From canteens and pantries to community meals, health clinics, microloans, and campaigns to address homelessness, Lutheran churches in Baltimore, MD offer a variety of special services to their congregations. Throughout the year, there is a weekday Mass on Wednesdays. This provides a special time to meditate on the Word of God and participate in the Blessed Sacrament. If there is a holiday that falls during that week, the Mass may be changed - so be sure to check the calendar for updates.
Founded in 1755, Zion Church in Baltimore City is the mother church of Lutheranism in the Baltimore metropolitan region. Services are offered in both English and German, making it the longest-running German-language church in the country. When Reverend John George Barger first arrived from Pennsylvania, he was only paid five pounds a year for his spiritual services. The Maryland General Assembly worked for equal opportunities in housing and Baltimore struggled with urban renewal as the social cost of tearing down old townhouses in favor of public assistance housing projects in skyscrapers.
The Lutheran Inner Mission accepted the hospitality of the congregation and held its annual Lenten services at the Parish House. During this time, many renowned Lutheran pastors preached. From 1964 to 1967, Reverend Scheib directed the Toronto Metropolitan Study for the United States Mission Board and was later chaplain at the Toronto and Halifax Lutheran Sailors Center. In 1965, Zion Church ratified a new constitution to be in accordance with the constitution of the newly formed Lutheran Church in the United States (LCA).
Throughout the year, Zion Church celebrates many special occasions and feasts. Reverend Scheib was able to bring together his congregation - which had a mostly pro-Union sentiment - around him during difficult times such as war. He also ventured to create many things that had been lost at a time when many predicted the final fate of German churches in the United States. At the turn of the century, there were more than thirty congregations in Baltimore that held Sunday services in German.
In 1941, Reverend Scheib wrote with Kressman Taylor an account of the situation of churches in Germany called “Until That Day”. All churches founded by immigrants from non-English-speaking countries have faced the problem of introducing English without denying use of their old language.
