September 7, 2005

BALTIMORE – Almost 1,100 Lutherans gathered Aug. 25- 28 at the Baltimore Convention Center for a Global Mission Event (GME) of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). The theme "Gathered by God's grace for the sake of the world" inspired plenary sessions, "Global University" sessions, worship, prayer, song, art activities and fellowship.

The ELCA has about 300 missionaries in more than 50 countries. During summer months many of those missionaries return to the United States to visit family and take continuing education classes. The ELCA uses this opportunity to invite its 4.9 million members to meet current and retired missionaries and to learn how Lutherans are involved in the world.

The ELCA Division for Global Mission worked with local volunteers to host two GMEs. The first was July 14-17 in Fargo, N.D. Support for the events also came from other ELCA churchwide units and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, a nonprofit financial services organization based in Minneapolis.

‘Fragment' Stories from Around the World

The opening celebration mixed global Christian music with "fragment" stories from around the world. Reading from the Gospel of St. Matthew, participants heard that, after feeding five thousand people, Jesus said, "Gather up the fragments left over, so that nothing may be lost."

The event's general facilitators, Mary Cain, Ellicott City, Md., and JMe Lowden, Pasadena, Md., introduced Joselito "Joseph" Carlos, a seafarer from the Phillipines. He introduced three other young men who were in port on the (cargo vessel) C.V. Adventure.

Joseph spoke of the stresses of life on the open sea. "The only thing that keeps us strong is our faith in God," he said. He thanked participants for supporting the Seafarer center, which helps him deal with the stress by providing communication with his family back home.

The Rev. John Rutsindintwarane, general secretary, Lutheran Church of Rwanda, spoke of the 1994 genocide in his African country and his role in resettling displaced Rwandans in Tanzania. He said he saw Jesus' miracle duplicated when Lutheran World Relief and Lutheran World Federation trucks arrived with food.

A teacher described the joy she experienced in her school in Cuddalore, India. In a video presentation she said that joy was replaced by fear and confusion after the Dec. 26 tsunami in the Indian Ocean. Death and displacement cut the number of her students in half, and she spent more of her time counseling and working to restore the local fishing business than teaching.

Ray Ranker, a student at the University of Maryland, talked about his time with the ELCA Young Adults in Global Mission program in Argentina. "They felt like leftovers," he said, with no way of breaking a cycle of poverty. While it was a difficult decision to leave home for service in a place where he didn't even speak the language, he said it was more difficult to leave Argentina and return home.

Malik fled his West African home in Guinea under the threat of death when he was 12 years old. Three years later he arrived in United States and was immediately put in prison as an unaccompanied minor. Local Lutherans moved him out of detention and into the International Friendship House while his case is being reviewed.

The 20-year-old Malik said, "I feel like I am not a strong man, because I rely on so many people." In Guinea his family was in a position to help others, he said. "I have lost the ability to help," he said, but he has found another family that helps others.

The Rev. Manuel Caceres, Peace Lutheran Church, Glen Burnie, Md., spoke through a translator of his work with Latino ministries (Iglesia Paz) and his background in El Salvador. Discrimination and injustice leave people feeling like crumbs, he said. The church gathers the crumbs together to make the bread of life, he said. "We are the crumbs made to bring sustenance to others."

Keynote Presentation

The Rev. Elieshi Mungure, a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania studying at Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minn., and the Rev. Mark Alan Powell, professor of New Testament, Trinity Lutheran Seminary, Columbus, Ohio, spoke Aug. 26, building on the Gospel story of Jesus feeding five thousand people.

Powell led participants in "an experiment in empathy," asking them to pretend they were various characters in the story – someone who was fed, a disciple, the boy with the basket and a loaf of bread. The bread is at risk of being consumed, but the miracle is that it grows, he said. "We are God's bread. We are the body of Christ. We are gathered by God's grace and offered to the world," Powell said.

Mungure described the problems of Africa, such as malnutrition and AIDS, which seem as overwhelming as the task Jesus gave his disciples to feed five thousand people. "Sometimes we look at our resources and not beyond," she said, seeing how little we have instead of how to use what is available. "Sometimes we are standing on the solution, but we are still looking around," Mungure said. "Bring a little boy with a basket of lunch, and the Lord will do a miracle."

Middle East and Christian Zionism

When participants showed up for an evening session Aug. 26, some were turned away by young people wearing black "Security" shirts. Entry was based on the colors of one's participant identification. Finally, as the program began, the doors were open to all participants.

"You experienced what Palestinians experience each day when they try to go to church, go to work, go to school, go to hospital," the Rev. Said Ailabouni, director for Europe and the Middle East, ELCA Division for Global Mission, told the gathering. The humiliation of checkpoints is compounded by house demolitions and a security barrier, he said, making it easier for Palestinians to emigrate from their land than to stay.

