Dear Friends in Christ,
For the past months, my office made available a series of videos under the initiative MNYSvotes. This guide focused on voting, to encourage all individuals equally. I am grateful for all our members who participated in this past election — by voting and volunteering — and made choices consistent with your faith values.
Now it is time to pray for our leaders and, as Bishop Eaton reminded us in one of her latest pastoral video messages, we [the ELCA] "will continue to lift up the gospel of Jesus Christ as the basis for equity, justice, and peace for all peoples and creation. As disciples in a democracy, we will hold fast to our commitments to gender justice, to dismantling white supremacy as an anti-racist church, to welcoming the stranger and accompanying the neighbor, to affirming LGBTQIA siblings, and seeking economic justice for all."
In all of this, we remember that we are Church TOGETHER.
Remember that we are Lutheran Christians, and we have a mission in and for this world. Let’s look across aisles and pews and have loving, healing conversations with our siblings. Let’s talk to each other with respect and openness and continue to advance the mission of our Church — the Gospel — TOGETHER.
Because we are a Church that belongs to Christ, and there is a place for everyone here.
In Christ,
Bishop Egensteiner