wfn.org | ELCA Pastor Heads to Iraq in Friendship

[<NEWS@ELCA.ORG>]

Title: ELCA Pastor Heads to Iraq in Friendship
ELCA NEWS SERVICE

>May 15, 2009  

>ELCA Pastor Heads to Iraq in Friendship
>09-116-SH

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Rev. Brooks Anderson is traveling to
Iraq May 16 to extend a hand of friendship to the people there.
"It's timely and feels Spirit-led," said Anderson, 76, Duluth,
Minn., a retired pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America.

Anderson will spend six days in the northeastern Kurdish
village of Raniyah. He's traveling with five others from Duluth
in hopes of establishing lasting ties between the cities.

"Building friendships across boundaries that divide us is
always a good thing, and sometimes critical to peacemaking,"
Anderson said. "We call it grassroots citizen diplomacy."

The goal may seem farfetched to outsiders, but less so in
Duluth. Anderson accomplished a similar feat with Russia during
the Cold War in 1986 when he led a group to Petrozavodsk.

The visit blossomed into a sister city relationship that led
to hundreds of "people exchanges" in areas such as music,
medicine and the arts. Each city alternates hosting an annual
language camp.

"I could go through a half a dozen issues where Brooks got
things rolling in the community," said County Commissioner Steve
O'Neil, Duluth.

The Iraq visit mirrors the avenue taken with Russia.
Citizens are reaching out on their own rather than in any
official capacity. Rather than a "sister city project," the trip
is dubbed an "exploratory visit." A youth center in Raniyah is
hosting the Duluthians, who'll tour government centers,
marketplaces, refugee camps and other sites to meet the Kurdish
people.

"Meeting face to face is a great way to build bridges and
dispel fears between people," said Tom Morgan, a Russian studies
and literature professor making the trip. He also traveled to
Petrozavodsk on the initial trip, but only after much arm-
twisting by Anderson.

"I thought it was crazy," Morgan said. "The idea that anyone
from the West could travel to Russia and say, 'We want to be your
friends' wasn't realistic. Well, look what happened."

Anderson, ordained 50 years ago, is a member of First
Lutheran Church, Duluth. He helped the congregation establish
relationships with communities in El Salvador and Namibia.

He arrived in Duluth as a Lutheran campus minister in the
1960s as civil-rights and anti-Vietnam war movements stirred. He
marched in Selma, Ala., fought discriminatory housing practices
in Duluth and led war protests. Colleagues say his activism often
marginalized him in the church.

"He was looked upon with mixed feelings," said the Rev. Dan
Bergeland, a retired ELCA pastor and First Lutheran member. "Some
thought he was 'out there.' He was often ahead of the issues and
at the front end. People now see that he was right. At the time,
there was resistance."

Anderson chaired the Duluth mayor's energy council and
promoted energy efficiency in the 1970s. He opened a peace center
in the 1980s. In the 1990s, he led forums on sexual orientation
with his gay son and launched a local chapter of the support
group PFLAG (Parents, Family and Friends of Lesbians and Gays).

Nine years ago, he spent three months in prison after being
arrested with a Catholic nun, Methodist minister and others
protesting the School of Americas at Fort Benning, a U.S. Army
military base in Georgia that trains Latin American military
officers.

Anderson views himself as a peacemaker and that's why he's
now headed to Iraq.

"Obama can't turn it around alone," he said. "The best way
to bring about peace is not with angry rhetoric. We need people
reaching out to people."

For information contact:

John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or news@elca.org
http://www.elca.org/news
ELCA News Blog: http://www.elca.org/news/blog