Bishop Stephen Bouman

Denomination: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)
Organization: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America

Bishop Stephen Bouman is executive director of Evangelical Outreach and Congregational Mission (EOCM) for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, based in Chicago. He formerly was bishop of the Synod of Metropolitan New York.

EOCM is a program unit of the ELCA. Its 149-member staff facilitates "the efforts of congregations, synods, and related institutions and agencies in reaching out in witness to the gospel to people in all contexts and cultures" across the United States and Caribbean. It works to develop new congregations and ministries, and to renew and equip existing ELCA ministries in evangelical outreach.

Born April 14, 1947, in Melrose Park, Ill., Bouman is a graduate of Concordia Senior College, Fort Wayne, Ind., and Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. He earned a master of sacred theology degree and a doctorate in ministry from New York Theological Seminary, New York. General Theological Seminary, New York, awarded him an honorary doctor of divinity degree in 2001.

Ordained in 1973 by the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, Bouman served as pastor of Christ and St. Jacobus Lutheran Church, Woodside, Queens, N.Y., and Atonement Lutheran Church, Jackson Heights, Queens, N.Y. His pastoral call was transferred to the Association of Evangelical Lutheran Churches (AELC) in 1977, and he served as pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church, Bogota, N.J., from 1982 to 1992. The AELC, American Lutheran Church and Lutheran Church in America formed the ELCA in 1988. In 1992 Bouman became an assistant to the bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Metropolitan New York Synod and in 1996 was elected to succeed the Rev. James E. Sudbrock as bishop. The synod elected Bouman to a second six-year term as bishop in 2002.

Bouman is author of several articles, curricula, devotionals and books, including From the Parish for the Life of the World, published in 2000 by Augsburg Fortress, and Grace All Around Us, published in 2007 by Augsburg Books.

Bouman and his wife Janet are the parents of three adult children.