needing to rely on unsafe water sources.

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ELCA, News, Leader ResourcesBrian FlatgardHunger, ELCA World Hunger, 2023 LentComment