About Goodsoil

Goodsoil is a collaboration of organizations working for the full inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and their families in the full ministerial and sacramental life of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). We work to reconcile our church’s policies and practices regarding same-gender marriage, blessings of covenanted unions, and the rostering of partnered LGBT ministers, harmonizing these with our shared values of faith, trust, commitment, monogamy, mutuality, and dignity.

GOODSOIL IS:

Lutherans Concerned/North America
Wingspan Ministry of St. Paul–Reformation Lutheran Church
The Network for Inclusive Vision

It's About Reconciliation:
Reconciling all through Jesus Christ, God gave us the ministry of reconciliation. Throughout all of Goodsoil's efforts before and during the 2009 Churchwide Assembly, our work is to engage the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in love and in grace, speaking the truth so that we may come to renewed understanding as the Body of Christ, overcoming estrangement and discord.

It’s About Transformation:
Our mission is evangelical, recognizing how all human relationships are transformed in and through the encounter with Jesus. Set free by Christ in his forgiveness, and bound to the neighbor in love, Goodsoil grounds its work in the freedom of Christians to establish mutually supportive communities of love, care, and trust among God’s people, no matter what their sexual orientations and gender identities may be.

It’s About Proclamation:
We give witness in all ELCA contexts—congregational, synodical, and churchwide—proclaiming the message of freedom in Christ with boldness and power, as did Paul among the Gentiles, as did Peter with Cornelius, and Philip with the Ethiopian eunuch. We acknowledge and celebrate the public promises of commitment for all couples. We call for one standard of ethical conduct for all ministers—regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. We encourage all members and leaders in the ELCA to similarly give voice to the transformed relationships they see before their own eyes.