ELCA NEWS SERVICE August 15, 2003 ELCA Assembly Lifts Up Refugee Concerns 03-CWA-33-DM MILWAUKEE (ELCA) -- The 2003 Churchwide Assembly of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) Aug. 15 voted 875 to 63 to encourage the church at all levels to call on the United States government to admit more refugees into the country and in other ways to care for refugees, immigrants and asylum seekers. The churchwide assembly, the chief legislative authority of the ELCA, is meeting here Aug. 11-17 at the Midwest Airlines Center. There are about 2,100 people participating, including 1,031 ELCA voting members. The theme for the biennial assembly is "Making Christ Known: For the Healing of the World." The assembly action encourages individuals, congregation and synod councils, and the presiding bishop of the ELCA to: + Call on President George W. Bush "to increase significantly the number of refugees admitted under Presidential Determination, and to support an increase in the funding level in fiscal year 2004 for the Migration and Refugee Assistance Fund." Security concerns following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks have had a negative impact on U.S. policies toward refugees and asylum seekers. For example, President Bush set the fiscal year 2003 ceiling for refugee admissions at 70,000 people. At current rates, however, fewer than 20,000 refugees actually will be resettled in the United States this year. + Call on members of Congress to join the Bipartisan Congressional Refugee Caucus and lift up the needs of refugees worldwide. + Call on the government "to protect the civil liberties of all people regardless of citizenship." + Call on Congress to pass the Unaccompanied Child Protection Act of 2003 (S-1129), intended to provide counsel and guardians for unaccompanied children so that they do not have to navigate the judicial system alone. Other provisions in the assembly's action encourage congregations to support Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS), an inter-Lutheran advocate for displaced persons, and to pray for and act on the needs of displaced persons; and to direct the ELCA Division for Church in Society to work with LIRS "to advocate for compassion and justice for asylum seekers, refugees and unaccompanied children." "Refugees are not terrorists," voting member Kami Moghbeli, ELCA Metropolitan New York Synod, told the assembly as he urged passage of the measure. Himself a former refugee from Iran, Moghbeli spoke of the torture and trauma that many refugees who are awaiting resettlement have suffered. "These people, with all the trauma, are locked up" and detained as they seek asylum, he said. The assembly's action, which was recommended by the assembly memorials committee, also commended the ELCA's Metropolitan New York, Slovak Zion, Southwestern Pennsylvania and South-Central Wisconsin synods for bringing refugees concerns to the Churchwide Assembly. -- -- -- Information about the ELCA Churchwide Assembly can be found at http://www.elca/org/assembly/03 on the Web. For information contact: John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or [log in to unmask] http://www.elca.org/news