Nancy Guthrie’s Pastor Still Has Hope as She Remains Missing

Published: February 13, 2026

By Gavin Boyle

Michael Rudzena, a pastor at Good Shepherd New York church, which TODAY host Savannah Guthrie and her mother Nancy have attended services at for 10 years, shared that he feels he has to have hope as Nancy remains missing.

“I think we’re all putting ourselves in the position of knowing the dark experiences can be overwhelming. And when we think of Nancy, our heart goes out to Nancy, and we don’t know what we don’t know,” Rudzena told Savannah’s former TODAY co-host Hoda Kotb. “And yet, we know that light shines in dark circumstances, and it’s light that gets us out of them. It’s light that brightens our mood and gives us a sense of security.”

“I think leaving the door open for hope is a way to fight against that sense of fatality or fatalism. It’s the sense that we all feel when bad things are happening. A sense of despair or gloom can sort of cloud our minds and hearts,” he added.

Savannah’s mother, Nancy, is believed to have been forcefully taken from her home in Arizona over the night of Jan. 31 and was reported missing on Feb. 1 after one of her friends noticed she did not attend church that morning. A week later, the family received a ransom note which demanded millions of dollars in order for Nancy to be returned.

Meanwhile, Savannah has kept fans in the loop throughout the heartbreaking two weeks, constantly asking them for prayers and thanking them for their kind words and thoughts.

“I just want to say first off, thank you for all the prayers and the love that we have felt, my sister, my brother and I. And that our mom has felt. Because we believe that some how, some way, that she is feeling these prayers and that God is lifting her even in the darkest place,” Savannah said in a video posted to Instagram on Monday, Feb. 9.

At the same time, she has asked the public for help locating her mother by remaining vigilant and keeping their eyes and ears open to anything that seems abnormal. Local law enforcement in Tucson, Arizona, have been working tirelessly alongside the FBI to locate Nancy and bring her home. Earlier this week authorities released a new video showing a suspicious man in front of Nancy’s front door who blocked cameras, presumably before he entered the home.

This video, which was only recently recovered by investigators, has breathed new life into the case and may lead to the breakthrough needed to locate Nancy. Please keep the Guthrie family in your prayers as they fight to keep hope and believe that there could possibly be a positive end to this story.

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