wfn.org | Women of the ELCA Opens Convention with Worship

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ELCA NEWS SERVICE

July 12, 1996

WORSHIP OPENS WOMEN OF THE ELCA CONVENTION
96-WO-08-AH

     MINNEAPOLIS (ELCA)  -- The Rev. April Ulring Larson told the
convention of Women of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America that
it is dangerous to follow Jesus and proclaim peace.  The third
triennial convention opened Thursday, July 11 under the theme
"Proclaim God's Peace," with 5,700 participants registered.  Larson,
bishop of the ELCA's LaCrosse Area Synod, preached for the event's
opening service of Holy Communion at the Minneapolis Convention
Center.
     "To be a follower of Christ is dangerous," Larson said.  "To
proclaim God's peace is to show up suffering and pain, hatred and
death -- by acts of healing to testify to the suffering in that
place," she said.  "It will be troubling.  When you name what's going
on, it's troubling. Jesus tells us,  Do not be afraid.'"
     Larson talked about a peacemaker from her own family, a cousin
who was killed by a firing squad in Chechnya.  "The people that shot
Fred did not know he was a man of peace.  They did not know about
peace or trust.  They hadn't heard that Christ is our peace, that
Christ has broken down the dividing walls of hostility."
     Larson said, "Fred worked with refugees.  He was a minister of
healing, a man of peace.  The firing squad did not know he brought
healing to a suffering people; to them he was simply the enemy, so he
was killed.  They did not remember or had never heard of God's peace.
     "Fred knew the risk and cost of being a peacemaker," Larson said.
 "Peacemakers stir things up.  Look at Jesus, he stirred up
controversy wherever he went."  She said, "If you speak of peace
people will call you names, even take your life."
     Larson said, "To be a proclaimer of peace in daily life is to
speak against injustice, to be a pest, to call the church ... and the
world to what is right."  She said, "The CEOs, the Pentagon, the
mafia, the generals, the drug dealers do not run this world.  When you
proclaim God's peace you will make a differences in this world and in
our church."

     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