Reverend Liliana Stahlberg, Pastor

I have been the pastor of Highlands Lutheran Church in NW Denver since late fall 2009. I was blessed to receive my first call at Highlands Lutheran Church, a small but tenacious congregation in NW Denver. Together with the faithful at Highlands I hope to be building the kingdom of God in this place.

My journey to becoming an ordained pastor of the Evangelical Church in America has been long, interesting, and exciting. I grew up in Eastern Europe in the Romanian Orthodox Church. I have always loved the church as a sacred space and as the body of Christ. My call to ministry came early but I denied it; as women in the Orthodox Church are not allowed in any position of authority. By the grace of God I worked for seven years with the World Council of Churches in Geneva as a commissioner. It was there I met ordained women; who opened for me the possibility to even consider becoming a pastor. In Romania, I founded several NGOs and a shelter for street children in Bucharest. (www.macrina.ro)

In the year 2000, my family and I came to the USA and joined an ELCA congregation. I studied the ELCA confession of faith and the statements on social issues. It soon became clear to me that it was God’s gift to me to find a church body with which I could identify so closely. In 2001, I was admitted at Iliff School of Theology. I graduated in 2004 and for three years I worked in a Lutheran congregation as Director for Youth, Education, and Spiritual Formation. I started the candidacy process with the ELCA and spent my Lutheran Year at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, in Berkeley, CA, 2007-2008. After another year of internship at Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Longmont, CO, I was finally approved for ordination.

I love conversations about God, the intertwining of our life and faith, about what we really believe and why, about the universe and our place in it – in short: What does it mean to be a Christian in the 21st century? Welcome to the conversation!

Contact Reverend Stahlberg