U-Mary 2008 Honorary Doctorate Recipient

For more than five decades Rev. Robert D. Lynne has modeled servant leadership, bringing passion, wisdom, caring, and an emphasis on community to his work and his life. The retired bishop of the Western North Dakota Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), he has preached and lived the principle of “self-giving,” while tackling challenges of church and faith at all levels from a “pastoral perspective.” Known for his “wry, self-deprecating wit,” Rev. Lynne has always seen himself as a pastor first — a calling he views as both rewarding and humbling.

Born in Turtle Lake, ND, Sept. 7, 1931, to Harry and Ella Lynne, Robert felt drawn to the clergy even as a boy. After graduating from Jamestown High School, he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree with an English major from Wartburg College in Waverly, IA, and his Bachelor of Divinity from Wartburg Theological Seminary in Dubuque. Following a yearlong internship at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Madison, WI, on June 16, 1957, he was ordained at St. John’s Lutheran Church in Jamestown, ND. After serving as a parish minister in Mott, ND, for three years, in October 1960, he accepted the challenge of starting the Bismarck mission congregation that became Bismarck’s Good Shepherd Lutheran Church. For 27 years, Lynne guided the congregation’s growth from 92 to 2,027 confirmed and 2,675 baptized members. In 1987, Rev. Lynne resigned from Good Shepherd following his election as bishop. Continuing to view himself as a pastor — albeit of a “little larger parish” — as the first bishop of the Western ND Synod of the newly formed ELCA, Rev. Lynne addressed the challenges posed by the merger of the American Lutheran Church, the Lutheran Church in America, and the Association of Evangelical Lutheran churches into the ELCA. Until his retirement in 1996, Rev. Lynne worked steadfastly to unite and develop the new church body and sow and nurture the seeds of rural renewal in North Dakota.

Committed to the belief that “the church cannot be isolated from society” and the importance of community involvement, Rev. Lynne was a chaplain at Heartview Addiction Treatment Center, Mandan, ND, for 20 years, and active in community and civic organizations including the original boards of the YMCA and the Missouri Slope Lutheran Care Center and the disciplinary board of the ND Supreme Court. In 1987, he received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Wartburg College.

Rev. Lynne has been married to the former JoAnn Keister of Mason City, IA, “his greatest blessing,” for 54 years. The couple resides in Bismarck and has three children, Mark, Janna (Viseth), and Jane (Town), and four granddaughters and a great grandson. Rev. Lynne’s sister, Mavis (Askew) is a resident of Fargo, ND. His mother, Ella, will be 98 in July and lives in Bismarck.