Keynote Address

Dr. Pat Taylor Ellison will be the keynote speaker for this year’s convention. Dr. Ellison is Managing Director of Research and Development at Church Innovations, St. Paul, Minnesota. She is an accomplished consultant, trainer, curriculum designer, and speaker with 40 years of teaching experience. Her address, “Building Agreement and Strategies for Spiritual Discernment in Community,” will help us how to face conflict in a way that makes us grow healthier instead of dividing us. This is a process she knows well, teaching it in person and on line from the standpoint of theological reflection, and participating in ongoing research and writing as she works with congregations all over North America as well as in Europe and in southern Africa.

Convention 2010

The 23rd annual convention of the Gustavus Adolphus College Association of Congregations will be held on Saturday, April 17, 2010. It promises to be an enriching experience in learning and fellowship as Gustavus hosts pastors and delegates from the 546 ELCA congregations from the region and across the country that are currently members of our Association of Congregations.

Dr. Pat Taylor Ellison will be the featured speaker for this year’s convention. In her keynote address, “Building Agreement and Strategies for Spiritual Discernment in Community,” she will lead us through discussion and exercises for faith-based conversations and dealing with conflict. After taking time to dwell in Scripture, we will learn effective processes for communal listening, speaking and discernment in exercises that help to change focus and redirect energy in a faith-based community.

The morning’s keynote will tee up conversation for the afternoon when, in facilitated workshops, groups will practice these techniques as they wrestle with a key question. The process will teach us to share differences in a way that give us energy in pushing forward instead of dividing. Based on Scripture, our experience, and listening, we will face discernment questions of what the Spirit is calling us to do. The model focuses on ways of connecting and building on Christian community.

In a final closing session, Ellison will return to Scripture, then bring it all together, discussing the practical applications of this experience and using this process as a tool for congregations dealing with conflict.

The morning Chapel service will feature homilist Rev. Stanley Olson from the national office of the ELCA.

During this day, Association delegates will elect members to the Board of Trustees of the College and also the Board of Directors of the Association. The Covenant Award will be presented, recognizing an individual who has made distinctive contributions to strengthen the partnership between the College and congregations of the Church.

Convention Information

• Convention Schedule 2009
• GACAC Awards

If you would like to be registered for the Convention, please contact the Office of Church Relations.