Recent Graduate Awardees
Founders’ Day, September 20, 2017
Citation for Rev. Martha Maier '89
Recipient of 2017 Alum Award for Distinguished Ministry as a Parish Pastor
Rev. Maier is a native of Eugene, Oregon and grew up in the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod. She did not know any Lutheran women pastors because there weren’t any.
She graduated from the University of Kansas with a degree in American Studies, being active in inter-Lutheran campus ministry. She was inspired to pursue church work, and became an LCA youth staffer in Manitoba province, Canada, centered in Selkirk. She enjoyed working with young people across the area, but became discouraged after staying in her travels with too many burned-out pastors.
So she decided to pursue a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Washington. During this time, she happened to meet her future husband, Philip Isensee. She also became involved in campus ministry under the well-known and inspiring campus minister, John Nelson. She was encouraged by him to work in lay campus ministry, and she applied and was accepted at Iowa State University in Ames. Fortunately Philip, who was trained for work in information technology, found a position at the university in information technology and they were married shortly after she began her ministry in Ames.
Martha discerned that she wanted more training for lay ministry and decided to attend seminary. When considering which one, Philip said it couldn’t be in the north. The school needed to be somewhere warm, which ruled out the northern seminaries. Between Southern and Pacific, they chose Berkeley for its location, and ecumenical character. Philip found a position at the University of California-San Francisco (UCSF). Over the course of time, Martha found herself falling into the “ordination track” at PLTS. She loved theology, worship leadership and faith formation and she found to her surprise, she was called to be a pastor. She began to overcome her initial resistance to the idea, and understood her own love of theology, faith formation and worship. She interned at Christ Lutheran Church in El Cerrito under Rev. Marty Schaefer, and after her daughter Emily was born in her fourth year, Martha stretched that year into two, while studying half time and graduating in 1989. While awaiting a call, she provided pastoral care at Christ Lutheran.
She appreciated professors Carl Graesser (her advisor with whom she shared LCMS roots), Bob Goeser for making Luther relevant, and Ted Peters in who made her a better theologian. She also grew very close to a married student formation group, which included John LaMunyon, Susan Nachtigal, Al Cassel, David Parks and Jean Duran.
Her first call was to Grace Lutheran Church in Corvallis, Oregon. During the call process she was distressed to find out this was a highly conflicted congregation. Professor Peters read the congregational profile with her and warned her that the congregation was in conflict. He reminded her, “Blessed are the Peacemakers,” a verse that kept her going during some challenging times. In this case, being forewarned helped her to be prepared. She served first with John Paulson and then with Dan Hallgrimson, spending twelve years there.
Her son Jeff was born in Corvallis. When Jeff was two years old, he received the diagnosis of Williams syndrome, which involves both particular gifts and particular challenges. Raising and advocating for Jeff, has been a critical piece of Martha’s continuing education and faith formation. Her husband, Phil, learned how to advocate for their son and for others to access and create appropriate public services,
At Grace, Martha led Christian education and youth ministries. She also started the catechumenate there, which is an enlivening journey of faith formation and concentrated program for those new to the church or the Christian faith. The program leads to baptism or the affirmation of baptism for adults who want to affirm or begin their Christian faith life. Through worship, prayer, small groups, Biblical reflection, sponsors and ministry in daily life, it transforms participants and revitalizes faith communities. Its four faith practices are: corporate worship, the study of Scripture, prayer and baptismal living. In line with Martha’s own emphases, it is: process-oriented rather than program-oriented; lay-led rather than clergy-dominated; and formation in Christ rather than information about Christ. She still serves on the national board for the catechumenate, which is now called Journey to Baptismal Living.
After twelve years at Grace, Martha took a leave from call to tend to hearth and family, while simultaneously earning a certificate in spiritual direction from Shalom Prayer Center in Mt. Angel, Oregon, and living in Vancouver, Washington. She continued preaching and did stints as an interim youth minister and intern pastor.
Three years in, she received a part-time call to St. Andrew Lutheran Church in Vancouver, Washington with lead pastor Jim Stender. There she continued in education, faith formation, catechumenate and youth ministries while also strengthening the relationships with preschool families. She developed “Preschool Sundays” during which the usual 100 people in a worship service swelled to 300 or 400, with lots of children. Imagine the logistics.
Her congregation also hosted a winter nights community homeless shelter, in their facility for five months each year which has led the congregation to adopt a goal of working to end homelessness. Of course, persons from other congregations helped staff it. With Martha’s encouragement and support, St. Andrew has become known for a center for spiritual transformation.
