HENDRICKS, Minn. — Jay Nelson steered his car past Lake Hendricks, past giant windmills and soybean fields, across the South Dakota border that abuts his town, and up a gravel lane.
Here stands the idyllic country church where Nelson was raised: Singsaas Church, founded in 1874 by America's first Norwegian Lutheran minister and now on the National Register of Historic Places. The adjacent cemetery is the final resting place for 870 people, including a Civil War soldier. "I know all of them," Nelson joked.
The former deacon is no longer welcome here, though. As Nelson walked the length of the cemetery, the 51-year-old was filled not with nostalgia but with sadness about losing his church home, which is now nondenominational. He was also filled with fear.
