Cover & Highlights for June/July 2023 Issue

(updated from the print edition)
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The cover is the design by Grand View University alumnus, class of ‘95, David “Zane” Vredenburg, for a commemorative print for this summer’s trip to Denmark by Dr. Rachelle Keck, President of Grand View, along with others associated with the university. Besides the Rebild July 4 celebration, where Dr. Keck will speak next year, the trip included meetings with officials in government, business/industry, and education.

The issue opens with a description of the recent 150th anniversary of West Denmark Lutheran Church of Luck, WI. [The photo with the print edition is mistakenly of a different congregation.] The artful lyrics of the event's gathering song, “Six Hundred Seasons,” by Henrik Strandskov, convey the inspiration from nature that heirs of Grundtvigian immigrants still hold. Following the song, Erik Hansen channeled his grandfather with a presentation in the old Danish storytelling tradition, printed here as “Living the Dream—Stories of the Early Immigrants.”

Then for a story about a Danish immigrant, at least an out- line of it, Rolf Buschardt Christensen gives us the first chapter of his recently released book “Cape Scott Pioneer: The Life and Times of Carl Brinck Christensen.”

We then fast forward about 100 years to have the continu- ation of “Preservation and Motherhood on the Northern Great Plains,” the interview of Kim Rudningen, from Dagmar, MT, by Megan Torgerson, featured on the first episode of Reframing Rural Podcast. With this, let us continue to lift her community in prayer after the devastating fire that recently consumed Nathanael Lutheran Church.

The world seems to easily forget hardships and losses, as we see with lives moving on from the COVID-19 pandemic. While individually we were affected in different ways, this collective experience has been truly remarkable, as we are reminded in excerpts from the final chapters of Unafraid, 2nd Edition: Pew, Pulpit, and Pandemic, published by Joy Marie Ibsen.

The next two articles “Grand View University Nurtures Next Generation of Lutheran Leaders,” by Kate Foss. and “Pastor Bert’s Musings,” by Albert Bodaski, speak to the journey of faith being nurtured by community, whether in a program for high schoolers or participating in the Eucharist as an evangelical catholic.

In extended extracts from his academic paper, “From Na- tion Building to Global Citizenship: Human Rights Education in the Nordic Folk High Schools,” Johan Løvgen argues that the community setting and pedagogical approach of Grundtvig’s “schools for life,” are well-suited for human rights education.

Then there is a last call for the Danebod Fall Meeting.

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