It was on the 1st
of September 2001 that I arrived in St. Petersburg to begin my
year-long internship as a part of the ELCA Horizon Program. I was
excited; I was returning to the country I had fallen in love with
while a student at St. Olaf, and I would be contributing to the
development of the Lutheran church as it re-emerged after 70 years of
repression. It would be just one year, but I was aiming to make the
most of it – to meet the other interns, to develop good
relationships with my supervisors (one from the ELCA and another from
Germany), and to be of use in the congregations (first in St.
Petersburg and then in Novgorod).
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| Leading Worship in Novgorod. 2002. |
Well, that single year
commitment to the church in Russia has now stretched in to its second
decade. So much has changed; both at St. Nikolai's in Novgorod and at
the Novosaratovka Seminary, there were many moments that inspired and
many others that brought disappointment. And now, as I start a new
ministry as a pastor in Novosibirsk, I've decided to be more
deliberate about publicly reflecting on the life of the church in
this country. When I was located in European Russia, I at least had
the illusion of being close to the West; now that I'm in Siberia, it
is clear that I am far, far away.
Over the next few months,
I hope publish updates here no less frequently than once a week. I'm
sure that this discipline will give me the chance to pause and get a
bit of perspective, while I hope that it will give you a window into
life on the other side of the planet.
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