We are happy to share with you the gift that we, ourselves, have received from those who founded this congregation, and from those who, with vision and courage, have renewed it and are renewing it still.
1899 The First Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Congregation is organized and purchases a lot on Rincón Hill in San Francisco.
1903 Ansgar Danish Lutheran Congregation is organized and selects a site on Church Street in San Francisco for its new church. The Ansgar Danish church was essentially completed just after San Francisco’s 1906 earthquake and fire. This is the building in which we worship today. Look around, and you can see beautiful artwork dating back to the very beginning of this congregation.
1906 The First Finnish church is dedicated in early April, but that congregation worships in their new building only once or twice before the April 19, 1906, earthquake
and subsequent fire destroys it.
1906–1936 First Finnish builds a new church and parsonage with the name Gethsemane at 50 Belcher Street, directly behind Ansgar Danish.
1964 Gethsemane and Ansgar merge and become St. Francis. The pastor encourages St. Francis to minister to its diverse community. A childcare center opens at the Belcher Street property. Outreach to Latino and Black families and to the growing Castro community begins.
1980s The AIDS crisis: At the height of the AIDS crisis, funerals are held several times a week for both members and non-members of St. Francis.
1990 St. Francis becomes the first Lutheran church in America to ordain and call openly gay clergy: St. Francis calls the Rev. Ruth Frost and the Rev. Phyllis Zillhart as its
pastors, breaking an ELCA rule that forbade congregations from calling gay or
lesbian pastors unless they had taken a vow of celibacy. The congregation is put on
trial, along with First United Lutheran Church of San Francisco, which had called a
gay seminary graduate, the Rev. Jeff Johnson, as its pastor. The ELCA Synod
(Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) holds a trial and finds both churches in
violation of the rule.
Dec. 31, 1995 St. Francis and First United are removed from the ELCA roster. St. Francis starts Lutheran Lesbian and Gay Ministries (LLGM), and with growing leadership nationwide, several groups begin advocating for the full inclusion of sexual minorities in the ELCA.
On January 1, 1996, St. Francis Lutheran Church was expelled from the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America (ELCA), along with First United Lutheran Church of San Francisco, for violation of a provision of the ELCA constitution. In January 1990, the two congregations had called and ordained a gay man and a lesbian couple, graduates of Lutheran seminaries, who were not approved for ordination by the ELCA solely because they refused to pledge lifelong abstinence from sexual relations. We believe gay people are as much a part of the
Body of Christ as anyone else.
Lutheran Lesbian and Gay Ministries, a predecessor of Extraordinary Lutheran Ministries (elm.org), was started by members of St. Francis to respond to the exclusiveness of the ELCA.
2009–2010 The ELCA re-examined their constitution and voted to make key changes in 2010. These changes were more friendly to lesbian, gay, and transgender clergy, allowing them to join the ELCA as clergy. The ELCA votes for full inclusion of sexual minorities, and in 2010, the Sierra Pacific Synod invites St. Francis to return. St. Francis accepts in July 2010.
Feb. 27, 2011 St. Francis celebrates its reconciliation with the ELCA.
Dec. 10, 2016 St. Francis celebrates its 110th anniversary in the Castro neighborhood.
