wfn.org | ELCA Begins Study of Health and Health Care

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ELCA NEWS SERVICE

November 18, 1998

ELCA BEGINS STUDY OF HEALTH AND HEALTH CARE
98-CC2-17-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA)
has begun an in-depth study of health and the ethical challenges of health
care.  Next year the church will decide if those issues warrants a social
statement.  The ELCA Church Council passed the question on to the 1999
Churchwide Assembly.
     The council is the ELCA's board of directors and serves as the
legislative authority of the church between meetings of the ELCA's
Churchwide Assembly.  The council met here Nov. 13-16.  Assemblies are
held every other year; the next is August 16-22, 1999, in Denver.
     "One reason for the proposal is that the policy of the ELCA
regarding health care is dated, quite thin and dispersed across several
statements it inherited from predecessor church bodies," said the Rev.
Charles S. Miller, executive director of the ELCA Division for Church in
Society.
     The Rev. Callon W. Holloway Jr., bishop of the ELCA's Southern Ohio
Synod, said "the landscape of health care changes so rapidly" that a
policy statement may be outdated as soon as it is adopted.
     Miller said a social statement would raise theological questions
about health and wellness, and address basic ethical issues.  It would not
be a position statement on genetic testing or other specifics, he said.
     With the council's approval, Miller said the division will begin a
study of health care under the direction of the Rev. Ronald W. Duty, ELCA
assistant director for studies.  If the Churchwide Assembly wants the
division to develop a social statement, the study's working group will
become the statement's task force.
     With the assembly's approval, the division will develop a social
statement through a process that involves as many as possible of the
ELCA's 5.2 million members in a study of the issues and publishes drafts
of a proposed social statement informed by responses from the church's
membership.
     A social statement will be ready for adoption at the 2003 Churchwide
Assembly.

For information contact:
Frank Imhoff, Assoc. Director (773) 380-2955 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://www.elca.org/co/news/current.html