The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod entered into a partnership in 2004 with Bethesda Lutheran Homes and Services, Inc., and the Central American Lutheran Mission Society (CALMS). The D.R. mission has since planted four churches, two adjacent Lutheran church-schools, and established a seminary for forming pastors. Concordia The Reformer Seminary was opened in 2010 in Palmar Arriba, Santiago, and serves all of the Caribbean, Latin America and Northern South America with ten residential students from seven countries. The seminary supports the formation of pastors to spread the Word, plant churches, and show mercy. An emphasis of mercy work in the Dominican Republic is ministry to people with developmental disabilities through Hogares Luteranos el Buen Pastor, a group home for several young adults. This ministry serves as a beacon to the community as an example of Christian care giving, and has led to positive change within numerous government institutions.
On Sunday, September 10, Concordia the Reformer Seminary in the Dominican Republic celebrated the installation of her new director, Rev. Sergio Fritzler. Pastors from five countries participated in the special service, with seminarians, missionaries, deaconesses, Dominican Lutheran Church members, Concordia Lutheran school children and faculty joining in the festivities.
Concordia the Reformer Seminary welcomed distance-learning Formación Pastoral Hispano (FPH) students and pastoral mentors from several Latin American countries to a week-long symposium in January. The FPH program is similar to the SMP program at our LCMS seminaries in the United States. This program consists of sixteen courses with the students taking four courses a year, with pastoral mentors assigned to them. The focus of the FPH program is on the pastoral acts.
The Lutheran Heritage Foundation (LHF) is a great help for the mission work in Latin America. We are grateful for their excellent work and congratulate them on thirty years of service to the Lord’s Church worldwide.
Concordia the Reformer Seminary’s deaconess program provides training for women in five Latin American countries: the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Mexico, Panama and Venezuela.
Lutherans in the Dominican Republic are excited and grateful for the recent shipment of books from the Lutheran Heritage Foundation (LHF).
In cooperation with the Bible Society of Brazil and the Bible Society of the Dominican Republic, LHF just sent over 2000 books to the Caribbean country for distribution to Lutheran missions nationwide.
Missionaries, seminarians and congregation members in Palmar Arriba, Dominican Republic, planned for about fifty children from the community to attend a week-long Bible camp. The camp gave children a place to be for a couple of hours during the heat of the Dominican afternoons and featured daily Bible stories, memory work, games, crafts, songs and snacks.
Today we said farewell to a valuable member of the Latin America & Caribbean missionary team. Courtney Zalmanoff, a GEO missionary arrived in the Dominican Republic on September 30, 2019. Armed with degrees in Spanish and Psychology, she faithfully carried out her role as assistant volunteer coordinator for over two years.
“Christ for all! That is how we can define the Alliance Project. From February 28 to March 14, 2021, on a trip to the Dominican Republic, I had the great opportunity to accompany eight IELB pastors and their families in language, culture and mission training. What a challenge! What learning! More than a special moment, as the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Brazil (IELB) and The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod (LCMS) joined forces in this project to bring the love of Jesus to different peoples and cultures.
Missionary Pastor Andrew Schlund, his wife, Kelsey, and their two little daughters, Charlotte and Margaret are on their way back to the United States. They have faithfully served as LCMS missionaries since June of 2015. Rev. Schlund worked tirelessly as Pastor of Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd in Mexico City, and as an adjunct professor for Concordia the Reformer Seminary in the Dominican Republic.
Our heavenly Father is faithful and has certainly protected and provided for His six children that He has placed in our care. January 3, 2021, marked the 10th anniversary of our kids moving out of the government orphanage and into the loving home prepared for them. The Lord has heard your prayers on their behalf. He has provided through all of you over the past ten years so that they might know the love of Christ Jesus.
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