ELCA NEWS SERVICE

March 3, 2004

ELCA Board for Church in Society Recommends and Reviews
04-033-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The board of the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America (ELCA) Division for Church in Society (DCS) is
recommending the ELCA Church Council address a number of items at
its next meeting.  The board also reviewed several of the
church's current and future projects, when it met here Feb. 26-
28.
     The ELCA's chief legislative authority, its churchwide
assembly, approved a strategic plan in 2003.  Based on that plan,
the church is now involved in a process to restructure its
churchwide organization.
     The board began its meeting by discussing its responses to a
series of questions that will inform that process, said the Rev.
James B. Martin-Schramm, DCS board chair and associate professor
of religion, Luther College, Decorah, Iowa.
     The Rev. Rebecca S. Larson, DCS executive director, reported
to the board on a number of spending cuts that have been taken
and are being considered to cope with income levels below
projections.
     "It is an opportunity for us to realign our budgetary
resources around mission," Martin-Schramm said, "but we don't
have the resources to really implement our mission the way that
we should."
     "We are cutting budgets when we have this wonderful new
strategic plan," he said.  "It's frustrating for our division,
which sees itself as eager to respond to that strategic plan, to
suddenly be faced with a lack of resources to do that."
     The board also discussed issues surrounding a study on human
sexuality that DCS is conducting with the church's Division for
Ministry.
     Churchwide assemblies are held every other year; the next
assembly will be Aug. 8-14, 2005, in Orlando, Fla.  The 2001
assembly mandated the study in preparation for decisions the 2005
assembly is to make regarding the blessing of committed same-
gender relationships and the ministries of people in such
relationships.  In addition, the study is to develop a proposed
social statement on human sexuality for the assembly to consider
in 2007.
     Current ELCA policy expects ministers to refrain from all
sexual relations outside marriage.  The church has no official
policy on blessing same-gender relationships.  The ELCA
Conference of Bishops, an advisory body of the church, stated it
does not approve of such ceremonies.
     DCS board members talked first about the involvement of
their own congregations in the study on sexuality before
discussing ways of dealing with disagreements the study is bound
to uncover, Martin-Schramm said.  "I thought our second question
really dealt with how we can have these conversations in such a
way that we respect each other," he said.
     "The third question was: 'At what price do we maintain the
unity of the church?'" Martin-Schramm said.  The discussion also
addressed differences between blessing committed same-gender
relationships and the ministries of people in such relationships.
     Assembly mandates are funded by a budget separate from the
divisions' budgets.
     The church council is the ELCAs board of directors and
serves as the legislative authority of the church between
churchwide assemblies.  The council plans to meet here April 16-
19.
     The DCS board recommended that the church council:
     + join with the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) and World
Council of Churches (WCC) in calling for an end to construction
of the "wall of separation" between the nation of Israel and
Palestinians.  The DCS resolution asked the council to affirm the
LWF statement, "Break Down the Walls," and to ask the ELCA's 65
synods to highlight these concerns, especially during their
upcoming meetings.
     + adopt a message, "Living in a Time of Terrorism."  The
proposed message said:  "In faith we may carry on our lives with
the confidence that nothing -- including terrorism -- 'will be
able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord,'" citing the New Testament.  The council may accept, edit
and accept, or reject the proposal.
     + adopt the social policy resolution on "The Donation of
Organs, Tissue and Whole Blood."  The proposed resolution
includes 11 affirmations, encouraging ELCA members to consider
donating organs, tissue and whole blood "as appropriate means for
contributing to the health and well being of other persons."
     + approve four issue papers on corporate social
responsibility: Human Rights, Codes of Conduct, Non-
Discrimination in Business Activities, and Violence in Our World.
Through an advisory committee, DCS counsels various institutions
of the church and shareholders about the social records of
corporations in which they hold stock.  Issue papers provide
"boundaries for voting proxies and filing resolutions."
     + approve the continuation of the "Stand With Africa"
campaign indefinitely.  In 2001 the ELCA entered into the three-
year campaign with the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and
Lutheran World Relief.  Through the campaign, the ELCA World
Hunger Program emphasized the church's work in Africa, especially
in addressing issues of food security and in responding to the
HIV/AIDS pandemic.
     + forward a request to the ELCA Conference of Bishops,
asking the 65 synod bishops to write pastoral letters to the
congregations in their synods.  The DCS board suggested the
letters could invite study of the ELCA's social statement on the
environment, "Caring for Creation: Vision, Hope and Justice," and
take specific actions described in the statement.
     + re-appoint Edith M. Lohr, Natick, Mass., and appoint Grace
G. El-Yateem, Brooklyn, N.Y., to three-year terms on the board of
the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS).
     + name Chris Anderson, Minneapolis, to the board of Lutheran
Services in America (LSA).  Both LIRS and LSA are based in
Baltimore.
     The DCS board's nominations of ELCA members to various
boards may seem minor, Martin-Schramm said, "but they are
important because they maintain the relationships of this church
to those other expressions of the Christian community and the
Lutheran community.  They are a concrete way that we are in
relationships with other partners in ministry around the world."
     The DCS board asked the division's staff to prepare a social
policy resolution on genetically modified organisms that it could
consider at its October 2004 meeting.
     The board recognized Mary Nasby Lohre as a staff consultant
to the division's task force helping develop a social statement
on education.  Lohre is executive director of organizational
development with Augsburg Fortress, the publishing house of the
ELCA, Minneapolis.
     DCS "celebrated" the work of two pastors who plan to leave
the division's staff in 2004:
     The Rev. Mark B. Brown has served the division as assistant
director for public policy, Lutheran Office for Governmental
Affairs, Washington, D.C., since June 1991.  In April he is to
become the representative of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF)
in Jerusalem.  The ELCA is a member of the LWF, which is based in
Geneva, Switzerland.
     The Rev. Gilbert B. Furst has directed ELCA Domestic
Disaster Response for nearly eight years.  He plans to retire at
the end of June.
-- -- --
     The home page of the Division for Church in Society is at
http://www.elca.org/dcs/ on the ELCA Web site.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or [log in to unmask]
http://www.elca.org/news