ELCA’s Gathers look to invite young adults into a more familiar kind of ‘church’

ALEXANDRIA, Minn. -- Riley Santelman grew up loving her home church of Gustavus Adolphus Lutheran Church in nearby Foley, Minn. 

Her mom was a local elementary principal and many folks from the school and their children also attended the same church.

And Santelman remembers the formative experience fondly. 

“We were pretty connected,” said Santelman, who nowadays serves as the youth ministry coordinator at First Lutheran Church in Alexandria. “Confirmation was impactful. So was later attending Luther Crest Bible Camp. … Impactful.”

Being a “super-reserved, shy kid,” Santelman said those close-knit experiences helped shape her faith even today, and continues to influence the work she does in the broader Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

You see, while not performing youth ministry coordination at First Lutheran, she also serves halftime as a Gather network coordinator for ELCA Young Adults Ministry and volunteers as a co-leader of one of Minnesota’s newest networks called “Gather Lakes Area.”

For context, let’s unpack all that a bit …

The ELCA Young Adults Ministry “offers inspiration, opportunities and resources for young adults … and for people who facilitate young adult ministry in their communities of faith,” according to the ministry’s website, which continues: “The ELCA is expanding its vision of what it means to be church and what it means to engage a population of young adults who are seeking authentic community and opportunities to serve their neighbors.”

The ELCA considers anyone aged 18 to 35 as a young adult.

One form that this ministry is taking is being funded by a generous grant that is providing seed funds for young adults to create “Gathers” in their communities, which all look as unique as the people creating them and the communities in which they spring up. 

For those steeped in a lifetime of traditional church, the concept may seem a bit amorphous. For instance, “Gathers” are formed by young adults themselves, and can be led by clergy but don’t have to be. Additionally, most don’t have a traditional church homebase, and often hold their gatherings -- not worship services -- at a series of non-traditional spaces, including coffee shops, breweries and even outdoors.

Partly a social event, partly a faith event, a “Gather” event can take on many forms. For instance, for the “Gather Lakes Area” group which has held two events, the first was a game night at a coffee shop, and the second was a “Cookies and Conversation” event at Luther Crest Bible Camp, which is situated just outside of Alexandria.

But what a Gather is not … is a church service.

“This is different from worship,” Santelman said. “If folks who have a faith lens would see a ‘Gather’ event, they’d understand that. It’s a space by and for young people to engage with Christ and the church, and it can be transformative. They are choosing to be there willingly to have that experience.”

What makes the concept difficult for some to understand is that a “Gather’s” faith formation practices take place outside the walls of a church and generally in a less formal setting.

However, Santelman insists that the ministry’s goal is to get young adults together to have deeper and more meaningful conversations regarding faith.

“Young people are looking for supportive social networks in their lives, even if it’s not a faith-based source,” Santelman said. “But a ‘Gather’ is not just a social club. The goal is that young adults can feel fed in their faith in meaningful community at this stage in life, knowing that their mature faith will lead them to engage with the world in various ways. After all, they do have hope that the church will live and grow. They still believe that people still need to hear Christ’s message.”

Santelman said participating in a “Gather” satisfies a faithful hunger in young people without them having to commit to a church congregation … just yet. She said that people this age often are still exploring who they are, and they’re often trying to just make ends meet financially while not knowing where they might eventually set down long-term roots. So committing to a church congregation can seem daunting.

But participating in a “Gather,” well, that’s more their speed. 

Nationwide, the ELCA Young Adults Ministry, has granted 20-some “Gathers” seed money to get started. And in Minnesota, “Gather Lakes Area,” while one of the newest, joins a handful of others, including “Gather Twin Cities” launched in 2019, one in Detroit Lakes that’s just getting started, one in Bemidji and one just started in the area of Mille Lacs/Isle/Camp Onamia.

As a college student, Santelman returned during the summers to work at Luther Crest Bible Camp, which had an enormous impact on her faith formation in her younger years.

And then Santelman says she fell in love with her faith while studying biology and neuroscience at Concordia College in Moorhead, Minn. She says that she “accidentally” ended up in a religion class that was cohort based, and she absolutely loved it. Those same classmates today still stay connected, and they do a book club regularly on Zoom.

Additionally, she said that the COVID pandemic exploded in her junior year of college, but when she returned back to in-person school, her first class was ecology and faith, and she was hooked.

After Concordia, it was off to Yale Divinity School with her husband, Henri, whom she had met working summers at Luther Crest. Henri obtained a master’s degree in religion, and Santelman obtained her master’s in divinity degree, although she did not pursue the ordination track.

They moved back to Minnesota in May 2024, and promptly settled in at Luther Crest, where Henri is the program director for the camp. And Santelman balances her obligations both as the youth ministry coordinator at First Lutheran in Alexandria, and as the Gather Network coordinator with the ELCA Young Adult program.

Santelman is passionate about this new churchwide initiative for young adults.

“It’s about meeting with other people your age and talking about the Bible,” Santelman said. “The hardest part is really scheduling that first meeting. Lots of people are excited about young adult ministry. But then you gotta just take the leap! “Our hopes really are that we’ll form a core group of people who will show up to these events and talk about their faith.”