BELFAST – A group of Waldo County Lutherans is working with the Rev. Elaine Hewes, pastor of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Bangor, and the Rev. Frederick G. Wedemeyer, mission director for the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America in New England, to establish a mission church.

There are 76,000 people in 191 ELCA churches in New England – a dozen of those in Maine – according to Wedemeyer. Waldo County Lutherans must now drive to Bangor, Ellsworth or Rockland to attend services.

Kenneth and Doris Fahlberg have experience worshipping in churches that have not been fully established. Years ago, they helped organize a congregation in Brooklyn, N.Y. Now, they drive 25 miles to Bangor most Sundays to attend Redeemer Lutheran Church.

The couple are lifelong Lutherans who moved to Searsport in the mid-1980s and find “the biggest challenge is always getting people to come,” Doris Fahlberg said. “Belfast is a growing center and there is enough growth here to start a mission church. There may not be a lot of Lutherans here, but there’s a great deal of unchurched people. There’s no reason in the world we shouldn’t try it.”

Last month, a group of people interested in seeing an ELCA church in Belfast met with Wedemeyer and Hewes. The Bangor pastor helped establish St. Andrew Lutheran Church in Ellsworth more than 20 years ago before she entered the seminary.

“Once people make that connection with a congregation and the Lutheran service means something to them, they want to continue that relationship rather than change denominations,” Hewes said.

The churches in Bangor, Rockland and Ellsworth each have five or six people who come from Waldo County, she said, “So we have a core group and there probably are more Lutherans in the area just for the summer.”

Waldo County Lutherans will meet again Friday, May 25, at the Fahlberg home. For more information, call 548-6553 or the New England Synod of the ELCA at (508) 791-1530.