Project ID: LM0006-65011

Twenty-five ladies from five countries gathered for Latin America & the Caribbean’s pilot deaconess intensive in 2016. Afterward, they were excited to promote Concordia the Reformer Seminary’s three-year diaconal formation program. As a result, nearly a hundred deaconesses recently graduated, and over 70 more are enrolled in the current cohort. The program has expanded to nine countries.

Deaconesses work in harmony with pastors and other church workers, caring for members and engaging in community outreach. They do acts of mercy while sharing God’s Word with the poor in spirit, the hurting and the marginalized. Deaconesses serve in a variety of ways, for example, disability ministry in the Dominican Republic, soup kitchens in Mexico, community outreach in Panama, and Sunday schools in Guatemala. The program includes women from the countries just mentioned, as well as Uruguay, Peru, Honduras, Spain, and Venezuela.

The deaconess formation program utilizes an online platform for intensive courses co-taught by a seminary professor and a deaconess. Local in-person classes taught by a pastor and a deaconess mentor bolster the online intensive courses, providing additional hands-on projects and discussion opportunities. Lord willing, the new deaconesses will be a great blessing to the Church as they spread the Gospel to a hurting and broken world.

Deaconess Formation

Checks should be made out to Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod or LCMS Memo Line: Project ID: LM0006-65011
The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod Mission Advancement
P.O. Box 66861
St. Louis, MO 63166-6861