We are excited to share updates directly from our staff to you regarding our celebrations and where we are feeling called to show up as we individually and collectively explore our vocations. We asked our staff the following questions: One thing you would like to celebrate about your work from the last academic year? and What is one thing you have learned about your own vocation this last year or something you are interested in digging into more deeply when it comes to your vocation this summer and fall?
Kristina Fruge
Managing Director, CCV, 7 years this month!
I am celebrating the creation of our upcoming book written by young adults to the church. Over the past year plus, 22 authors have been gathered and supported through the writing of 11 distinct chapters – each chapter speaking to a topic young adults would like to see the church give more energy to. Currently, I am compiling and revising these chapters into a manuscript we will submit to the publisher by the end of summer. This was an incredible creative task with lots of moving parts (and authors!) As the primary editor, I am excited about what this writing community has crafted. Their collection of voices on several meaningful themes is something I am honored to steward and eager to get printed and bound and into the hands of many readers!
One of my strengths is being a connector. While I get to utilize this gift in many ways in my work, we are approaching a season of our work where I’m noticing a growing need to apply this gift more strategically. As a leader, the call I am sensing is one that utilizes my gifts as a connector towards stewarding the trustworthy relationships we have cultivated over the years of our Riverside Innovation Hub work while also investing in relationships that build sustainability for the work and to continue.
Jeremy Myers
Christensen Professor of Religion & Vocation, Executive Director of the Christensen Center for Vocation | I have been at Augsburg since 2006
I am really proud of the Uncovering Vocation series we have developed over the last two years. On the 2nd and 4th Tuesdays of most months, we invite a different member of the Augsburg University community to share a short story about their vocation during our campus wide chapel time. It has become a beautiful way for our community to become reacquainted with one another, it has deepened our appreciation for one another, and it has provided tangible examples of vocation for our students.
Over the past year I have realized that it is critical for us to find ways to weave vocation throughout the culture at Augsburg rather than leaving it only in the curriculum. That is what I will be working on doing during my sabbatical from July 1, 2024 – January 21, 2025. I will be discovering how my gifts can help Augsburg develop a rich culture of vocational discernment that benefits our students, faculty, and staff.
Gretchen Roeck
Program Director for The Confluence. I’ve been at Augsburg for 5 months and 7 days!
I am celebrating the relationships I have developed with colleagues, staff, students and congregational leaders.
I’ve learned I’m called to and find it life-giving and energizing to nurture community development and forge reciprocal relationships. The Confluence recently received a $50,000 grant from the Forum for Theological Education to build financial and programmatic sustainability. I’ll be working on an Executive Certificate in Religious Fundraising and taking a course on the Principles and Foundations of Philanthropy this fall. I’m excited to explore what community development looks like through a financial and philanthropic lens.
Geoffrey Gill
Your friendly neighborhood mystic and Congregational Facilitator, three years and counting!
I want to honor and celebrate endurance! It’s been a tough stretch, but I’ve stayed in the game, showing up day after day. That’s something I’m really proud of.
Looking ahead, I’m excited to jump back into the world of cinematography. To start creating and sharing some fresh videos with my friends and family brings me energy.
Brenna Zeimet
Congregational Facilitator, 1 year with CCV
I am celebrating that the teams I facilitate have begun to build trust and deep relationships with me, their neighbors, and each other. They have begun to realize that relationship is the project.
This job uses all the skills and gifts that I have developed over my years of work and ministry as a pastor, coach, mentor and consultant. Walking alongside these churches and helping them reorient their vision, mission and identity to align with the neighbor feels like the work that God has been preparing me for vocationally for many years. It is deeply fulfilling and meaningful, I love my job
Ellen Weber
Operations Program Associate, 2 years
I am celebrating all the events we have hosted on campus and off in this last year! From writing retreats, happy hours, webinars, launch events and learning events. It has been an honor to help turn ideas into realities and to watch how our communities experience our gatherings that help foster relationships and grow the groundswell of people who deeply care about their neighbors.
I am continuing to explore what it means to be a community builder and gatherer. This past year I took a course from Priya Parker on the Art of Gathering. It has continued to inform how we plan our gatherings and I look forward to building on what I learned in that course as we plan our upcoming gatherings in person with the Riverside Innovation Hub and online on the Riverside Collaborative.