Photo Exhibition
Reception area
The LWF President is Bishop Henrik Stubkjær, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Denmark. His first official visit to the communion’s churches in April 2024 was to Tanzania and Ethiopia. On his itinerary in Tanzania, Bishop Stubkjær, witnessed how the sisters of the Community of Hope in Moshi are promoting renewable energy and climate friendly agriculture. Photo: LWF/A. Danielsson
Titled Sharing Hope – Empowering churches, impacting the world, the LWF Strategy 2025-2031 focuses on empowering people and churches to be signs of hope through words and deeds, bringing peace and healing, working for justice and reconciliation. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
LWF General Secretary Rev. Dr Anne Burghardt, Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church, is the first woman to serve as LWF's chief executive officer. The general secretary’s engagement with member churches in their local contexts contributes to strengthening communion relations. Her November 2023 visit to the 14 churches in Indonesia, included discussions with Bishop Firman Sibarani, Indonesian Christian Church (HKI) in Siantar. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Members of the LWF Council at their first meeting, following the September 2023 Assembly in Kraków, Poland. Elected by the Assembly, the Council is LWF’s governing body between assemblies. It comprises 48 members, the President and the Chairperson of the Finance Committee. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Created by artist Christian Chavarria Ayala for the Joint Catholic-Lutheran Commemoration of the Reformation in 2016, the Salvadoran Cross depicts the triune God’s creative, reconciling and sanctifying work. Photo: LWF/M. Renaux
Former LWF Vice-President Rev. Dr Prasanna Kumari (1950 – 2006), India, at a church service of the October 1999 signing of the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (JDDJ) in Augsburg, Germany. The historic agreement between Lutherans and Catholics, resolving divisions on the “basic truths” of salvation as a free gift from God, has been affirmed by Methodists, Anglicans and the Reformed. Photo: LWF/K. Wieckhorst
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More than 1,000 worshippers from various churches attended a November 2023 ecumenical prayer service in the Pearaja congregation of the Protestant Christian Batak Church (HKBP) in Tarutung, Indonesia. The service coincided with General Secretary Anne Burghardt’s visit to the 14 Lutheran churches in the country. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Youth from Lutheran churches across Europe during the March 2023 regional Pre-Assembly, held at Mansfield College, Oxford, United Kingdom. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
A February 2023 visit by LWF General Secretary Rev. Dr Anne Burghardt to the United States included meetings in Chicago with leaders of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. In New York and Washington DC, she met with United Nations officials, LWF partners, US Senate and State Department representatives, and launched a report on LWF's COVID-19 advocacy. Photo: LWF/A. Danielsson
An altar cross at the Resurrection Church of the Christian Lutheran Church in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Leaders of the church hosted General Secretary Rev. Dr Anne Burghardt during her October 2023 visit to LWF member churches and country programs in Central America. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Supporting churches' ministry: “Sharing the table” was the theme of a November 2022 workshop held in Porto Alegre, Brazil, bringing together diaconal practitioners from 11 LWF member churches in the Latin America and Caribbean region. Photo: LWF/Eugenio Albrecht
The LWF is a communion of 150 member churches representing over 78 million Christians in 99 countries around the world. Congregants gather for Sunday worship in Moshi Lutheran Cathedral, Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
During a May 2024 solidarity visit to the German Evangelical Lutheran Church of Ukraine hosted by Bishop Pavlo Schvarts, LWF President Bishop Henrik Stubkjær and General Secretary Rev. Dr Anne Burghardt participated in Sunday worship at the St Catherine Lutheran Church in Kyiv, Ukraine. Photo: LWF/ Anatolyi Nazarenko
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The LWF Youth program empowers and supports youth across the communion by working with member churches to include young people more fully in leadership, theological education, and participation in networks such as the Global Young Reformers and Peace Messengers, and climate justice. Photo: LWF/Johanan Celine Valeriano
Strengthening theological education across the Lutheran communion is a major priority. The LWF is committed to supporting theological education through various programs in order to develop leaders who are equipped for the complexities and changing realities of today’s world. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
The LWF Youth program empowers and supports youth across the communion by working with member churches to include young people more fully in leadership, theological education, and participation in networks such as the Global Young Reformers and Peace Messengers, and climate justice. Photo: LWF/Johanan Celine Valeriano
Strengthening theological education across the Lutheran communion is a major priority. The LWF is committed to supporting theological education through various programs in order to develop leaders who are equipped for the complexities and changing realities of today’s world. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
