Current seminaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA):
In addition, the ELCA sponsors the following seminary education programs, which are not on the campus of an ELCA seminary:
Former seminaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America:
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant Lutheran church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. As of 2020, it has approximately 3.14 million baptized members in 8,894 congregations.
The American Lutheran Church (TALC) was a Christian Protestant denomination in the United States and Canada that existed from 1960 to 1987. Its headquarters were in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Upon its formation in 1960, The ALC designated Augsburg Publishing House, also located in Minneapolis, as the church publisher. The Lutheran Standard was the official magazine of The ALC.
1517 Media, formerly Augsburg Fortress Press, is the official publishing house of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), also publishing for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC) as Augsburg Fortress Canada. Headquartered on South Fifth Street in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the former headquarters of the American Lutheran Church, Augsburg Fortress publishes Living Lutheran, the Lutheran Book of Worship (1978), the Lutheran Study Bible, and Evangelical Lutheran Worship (2006), as well as a range of academic, reference and educational books. Tim Blevins has served as the CEO of 1517 Media since August, 2018. Beth Lewis served as the CEO of Augsburg Fortress since September 3, 2002.
The Lutheran Church in America (LCA) was an American and Canadian Lutheran church body that existed from 1962 to 1987. It was headquartered in New York City and its publishing house was Fortress Press.
Luther Seminary is a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. It is the largest seminary of the ELCA. It also accepts and educates students of 41 other denominations and traditions. It is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and the Association of Theological Schools. It also has theological accreditation through the ELCA as well as the United Methodist Church.
The United Evangelical Lutheran Church was one of the many denominations formed when Lutherans came to the United States from Europe. Originally known as the United Danish Evangelical Lutheran Church, the United Church merged with other Lutheran groups to form the American Lutheran Church in 1960, which endured until 1988.
The Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America is the regional ELCA judicatory of the Philadelphia metropolitan area. It is one of the 65 ELCA synods. The synod covers Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery counties as well as the City of Philadelphia.
The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg was a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It was one of seven ELCA seminaries, one of the three seminaries in the Eastern Cluster of Lutheran Seminaries, and a member institution of the Washington Theological Consortium. It was founded in 1826 under prominent but controversial theologian and professor Samuel Simon Schmucker (1799-1873) for the recently organized General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States. The seminary was the oldest continuing Lutheran seminary in the United States until it was merged on July 1, 2017, after 189 years of operation, with the nearby and former rival Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia to form the United Lutheran Seminary. The new institution continues to use both campuses.
Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary (LTSS) is a theological seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and located in Columbia, South Carolina. It offers theological degrees. In 2012, it merged with Lenoir-Rhyne University, also affiliated with the ELCA. Although Lenoir-Rhyne is based in Hickory, North Carolina, LTSS operates as a satellite campus in Columbia.
The Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC) is a consortium of five predominantly African-American denominational Christian seminaries in Atlanta, Georgia, operating together as a professional graduate school of theology. It is the largest free-standing African-American theological school in the United States.
Trinity Lutheran Seminary at Capital University is an Evangelical Lutheran seminary in Columbus, Ohio.
Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary (PLTS) is a private Lutheran seminary in Berkeley, California. It is affiliated with California Lutheran University and is a member school of the Graduate Theological Union.
The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia (LTSP), also known as the Philadelphia Seminary, was one of eight theological seminaries associated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheran denomination in North America. It is located on Germantown Avenue in the Mount Airy neighborhood of northwestern Philadelphia. Founded in 1864, it has its roots in the Pennsylvania Ministerium established in 1748 in Philadelphia by Henry Melchior Muhlenberg.
Wilma S. Kucharek is bishop of the Slovak Zion Synod.
John Christian Frederick Heyer was the first missionary sent abroad by Lutherans in the United States. He founded the Guntur Mission in Andhra Pradesh, India. "Father Heyer" is commemorated as a missionary in the Calendar of Saints of the Lutheran Church on November 7, along with Bartholomaeus Ziegenbalg and Ludwig Ingwer Nommensen.
H. George Anderson was the second Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America from October 1995 to October 2001. Prior to his term as Presiding Bishop, he was the president of Luther College in Decorah, Iowa and on the faculty of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, serving as president from 1970 to 1982.
The Pennsylvania Ministerium was the first Lutheran church body in North America. With the encouragement of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg (1711–1787), the Ministerium was founded at a Church Conference of Lutheran clergy on August 26, 1748. The group was known as the "German Evangelical Lutheran Ministerium of North America" until 1792, when it adopted the name "German Evangelical Lutheran Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Adjacent States".
The Evangelical Lutheran General Synod of the United States of America, commonly known as the General Synod, was a historical Lutheran denomination in the United States. Established in 1820, it was the first national Lutheran body to be formed in the U.S. and by 1918 had become the third largest Lutheran group in the nation. In 1918, the General Synod merged with other Lutheran denominations to create the United Lutheran Church in America. Both the General Synod and the United Lutheran Church are predecessor bodies to the contemporary Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
United Lutheran Seminary is a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in Gettysburg and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is one of the seven seminaries of the church. It was created in 2017 when the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia merged.