New Haven's Little Piece of Home.

The following post is a paper written for my JRN 320: Magazine Writing Class.

Every Sunday at 5:00 p.m, Yale student Stevie Roets walks up the steps of 27th High Street in New Haven, Conn. After opening the white door, he is greeted by the sounds of hymns accompanied by a piano in the background and the mouthwatering scent of the dinner following the service getting prepared in the kitchen-this Sunday it’s pasta. As he enters the worship space--which is the living room in the home--he see the group sitting in a circle. They are  gathered around a table containing two candles that have just been lit. Golden brown bread and wine the color of blood are in between them, signifying the body and blood shed for Christ. Stevie sits down and begins to join the chorus of the opening Hymn.  Rev. Kari Henkelmann Keyl smiles at him as she welcomes him to Sunday night worship at Luther House.

After the worship service ends, Stevie exchanged hugs with others who have come to worship because the peace offering was saved at the end. Some of them have come to Luther House for the first time, while he recognizes some of the familiar faces of the regulars. This weeks' group is composed of undergraduates, graduate, Divinity School students and even interested New Haven community members who just wanted to stop by to see what Luther House was all about.

Roets, a sophomore double majoring in Ethics, Politics and Economics and Art with concentration in painting and printmaking, attends Luther House regularly. He has attended Sunday night worship every Sunday since the second semester of his freshman year, as well as regularly participating in other events that Luther House sponsors such as tutoring and Bible Study. “It's a really great community. We all care deeply about the world and people around us,” says Roets. “We all support each other, can recollect about things in our past, and be open with each other.  It is a community that I can feel comfortable in.”

Luther House, which is Yale’s Lutheran Community, is one of Yale’s 30 plus religious communities which strives for diversity and social justice. According to the Yale Religious Ministries Chaplin’s page, these communities are dedicated to “the spiritual, ethical, intellectual, social, and physical welfare of students, faculty, and staff.” The site goes on to say these religious communities are “committed to strengthening the University in its task of educating students and expanding the boundaries of human knowledge” as well as being “committed to strengthening the University in its task of educating students and expanding the boundaries of human knowledge.”

Located on 27th High Street, right across the street from Fro Yo World, the community does several things to help with its' desire for social justice. For starters, the space is a LGBTQIAA (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning, Asexual and Agender) friendly space and devotes to making sure that no matter what sexuality someone is, they feel they are welcome. The space also houses residents, which include a variety of Yale students, all of which have a passion for justice. There’s a garden out in its backyard, which the residents tend to and then donate its contents to local soup kitchens.

Luther House’s current Pastor is Rev. Kari Henkelmann Keyl. Keyl has been an ordained ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church of American) pastor since 1990. She has been the pastor at Luther House since 2011. Keyl is committed for Luther House to be a space for those who are not only “curious” but also “have a passion for justice.”

On the Luther House website, Keyl encourages those who have questions to reach out to her (as she leaves her personal cell phone number and email address on there), and is willing to meet with those who need to talk by treating them with a “cup of coffee or tea at Starbucks” as well as “a frozen yogurt from Fro Yo.” Although Keyl has worked in more traditional congregations, she enjoy how Luther House is a non-traditional aspect to connect with students. “I really like the opportunity to engage with students,” she says. “I look for ways to connect with what you’re learning at school to real life.”

Keyl wears many hats at Luther House. She preaches every Sunday and leads the service, but she also tends to the Community Garden and keeps up with the upkeep of the house. However, her biggest goal is to create an environment where students can feel at home and welcome in. "You just have to be someone who is asking questions and want to be with others who like to ask questions," says Keyl.

Although Keyl is in the process of finding out more about the history about Luther House, she can confirm that the community started in the 40s. Back then, it was called the Lutheran Student Association. "It was a group of Lutheran students and faculty," says Keyl. In 1968, the building which would later become Luther House. "The building was a place for the pastor to live," says Keyl. According to Keyl, in the 1970s, the house was remodeled to house a community of Christian students and in the 1980s the invitation to live at Luther House expanded to those outside the ministry. In 2014, she says it became a social justice based community.

Luther House’s main event is Sunday Worship which occurs at 5:00 p.m. every Sunday during Yale’s semester. Worship consists of prayers, bible readings, communion, singing and listening to a sermon usually given by the pastor or the current intern. After the service is done, dinner is served. It’s provided by a local member in the community. Once every member of the group fills their plate, they sit down on the couches and enjoy their meal together.

Luther House sponsors more activities than just Sunday night worship. Tuesday nights at 9:15 p.m. is Taize Prayer which is held in the historical Dwight Chapel. Taize Prayer, which is a combination of prayer and song modelled after a community in Taize, France. Thursday nights from 6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m members go to tutor struggling students at Resurrection Lutheran Church also located in New Haven.

In addition to its regular events, Luther House hosts a Theological Coffee House. This event discusses issues at hand, and varies in topics--from mental health, peace in the Middle East and race---just to name a few.  

Some of the recent guest speakers  include the Bethesda Lutheran Church Pastor, Rev. Tim Keyl who talked about the Middle East Crisis and how Lutherans can get to be more involved in the efforts for peace. The most recent guest was Yale Divinity School Professor Jan Holton, who talked about faith and the mental illness.

Students around Yale enjoy the community that Keyl has created, as well as her efforts to make Luther House run smoothly. “Kari is just a very genuine and open and welcome. She's a quiet spirit. She allows students to make their decisions. She's a very calming presence for a lot of people,” says Brad Abromaitis, who is on the directing committee of Luther House. The Directing Committee, according to Abromaitis, is “the support for Kari and what she does.”   

Abromaitis has been attending Luther House regularly for the past three years. He’s currently getting his PhD in History, however he got his Masters in Divinity in 2013. As a former Yale Divinity School student, Abromaitis says there’s a “good engagement with Luther House and the Divinity School.”  Abromaitis believes this because of the fact many Master of Divinity students “are involved with services on Sunday so they can come to worship at night.”

Luther House is also a place where many students who are in the process of getting their Master’s in Divinity come to do their internships. Former intern Miriam Samuelson, who is scheduled to graduate May 2015, was the intern for the 2013-2014 school year. However, she has been involved with the community for almost three years. “When I first started going to Luther House I liked the almost family like dinner both in worship and in dinner. It's very intimate,” she says. “I felt like I got to get exposed to a broad diversity to ways of being with church. the tutoring is more like an outrage ministry, bible study  was more of an intellectual ministry, and taize was a spiritual ministry.”

She first started attending the Sunday night worship while her friend was the intern. One of her favorite parts about being a part of the Luther House Community is the Taize Prayer service. “It's a really powerful experience. You go in with very little instruction,” she says. “You have a song booklet and the whiteboard with the hymn numbers. The leader starts singing it and over and over. These songs become a part of you from singing so much. The idea is that the song is a part of your body and a part of your bones.”

Although Samuelson is graduating from the Divinity School, she says she’ll miss Luther House. “I felt like whoever shows up that day is my community, and I feel like we always things to talk about and things to connect about,” says Samuelson. “Sometimes it's little things and big things. I spend so much of my time surrounded with people who are doing the same things as me, and it's a really amazing sense of diversity.”