Title: Lutheran Health Ministry is Vital Worldwide
ELCA NEWS SERVICE
April 4, 1996
LUTHERAN HEALTH MINISTRY IS VITAL WORLDWIDE (65 lines)
96-08-025-AH
CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Dr. Mark L. Jacobson called health
ministries "among the most vital, vibrant, holistic" ministries
of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Division for
Global Mission. Jacobson is doctor in charge at Selian Hospital
near Arusha, Tanzania. He spoke to the division's board at its
meeting here March 21-23. Selian is a hospital of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania.
"A holistic approach is part of our history in health
ministry," Jacobson said. He called health care "one leg on the
three-legged stool with evangelism and education." The approach
asks, "What might people do for themselves? What are their
problems?"
"The people of Africa do not divide the spiritual from the
rest of life," Jacobson explained. Health is related to
wholeness. Poor health is the result of broken relationships.
"They ask `why' they became ill, not `how.'"
Jacobson told the board, "The gift of reconciliation is our
message, and the gift of health is the ministry of reconcilers."
He described a program that has moved "curative and primary
health care" out of the institution and into communities "on the
periphery," among the nomadic Masai people and in small villages.
Among health personnel in Tanzania, he said,
"transformation" has emerged as a goal. "Transforming
situations" might mean concentrating on clean water to reduce
diarrhea, he explained.
Jacobson outlined the "alarming" rate of the spread of AIDS
in Tanzania. In coming years Tanzania will lose 20 percent of
its teachers. The Central African Republic will lose half its
high school graduates. There are 10 million AIDS-related orphans
in Africa, he told the board. "There is no greater issue before
us as healthy people and as Christians," Jacobson said. The
church should be "a catalyst for prevention."
The Tanzanian church has begun providing AIDS education in
confirmation class, Jacobson said, "linking the time of beginning
to be sexually active with the age of decision in faith."
Jacobson serves as the division's consultant for health
ministries around the world.
Dr. Peri Rasolondraibe, director of the Lutheran World
Federation's Department for Mission and Development, Geneva,
addressed the board on the subject of cooperation and
interdependence. He stressed the principle of partnership,
"Partners are endowed with different gifts and capacity, such as
human and material resources, technical abilities, spiritual
experience; yet they must share the level of commitment ... to
the task and commitment to each other."
"This understanding of equality will strengthen the quality
of our partnership," he said, especially through "honesty,
transparency, trust and respect, rights and responsibilities, and
interdependence -- that is, sharing empowerment and
vulnerability."
The board acknowledged retiring missionaries, some of whom
have served overseas for up to 45 years. They include the Rev.
Kenneth and Eloise Dale and the Rev. Andrew and Masae Ellis,
serving in Japan since 1951; the Rev. John and Elizabeth Nelson,
Salina, Kan., serving in Singapore since 1955; the Rev. Earl and
Nijiko Bergh, in Japan since 1957; Lois Swanson, Proctor, Minn.,
serving in Tanzania since 1958; the Rev. Ronald and Ruth Nelson,
Hettinger, N.D., in Cameroon since 1959. Patricia Bentsen,
Blair, Neb., will return from Madagascar where she has served as
a nurse since 1967.
For information contact: Ann Hafften, Dir., ELCA News Service, (312)
380-2958; Frank Imhoff, Assoc. Dir., (312) 380-2955; Lia Christiansen,
Asst. Dir., (312) 380-2956