LWF World Service is known for working in countries and regions where few international aid organizations are willing to go. One such crisis is the protracted conflict in the Central African Republic, where LWF’s response includes support to both the internally displaced people inside the country and to those who have fled to neighboring Cameroon. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Youth have been instrumental in the Lutheran communion’s leadership in climate justice matters. Since 2011, LWF’s delegations to the annual United Nations climate conference – COP (Conference of the Parties) have been led by youth highlighting care for creation, and inclusion of the most vulnerable people affected by climate change around the world. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Fellowship and spiritual nourishment are an integral part of LWF’s gatherings. Most regional meetings begin and close with a worship service that includes celebration of Holy Communion. Daily biblical reflections and prayers are part of the morning and evening devotions. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
LWF’s commitment to gender justice is grounded in the theological conviction that all people are created in God’s image as equals in rights and dignity. The program in this area prioritizes theological education and leadership training to address systems and situations of imbalance among the member churches, country programs and the Communion Office. Photo: LWF/S. Gallay
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In countries under the Central America regional program, LWF collaborates with churches and local organizations to advocate on critical issues including human rights, food security, financial policies and climate justice. In Honduras, training and other forms of assistance are provided to young returnee migrants to help them resettle and reintegrate back into society. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Started as a refugee operation in 1948, LWF’s work in Jerusalem continues to primarily serve Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, including access to health services at the August Victoria Hospital in East Jerusalem. The hospital has become the main referral center for specialized treatment of cancer and diabetes, while also paying attention to social, economic, and mental health needs. Photo: LWF/Atta Jabr
In Myanmar where LWF’s humanitarian intervention began in 2008, the LWF is the main coordinating agency for eight camps sheltering internally displaced people from the Rohingya community and from the local population in Rhakine state. The services provided include education in 90 schools and 20 child friendly spaces. Photo: LWF Myanmar/Isaac Kyaw Htun Hla
The LWF headquarters are in Geneva, Switzerland. Led by the General Secretary with support from the Communion Office Leadership Team, staff based in Geneva and other cities around the world carry out the work mandated by the Assembly and Council, and facilitate collaboration with the member churches, related agencies, theological institutions, ecumenical and other partners. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
The LWF has a dynamic workforce. Out of its 100 Communion Office employees, two thirds are based in Geneva, and the rest operate from other cities around the world. Nearly 7,000 people from different cultural and faith backgrounds work in the country programs as international and national staff, incentive workers, and volunteers. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
LWF World Service is one of the largest faith-based humanitarian actors worldwide. Its work is carried out through 18 programs in 24 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Central America, the Caribbean and the Middle East. The focus is on three programmatic priorities: livelihoods, protection and social cohesion, and quality services. In Burundi, women in a cooperative group receive maize for agricultural inputs. Photo: LWF/L. Gillabert
In Jordan, where the LWF has been present since 2012, focus is on the refugee crisis caused by the civil war in neighboring Syria and Iraq. Education and sports are part of the activities organized to support Syrian and Iraqi refugees and vulnerable Jordanians. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
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The annual seminar for Lay Leaders plays an important role in connecting church leaders across the global communion. The LWF provides this platform to support member churches in practicing good governance and transparent leadership. Photo:
In the World Service country programs, international and national staff, incentive workers, and volunteers support refugees and internally displaced people and host communities. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in Iraq, for example, LWF staff distributed food and other basic supplies to vulnerable families in Summel District in Dohuk Governorate. Photo: LWF Iraq
LWF staff stay connected through real-time communication and regular online meetings. The annual in-person Days of Meetings at the Ecumenical Center in Geneva helps to strengthen a sense of community, and to review and strategize for the work ahead. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
LWF’s highest decision-making body is the Assembly, which convenes every seven years. The Thirteenth Assembly was held, 13-19 September 2023, under the theme “One Body, One Spirit, One Hope.” It was hosted by the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Poland at the ICE Congress Center in Kraków. More than 1,300 people, including 327 member church delegates participated. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
The LWF supports its member churches to strengthen their witness, serving people in need and working for peace and jusice. In this photo, the tower of Saint Peter Lutheran Church in Monrovia, where some 600 people were killed in 1990 during the civil war in Liberia. The Lutheran Church in Liberia took a leading role in the conflict resolution and peace building process in the country. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
The expertise of LWF’s workforce ranges from theology to capacity building, project management, advocacy, and humanitarian and development work. Photo: LWF/Marie Renaux