People in the Middle East feel like they are living in a prison, Ailabouni continued. "You feel safe within your prison, but you are not free to go in or out," he said.

Lutherans in the Holy Land work with Muslims, Jews and other Christians toward peaceful coexistence, Ailabouni said. "One stumbling block is theology," he said, referring to Christian Zionism.

The Rev. Barbara R. Rossing, professor of New Testament, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, said Christian Zionism is not the traditional Zionism that formed the State of Israel. Christian Zionism is a belief that Christ's second coming depends on the rebuilding of Jerusalem's temple and must follow years of death and destruction.

Christian Zionism is anti-Jewish and anti-Palestinian, Rossing said. Some Christian fundamentalists support Israel's dominance in the Middle East, but they also believe all Jews must convert to Christianity or die, she said. Most evangelical Christians don't support Christian Zionism, she said.

Rossing is the author of "The Rapture Exposed." She told the gathering that the last book in the Christian Bible, Revelation, was long ignored by scholars because of its complex metaphors and imagery.

The concept of a rapture was "a flim-flam" pieced together in the 19th century by interpreting various Bible passages, especially in Revelation, as predicting a time when all believers in Christ will be lifted from the Earth to heaven before Christ's second coming, Rossing said. Rapture theology "poses a heretical challenge" for Christians, she said.

The book of Revelation has been "hijacked" to finance a lucrative "Left Behind" industry, Rossing said. She said she wanted to reclaim Revelation and demonstrate that it is more a message of hope and peace than death and destruction. She called the book "God's vision of a holy city in which we all live together in peace."

A single image of Jesus with a sword is outnumbered by images of Jesus as a nonviolent lamb in Revelation, Rossing said.

"Apocalypse" means "unveiling," she said. Revelation unveiled the injustices of the Roman Empire in the first century, a time when the emperor claimed to be a god, Rossing said. The book contrasted those injustices with God's justice – a land of peace with open gates and big enough for everyone, she said. A river of life flows through the land and a healing tree stands at its center, Rossing said.

"This is God's vision for the Middle East – a healing tree of life. The new Jerusalem of Revelation is a life-giving vision," Rossing said. "The whole Bible is full of the amazing stories of healing for the world. This is God's vision in Revelation for the Middle East," she said. "It's a vision for wherever you live."

Andy Willis shared several stories of his experiences as an ELCA missionary and assistant to the director of schools for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land. "The very fabric of life has been pulled from under the feet of Palestinian Christians," he said.

Nine young Palestinian men formed "the Jerusalem bachelors club," Willis said. After seven years only one of the men remained in Jerusalem, he said, the rest had emigrated to various parts of the world.

Willis called the Holy Land "home for people of three faiths."

Tribute to ‘Baltimore Partners'

Belletech Deressa, director for international development and disaster response, ELCA Division for Global Mission, hosted a tribute to the "Baltimore Partners," Lutheran organizations based in the area, providing human services around the world. The Baltimore partners are: Lutheran Association for Maritime Ministry (LAMM), Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS), Lutheran Services in America (LSA) and Lutheran World Relief (LWR).

Before introducing representatives for each organization, Deressa described the work they do to address "silent emergencies" – those not in the news. Silent emergencies kill more people every five days than the Indian Ocean tsunami in December, she said.

LWR President Kathryn Wolford said the overseas relief and development work of U.S. Lutherans is providing Niger with food and seeds. While restoring self-reliance in Nicaragua after Hurricane Mitch, LWR supports goals of peace with justice in Colombia, she said. ELCA congregations purchasing fairly traded coffee is "a life-line for farmers" around the world, she said.

LSA President Jill Schumann said social ministry organizations are compiling information about low-income housing across the United States to "ramp up production of affordable housing in this country." LSA is also gearing up for "Trading Graces," an online auction Feb. 26-March 8, 2006, to support social services in local communities.

LIRS President Ralston H. Deffenbaugh Jr. said U.S. Lutheran churches have worked with refugees, immigrants, asylum seekers and unaccompanied refugee children since World War II. "Welcoming the stranger" has become more difficult since the Sept. 11 terrorist attack in 2001, he said. "The balance between freedom and security has shifted." Deffenbaugh said almost everyone would agree that the U.S. immigration system is broken, but there is little agreement about how to fix it.

LAMM board member Steven Laine, Boca Raton, Fla., said Lutheran volunteers serve "crew members of ships that come into our harbors," who may be away from home for a year at a time. Some crew members cannot get security clearance to get off their ships, he said, so chaplains and other volunteers board the ships to conduct informal worship and to provide cell phones so seafarers can communicate with their families. Laine said crew members have a lot of time on their hands between ports, so LAMM hands out "Water Words," a book of Bible materials relating to seafarers.

