The Augustana Story: Shaping Lutheran Identity in North America

This is the first book since 1960 to chronicle the history of the Augustana Lutheran Church, which was founded in 1860 primarily by Swedish immigrants and merged in 1962 with other bodies to form the Lutheran Church in America. The LCA merged in 1988 with the American Lutheran Church (ALC) and the Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches (AELC) to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). The Augustana Lutheran Church was the largest organization ever founded by Swedish Americans, and it gave birth to a large number of literary works, colleges, and hospitals, as well as a theological seminary.The Augustana Story explores such topics as: · Swedish Beginning· Making Lutheran Connections in America· The Next Generation· Transitioning to Being an American Denomination · An American Church in a Changing America · Augustana's Place in a Wider Religious Context · Growth and Institutional Development· Augustana and t