Martha retired from active ministry last year. She is grateful for helping communities of faith experience God’s love and gospel, and to learn together how they can make the world a better place. There is great satisfaction in helping people of all ages realize that they are a beloved children of God, and who have hope in Jesus’ name through the promise of new life in Christ.
Those who know Martha remark on her careful listening, her caring heart, her focus on prayer and healing, her creative preaching (especially for children),and children chats, her nurturing of lay leadership, her worship leadership and her intergenerational faith formation. As she puts it, “I got to do all the fun stuff.” You can too!
For these reasons and others, PLTS is pleased to bestow on the Rev. Martha Maier the 2017 Alum Award for Distinguished Service as a Parish Pastor.
Citation for Rev. Dr. Christian Scharen '96
Recipient of 2017 Alum Award for Distinguished Ministry in Special Service
Dr. Scharen’s early faith was shaped by the contrast between the warmth and kindness of his grandfather who was a Missouri Synod Lutheran pastor and the strife within his home congregation that eventually split over issues of worship and pastoral leadership. This tension between the beauty of a life of faith and the tensions of shaping communities of faith set a groundwork for Scharen’s work at the intersection of faith practices and communal life.
At Pacific Lutheran University, campus pastors Susan Briehl, Martin Wells and Dan Erlander modelled the integration of worship, community and social justice. The religion faculty engaged the intellect while reading Luther alongside of Gustavo Gutierrez, sparking further interest in social ethics, theology, culture and, ultimately, graduate study.
After a year in the Lutheran Volunteer Corps for a year, Scharen came to the Graduate Theological Union and PLTS. Timothy Lull, Marty Stortz, Robert Goeser, Robert Bellah and Julius Carroll became important mentors during this time. Graduating with his M.Div and MA in Religion and Society, He continued his engagement in these issues pursuing a PhD at Emory University in Atlanta, GA. For his dissertation, “Public Work and Public Worship,” he studied three urban congregations, including the oldest African-American church in Atlanta, to explore how their worship life shaped their engagement in the public sphere.
After completing his doctorate, Scharen accepted a call to a congregation in central Connecticut in a Puerto Rican/Dominican neighborhood. Landing in a conservative congregation outside NYC only months prior to 9/11/2001 provided a fertile ground to continue exploring issues of faith and broader community engagement. Preaching the gospel and leading in this context was a powerful experience of beauty and challenge. After serving in the congregation, he accepted a position in the Center for Faith and Culture at Yale University with Miroslav Volf.
In 2008, Scharen became a Professor of Worship at Luther Seminary. During this time he also spearheaded a Lilly Endowment grant entitled Learning Pastoral Imagination Project. This project followed 50 people in ministry over 5 years in ten different denominations, exploring how people develop pastoral skills and imagination both through and despite their formal training. While at Luther Seminary, Scharen became the Director of Contextual Education where he helped to think about how the seminary connects with cities, overcomes its isolation, works with specific neighborhoods and ministries.
In 2014, Scharen accepted the position of Vice President of Applied Research at Auburn Seminary in New York City where he leads the Center for the Study of Theological Education. Though Presbyterian in origin, Auburn embraces a multi-faith and ethnic ministry. He studies theological education and faith movements, exploring how seminaries and the church can innovate to better respond to the faith leadership needs facing our world today. He sees his work as a metaphorical gardener and midwife: planning seeds, encouraging when to push, provoking with stories and case studies, looking beyond the challenges, finding resources, struggling with questions, living with the world’s risk and uncertainty.
Scharen considers the present life of the church and the faithful as exciting and dynamic. Depending on one’s social location, it can look like a storm or a refreshing rain. As we encounter inevitable change we should not be anxious, but rather value social transformation. He has many insights about the future of the Lutheran Church, our whiteness, pastoral training processes, and our bureaucratic structures as we continue to build a church that is relevant for our culture and future.
He has written and co-authored several books, including Faith as a Way of Life: A Vision for Pastoral Leadership; Christian Practical Wisdom: What It Is, Why It Matters; One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to Those Seeking God; Broken Hallelujahs; Ethnography as Christian Theology and Ethics; and Fieldwork in Theology: Exploring the Social Context of God’s Work in the World.
Scharen lives in St. Paul and commutes to New York part time. His wife, Sonja, is a nurse midwife in a community clinic. His youngest child, Finn, is a senior in high school and oldest, Isaiah, is a sophomore at St. Olaf College.
For these reasons and others, PLTS is proud to bestow on the Rev. Dr. Christian Scharen the 2017 Alumni Award for Distinguished Ministry in Special Service.