Pastors

Within just eight days from Sunday 27 April, three people are joining the LCANZ’s pastoral ministry ranks, including the church’s second woman pastor and two Aboriginal pastors.

You’re invited to join Pray through May – a month-long invitation from LCA International Mission to intentionally spend time cultivating communities of prayer, celebrating who God is, and joining him in his mission in Australia, New Zealand and abroad.

by Jodi Brook

After the first year of a new LCANZ grants fund designed to nurture a missional culture across the church, 10 congregations have begun a journey to bring their local mission dreams into being. The LCANZ Local Mission Fund application process for 2026 grants opens on 1 July 2025.

The LCANZ has joyfully welcomed two new pastors: Mark Tung, ordained in Auckland on 6 April, New Zealand, to serve the Mandarin-speaking Botany Lutheran Church, and Maria Rudolph, the church’s first female pastor, ordained in Adelaide on 13 April. She will serve at St John’s Lutheran Church Perth.

Six people will join the LCANZ’s ordained ministry ranks in the coming six weeks, including two women in what is a first for the church.

Due to recent updates to the membership of the Commission on Theology and Inter-Church Relations (CTICR), vacancies exist for two lay members and one pastor member.