Incarnate, Together

Beloved in Christ,

Next week, I and several members of the diocesan staff will be in residence in Northeast Minnesota for the whole week. I will be making six official visitations to congregations, and members of our team will either be joining me or making their own visitations during that time. There will also be a social gathering at St. Andrew's, Duluth, on the beach of Lake Superior on Saturday, August 5 for anyone in the mission area. You can find more details here. 

It has become my practice to spend one full week in residence in a region outside of the metro area each year, in addition to my regular schedule of travel around the diocese, and to bring as many of the diocesan staff as possible with me. The vast size of our diocese means it's easy for us to feel disconnected from one another across the many and varied geographic and cultural contexts within which we do ministry. Yet, we truly are one body, we are one team, and our central identity is the one given to us in our baptism, which transcends all the things that might divide or isolate us. It's a critically important spiritual practice to incarnate as often as we can that shared identity across time, space, and difference. My hope is that regularly spending significant time in one place can be a small part of that practice.

We will be present in mostly smaller congregations and smaller towns across the Iron Range and the North Shore. These parts of Minnesota are stunning in their natural beauty, and the lay and clergy leaders who do ministry in those places are deeply faithful, love Jesus and one another, and reach out in small, quiet, tender ways with God's love to their neighbors. It will be a full week, but I find very few things more nourishing or restorative to my soul than spending time with such people, in such places. 

I will try to share photos and stories as I go so you can follow along and get to know this part of our diocese better. Even as we continue to face the many challenges that are in front of all of us, I hope you will join me in giving thanks for this place we've been planted, and for the indescribable gift of being joined together for this very moment in the life of Christ's Church, for God's world. 

Grace and peace,

The Right Reverend Craig Loya
X Bishop