Our Impact

Caroline Rorhus (‘25, pictured center, above) did not grow up Lutheran, but was searching for a church that felt like a fit when she arrived to Michigan Tech. During her freshman spring, she noticed the pride flag waving in front of Good Shepherd Lutheran Church and decided to step inside.

“What I found,” Caroline recalls, “was a community where everyone was genuinely happy to see each other.” That authentic welcome made Good Shepherd a place she would eventually look forward to attending each week.

College brought its share of anxiety and uncertainty. “When I started, I was a lot more panicky,” Caroline says. “LCM/Good Shepherd helped me learn to trust in God’s unfolding—that you don’t have to have steps one through thirty-eight figured out. You just do your best in the next one.”

With her family hundreds of miles away, Good Shepherd became like another home base for support.  Caroline reflected on how in college you’re an adult, but don’t know how to be an adult in many ways. At Good Shepherd/LCM, a whole community of caring adults who were right there as support for her, week by week. Through them, she understood one of faith’s most beautiful truths: there are no solo quests.

When Caroline stepped into leadership in Lutheran Campus Ministry—just after COVID and while GSLC was between pastors—there were only two students left in the group. “It was hard to recruit,” she admits. But the church community held the two LCM students in the meantime, like embers of a fire ready to be fanned back into flame.   Slowly, through prepping the Community Meal, planning events, and worship, life returned to LCM as a student org.  “Sometimes life-changing events aren’t fireworks,” she says. “They’re a slow kindling.”

Caroline found God at work through LCM not only in the big moments but in the quiet ones too—in “a joyful togetherness” while cooking for others, and “a reflective love in the calm between words in worship.”

Without Lutheran Campus Ministry, Caroline says she might never have become a regular churchgoer. Now working at an environmental education center in Minnesota, she’s seeking a faith community that feels like home again. “I’m just trying to keep the door open,” she says. “And trust the next step.”