LCA members Graham Lieschke and Fred Stolz were recognised in the Australia Day 2023 Honours List.
Graham Lieschke, from Ascot Vale in Melbourne, is a research professor in medical research for Monash University’s Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute and a clinical and research haematologist for the Royal Melbourne Hospital/Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre. He was awarded an AM as a Member in the General Division of the Order of Australia ‘for significant service to medicine as a haematologist, and to medical research’.
Fred Stolz, from Kippa-Ring in Queensland’s Moreton Bay area and the founding headmaster of Grace Lutheran College at Rothwell in the same region, received an Order of Australia medal in the general division for ‘service to secondary education’.
Professor Lieschke said the award was ‘a great honour’. ‘It feels very special, and it makes me very thankful not only for the people I’ve worked with but also to God for the opportunities and blessings he’s given me’, he said. Professor Lieschke, a member and musician at St Johns Lutheran Church Southgate in Melbourne, said his faith was also an important factor in the way he has approached his work. ‘My faith is really important in establishing values of integrity, honesty, care and compassion in the clinical and research work I do.’
Fred Stolz served as headmaster of Grace Lutheran College, Rothwell, from 1980 to 2009 and was a Mathematics teacher there until 2019. A member at Redcliffe Lutheran Church, he was also inaugural principal of Balob Teachers College at Lae in Papua New Guinea, from 1965 to 1979, and in 2018 became an Officer of the Order of Logohu, PNG, in recognition of his service.
He said while his OAM was a ‘very unexpected but very much appreciated’ honour, he views it as ‘an honour for our Lutheran education system’. ‘One of the reasons why I’m a great advocate of Lutheran schools is because it’s an opportunity to bring the gospel before so many young people’, he said.
The congratulations of the church are offered to these recipients and any other members honoured with awards.
Read the full story at www.lca.org.au/lutherans-honoured-in-australia-day-list-2023
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