Who We Are
The EcoFaith Network NE-MN works in collaboration with Saint Paul Area Synod Care of Creation to promote the care of creation within and beyond synods.
The EcoFaith Network of the Northeastern Minnesota Synod is a growing network of ELCA Lutheran congregations and their members with a mission to live out God's call to be stewards of the earth for the sake of the whole creation.
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The network encourages creation care awareness and action among the 133 congregations and serves as a catalyst for creation care awareness and action throughout the upper Midwest. The EcoFaith network meets on the third Wednesday of the month. For more information, contact us.
The Saint Paul Area Synod Care of Creation work group believes that we are called to care for God's creation as a central part of our Christian faith and identity. The group was established in 2018 to:
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explore life-giving ideas
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share best practices within our synod, the larger church and the community
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become part of the public and teaching voice of the church
The Care of Creation work group is part of The Bishop's Committee for Public Witness. To join or for more information contact Pr. Bob Lehner at 320-583-4732.
EcoFaith's Theme Hymn
Now the Green Blade Rises
Theme titles and Verses II, IV, VI, VII written by Paul Jacobson 2020. Permission to copy and use.
I - Promise
Now the green blade rises from the buried grain,
Green wheat that in dark earth many days has lain;
Love lives again, that with the dead has been;
Love is come again like wheat arising green.
II – Exploitation
When we use the world as if it were our own,
Planting seed with poison, causing earth to moan,
Earth turns to sand, and ice melts into sea,
Rivers turn to mud, and putrid ponds turn green.
III - Slumber
In the grave they laid Him, love by hatred slain,
Thinking that He never would awake again.
Laid in the earth like grain that sleeps unseen,
Love will come again like wheat arising green.
IV - Lament
Now our world is wounded, scarred by human greed.
Now the earth is ravaged by unbridled need.
O Lord, how long must your creation cry?
Darkness soon may come to shroud the once bright sky.
V - Death
When our hearts are wintry, grieving or in pain,
Your warm touch can call us back to life again.
Fields of our hearts, that dead and bare have been,
Long for love to come like wheat arising green.
VI - Incarnation
Come, O great Creator, as in Bethlehem,
To your world, incarnate, bringing hope again.
All creatures sing, “You only can redeem!”
Love shall come again like wheat arising green.
VII – Responsibility
Come, O Gracious Healer, source of health and life,
May we, too, be healers, we who have caused strife.
Strengthen our hands to bind the wounds of Earth,
Sharing with the world your promise of rebirth.
VIII - Resurrection
Forth He came at Easter, like the risen grain,
Jesus, who for three days in the grave had lain.
Raised from the dead, our risen Lord is seen;
Love is come again like wheat arising green.
Partner Congregations
Dear companions in care for the whole Creation,
The signs are all around us. From the disastrous floods early summer and the hottest summer and early Fall on record in Minnesota and globally, to the devastation of Hurricane Helene for our neighbors in the United States’ Southeast ~ and so much more ~ we can see that this is a Kairos moment, a decisive turning point, for the Church of Jesus Christ to respond to the climate and biodiversity crisis with faith active in love.
At our 2023 Northeastern Minnesota Synod’s assembly, we resolved to respond to “this Kairos moment of the climate crisis as a synod and as congregations”. Together as a synod, as congregations, camps, and WELCA, we ARE responding to this Kairos moment! We have become a Pollinator Synod, and 49 congregations have become or are on the way to becoming Pollinator Sanctuaries, growing a web of healthy habitat for these endangered species across northeastern Minnesota. We continue to host the annual EcoFaith Summit, which this year featured Larry Rasmussen and drew 300 people in person and online for Cross Currents in the Flood: Building Arcs Together for a Livable Planet.
Thank you for your partnership in all that is germinating in our synod for the care of creation! And thank you to this year’s twenty-two EcoFaith Network Partner Congregations, who, along with individual Donors and the synod’s budgeted commitment to the EcoFaith Network, make all this possible.
We invite you to join with your sibling congregations as a 2025 EcoFaith Network Congregation Partner by praying for the Creation and those who work to repair it, sharing with us your creation care story and making a financial contribution of any amount.Your Partner contribution helps fund EcoFaith micro-grants, the EcoFaith Summit, the Green Blades Rising Newsletter, the ecofaithnetwork.org website, and the stipend for the EcoFaith Network Communication Coordinator.
We cannot do this work alone. Thank God we do not need to do it alone. Let us turn to one another in Christ for the sake of the whole Creation! Please join your sibling congregations in the Northeastern Minnesota Synod by becoming a 2025 EcoFaith Partner Congregation!
In Christ, Green Blades Rising +
David Carlson and Kristin Foster
On behalf of the NE MN Synod EcoFaith Network Leadership
EcoFaith Network 2024 Partner Congregations
Thank you to these twenty-five congregations in the Northeastern Minnesota Synod for your contribution to our shared work as we live out God’s call to be stewards of the earth for the sake of the whole creation!
Baptism River, Finland
Bethel-Trinity, Bovey
Bethlehem, Brainerd
Bethlehem, Grand Marais
Bethlehem, Twig/Saginaw
Calvary, Mora
Church of the Cross, Nisswa
Concordia, Duluth
Faith United, Iron
First, Aitkin
First, Duluth
First, Hibbing
Gloria Dei, Duluth
Grand Marais, Bethlehem
Holden, Isle
Immanuel, Princeton
Knife River, Knife River
Lutheran Church of the Cross, Nisswa
Our Redeemer, Pine City
Our Savior’s, Outing
St. Andrews, Grand Rapids
Trinity, Cass Lake
Trinity, Hovland
Zion WELCA, Grand Rapids
Zion, Milaca
We will acknowledge all 2024 Partner Congregations at the end of the fiscal year.
Partner Organizations
Duluthians collaborating to restore monarch habitat and to educate residents about the ecology of monarchs.
The EcoFaith Network seeks to bring congregations together as we build awareness and work towards building a more sustainable, just, and equitable community. As a network, join together to take action for a new vision of God’s creation.
Lutheran Advocacy-MN is a state public policy office of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). LA-MN advocates for justice in the areas of hunger, poverty, and care of God's creation. Working together with congregations, coalitions, and legislators throughout the state of Minnesota, LA-MN creates networks to advance public policies that promote and protect the common good.
Lutherans Restoring Creation is a grassroots movement promoting care for creation in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. LRC accomplishes this by cultivating a community of dedicated stewards of earth and neighbor who proclaim God’s promise of hope and healing for all.
Minnesota Interfaith Power & Light works in partnership with faith and spiritual communities to build transformative power and bring the lights of people’s unique gifts to addressing the climate crisis.
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MNIPL grows the climate movement in Minnesota by empowering individuals and communities across the state to take action that is authentic, effective, and energizing in their context.
The Northwest Synod of Wisconsin is 1 of 65 synods in the ELCA. We are region 5-H. There are 195 congregations (over 93,000 members) in our synod.
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Synod means walking together, which describes our interdependent ministry relationship as we support mission partners, carry out synodical and churchwide initiatives, provide for education events and leadership training, respond to disaster and emergency needs, and heed the call to be a church engaged in all the world.