Archives for October 2026

Do you have a prayer or hymn that is meaningful to your faith? A prayerbook is being created by and for the Luther Seminary community, and we want your suggestions. Please email prayers or hymns to aaakre002@luthersem.edu with the subject line “prayer.” We’re not able to take original compositions—only existing texts. Please include whatever information you have about copyright to the text you’re submitting. Search through hymnals, wallets, and prayerbooks for those beloved words that aided you, so they might now aid others.

In this devotion, Deborah Jorgens ’19 M.A., says the life of faith isn’t easy and living it out in community is a gift. Read today’s God Pause.

Reminder: Our Portico Open Enrollment presentation will be held this Wednesday, October 14, 9–10:30 a.m. CT in OCC 10. Portico representatives will be on campus to present plan details, review key updates for the 2027 plan year, and answer any questions you may have. (See Zoom option in the calendar invitation). Other reminders:

• Open Enrollment Window. Open Enrollment officially begins on Monday, October 19. Watch for your email invite directly from Portico starting that day (sent in batches over a few days). Everyone will have two full weeks to complete enrollment.
• Overview of Benefit Changes. Calendar invites and the 2027 Overview of Benefit Changes/premium rates have already been sent out.
• Recording. If you are unable to join us live, the presentation will be recorded and shared with all faculty and staff afterward.

If you have any questions ahead of Wednesday’s session, please email Carrie Johnson (cjohnson007@luthersem.edu) or Joe Ahrens (jahrens001@luthersem.edu).

Come and sing with us! All students, faculty, and staff are welcome to join the Luther Seminary Chapel Choir. We rehearse weekly 12:15–1:15 p.m. after Wednesday chapel and sing about once a month during Wednesday worship. People of all singing and music-reading abilities are welcome. Please fill out this online form to indicate your interest.

Students, faculty, staff, join my former NYC parish, Saint Thomas Church 5th Avenue, this Wednesday, October 14 at 6 p.m. CT, for this year’s John Henry Hobart Theology Lecture with Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury. Rowan Williams served as Archbishop of Canterbury from 2002 to 2012, leading the worldwide Anglican Communion through a period of profound challenges. Twenty-five years after 9/11, he will reflect on questions that concern us all: How can we resist the temptation to turn strangers into enemies? How do we rebuild trust in a divided world? How can we rediscover the bonds of solidarity that make genuine community possible? Archbishop Rowan was himself in Manhattan on September 11, 2001, and his experience that day inspired his moving book “Writing in the Dust.” I hope you will join this call for what promises to be an exceptionally thoughtful and inspiring evening. Registration for Twenty-Five Years after 9/11: Strangers, Neighbors, and the Work of Solidarityi s required.
—Timothy Higdon

In this devotion, Deborah Jorgens ’19 M.A., says there is only one true God worthy of our praise. Read today’s God Pause.