Joann fulfilled a dream to start the first Native American Lutheran Church in South Dakota.

As an enrolled member of the Oglala Lakota tribe, she was raised on the Pin Ridge Indian Reservation. She currently serves as the pastor of Woyatan Lutheran Church in Rapid City, S.D. She was originally called to Atonement Lutheran Church in Rapid City, but when the church decided to relocate, Conroy worked with the South Dakota Synod to create Woyatan from the building Atonement left.

“Despite cultural differences, she has remained faithful to her ministry calling by serving as a mission developer of a new ethnic congregation,” says Pastor Barbara Wangsness Lizarazo, associate pastor of First Lutheran Church in Sioux Falls.