Sunday School Classes

GME participants chose to attend one of three concurrent sessions Aug. 28: "Peace and Justice in Africa," "Interfaith Dialogue" and "Travel Faithfully."

Moses Gobah of the Lutheran Church in Liberia (LCL) described how decades of civil war and violence severely damaged the infrastructure of his West African nation. "Thank God for the international community and the United Nations," he said. "The war is over. There is no more fighting in the country, but there are many problems that the war left behind."

Gobah said tribal and religious tensions remain; they foster human rights abuses and chronic injustice. The LCL and the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) have sponsored a peace and justice program in Liberia since 1991, he said. The program trains pastors in peacemaking and advances community-based programs promoting peaceful coexistence. He said the program often works with former security personnel who want to return to communities they may have terrorized years earlier.

The LWF is a global communion of Christian churches in the Lutheran tradition. Founded in 1947 in Lund, Sweden, the LWF currently has 140 member churches in 78 countries worldwide, with a membership of nearly 66 million. The ELCA is a member of LWF; ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson is president of LWF.

Syafa'atun al-Mirzanah of Indonesia is a member of the LWF Christian-Muslim Study Program on Conflict and Peace. She and the Rev. Michael T. Shelley, visiting professor of world religions, Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, discussed interfaith dialogue between Muslims and Christians.

Learning more about other religions helped her better understand her own religion, Islam, al-Mirzanah said. "Dialogue transforms my experience," she said.

Sometimes dialogue among people of the same faith can be difficult, but it is important for interfaith relations," al- Mirzanah said. "There will be more conflict in the future if you teach children God loves your religion more than others," she said.

"Dialogue is a forum for mutual witness," Shelley said. "Each party has something to say," he said. A key principle for interfaith dialogue is to "deal with one another respectfully and listen to one another," he said.

The Rev. Kim D. Erno, director, ELCA Lutheran Center in Mexico City, and Robert Sitze, director for hunger education, ELCA Division for Church in Society, led a Bible study as part of the Travel Faithfully session.

International travel experiences are stored in the brain's long-term memory, Sitze said. He encouraged travelers to share their experiences with those back home by contemplating what God is doing around the world. Travelers change and are changed, he said.

Erno called travel a circle of experiences – take in reality while traveling, evaluate the experience, use what was learned in relationships back home, and advocate for the people met while traveling. "We return home not the same people," he said. "What small steps of solidarity can be expressed?"

Gathering for Closing Worship

"I stand before you as a witness" to the gospel brought by missionaries to India, Moses Penumaka said in his sermon during the GME's closing worship. He is a doctoral candidate at the Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, Calif., from Rajahmundry in the state of Anadhra Pradesh in South India.

Penumaka shared some of his experiences of "a gathering God a God who gathers untouchables like me."

"I am a fourth generation Indian Dalit Lutheran," he said. In India, caste is the factor that excludes and marginalizes one- fifth of the total population by virtue of their work and descent. Dalits or "untouchables" are at the bottom of the social hierarchy, excluded by the ‘non-Dalits' in social and economic life.

"There is a caste system in every country," Penumaka said. "We treat many people as Dalits," he said. "God gathers untouchables."

As a symbol of the damage the Dec. 26 tsunami caused to lives and livelihoods and of the hope provided through Lutheran relief efforts, GME participants received tattered pieces of fishing nets that were gathered along the beaches of the Indian Ocean.

Global University, GlobalFest and Generations

Participants had six opportunities to select from 88 workshops and seminars known as "Global University Sessions." Workshops were organized under ten general categories: Global Mission, Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, Middle East, Globalization, Peace, Public, and Congregational Witness and Outreach. Topics included: "Fair Trade Coffee: From Crop to Cup," "HIV/AIDS in Senegal: True Success Story?" "ELCA's Responses to the Southeast Asia Tsunami," "Cuba and the United States," "Plight of Christians in Jerusalem," "Protecting Refugee and Immigrant Children," "Principles of Christian Peacemaking," "Violent Video Games" and "Shopping with a Conscience."

A tribute to the mission personnel of the ELCA was a highlight of the GME's GlobalFest, which featured interactive exhibits, special presentations, music, dance and dress from countries around the world. Food and the arts provided the means for Lutheran missionaries from around the world to exhibit their experiences.

The GME included programming for people of all ages. Child care was provided for children through age two. A children's program offered a creative mix of learning experiences for children ages 3 to 10. Special programs for junior high and senior high school youth were conducted.

ELCA News Service