From the Worldwide Faith News archives www.wfn.org


CHURCH WORLD SERVICE CELEBRATES 50TH ANNIVERSARY


From ROY_LLOYD.parti@ecunet.org
Date 20 Nov 1996 00:53:45

Contact: Carol J. Fouke, NCC, 212-870-2252

NCC11/19/96                    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

****************************************************
Editor's Note: The history of Church World Service
is recounted in a new book, "Church World Service:
Fifty Years of Help and Hope," by Ron Stenning,
former director of the CWS Community Education and
Fundraising Program.  Also available is a jubilee
prayerbook, "For the Healing of the Nations."  For
information on these and a host of other available
resources, contact: Church World Service, P.O. Box
968, Elkhart, IN 46515.
****************************************************

CHURCH WORLD SERVICE CELEBRATES 50TH ANNIVERSARY

 CHICAGO, Ill., Nov. 13 ---- Church World
Service's year-long "jubilee" observance of its 50th
anniversary culminated today with a celebration that
featured a keynote address by Anglican Archbishop
Emeritus Desmond M. Tutu of South Africa, a CROP
WALK and a multi-media salute to this ecumenical
ministry.

 "A simple act - sharing -- sharing compassion
and hope" is how Bishop Will Herzfeld, CWS
Chairperson, defined the work of Church World
Service.  He said that for 50 years, CWS has offered
"vibrant creativity in community, from the mine
fields of Cambodia to the school rooms of Chicago."

 Born in the aftermath of World War II to help
rebuild war-torn Europe, Church World Service today
works with churches and organizations in more than
70 countries, including the United States, to help
people move beyond poverty and powerlessness.

Since 1946, CWS has provided more than 5.3
billion pounds of material assistance in support of
relief and development efforts worldwide, and has
worked in partnership with U.S. congregations and
their own denominations to resettle some 400,000
refugees in the United States.

Thirty-three Protestant and Orthodox
communions, constituting the membership of the
National Council of Churches, join together with
several affiliated organizations in this ministry of
relief, development and refugee assistance.

The 50th anniversary celebrations took place
during the NCC’s annual General Assembly, meeting
here Nov. 13-15.  The about 300 Assembly
participants marched through the streets of Chicago
this afternoon (Nov. 13) with signs and balloons in
a mini CROP WALK to the First United Methodist
Church.  The Walk symbolically recreated and honored
the some 2,000 locally organized, CWS-sponsored
community CROP Hunger Walks held annually across the
United States.

 Last year more than three million people took
part as walkers, sponsors and volunteers, raising
more than $13.9 million to provide self-help
assistance to the struggling poor and powerless.  Of
that, CROP WALKS shared $3,435,180 with United
States food banks, pantries, community gardens and
other local hunger-fighting agencies nationwide.

Anniversary celebrations continued at the First
United Methodist Church, where Bishop Herzfeld
(staff at the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America, Chicago) moderated a multimedia
presentation including testimony from former
directors of Church World Service, videos
illustrating the empowering self-help programs CWS
sponsors throughout the world, and special music.

 The audience was particularly moved by the
testimony of a Bosnian teenager, who escaped from
his war-torn country with CWS help.  After three
years of violence, death and broken dreams, he said,
in America "I have opportunity and dreams for my
future again."

Former and current CWS leaders stressed that
the ministry’s power comes from standing with local
churches and poor people as well as facilitating
dialogue among people of different races, religions
and nationalities.  The Rev. Dr. Rodney I. Page, CWS
Executive Director, said, "Many issues fragment us
and pull us apart, but we have partnership in
sharing."

 The Rev. Dr. Gabriel Habib, a consultant to CWS
and former General Secretary of the Middle East
Council of Churches, based in Cyprus, spoke of the
partnership as a sign of "the local churches'
intention of transcending isolation."  It
demonstrates that "the power of Christianity is not
the economic or cultural power of the so-called
Christian West, but that of the Holy Spirit, the
power of the powerless local Christian communities
or churches."

 Partnership, Dr. Habib said, "facilitates
dialogue between people of different races and
creeds for justice and peace to all.  It calls for
sacrificial solidarity with the poor and the
oppressed and for prophetic challenges to the
oppressors."  Bishop Herzfeld noted, "Partnership is
more than programs.  It is people working for the
love of Christ on behalf of people in need."

The celebrations continued with an evening
banquet featured an opening procession led by Church
World Service partners, staff and resettled refugees
from Africa, Europe, Asia, Southern Asia and the
Middle East.

After musical selections from the Gospel Choir
of the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, mime
Doug Berky  performed two sketches that riveted the
audience.  One sketch showed the indulgence of
Americans through several personalities contrasted
with a hungry parent whose baby was dying.  The
second sketch celebrated the sacrifices and risks
taken by such historical figures as Corrie Ten Boom,
a Christian who hid Jews during the Holocaust; the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, and
Jesus Christ himself.

The Most Reverend Desmond M. Tutu, Anglican
Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, delivered the
keynote speech (see sidebar) in which he thanked CWS
for its service in the form of scholarships and
legal aid to South Africans and pleaded with the
audience to extend the jubilee to international debt
forgiveness.

The evening ended with "an ecumenical re-
dedication" recited by all present to "join with
brothers and sisters the world over to resist the
powers that dehumanize and destroy all that is
created in God's image."

Throughout the day, speakers celebrated the
past by pointing to the future.  "Our God who
animates us calls us forward to catch up to the
moment of new beginnings, remember with gladness and
look to the horizon where new challenges wait,"
Bishop Herzfeld said.

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