wfn.org | South African Lutherans Seek Economic Justice

[ELCANEWS@ELCASCO.ELCA.ORG]

ELCA NEWS SERVICE

November 6, 1996

SOUTH AFRICAN LUTHERANS SEEK ECONOMIC JUSTICE
96-25-077-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Since democratic elections in April 1994,
South Africa has made significant strides in stabilizing its
political and social life, but its economic life has suffered,
said the Rev. Molefe Tsele, a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in South Africa (ELCSA) and director of the Ecumenical
Service for Socio-Economic Transformation (ESSET), Johannesburg,
South Africa.
     "The threat to the viability of our democracy will simply
come from people who are poor, who are unemployed and who are
marginalized by the way the economy is working," said Tsele.
ESSET is trying to help make the economic life of South Africa as
democratic and accessible as its political life has become, he
said.
     "We are researching the state of the economy in the country,
particularly posing questions: Is it working in the interest of
all?  Is it contributing to a better quality of living for all?
How can it be made to perform with particular moral values," so
it responds to human needs while being productive and profitable?
ESSET promotes "systems that can put employment of people as a
priority, that can put training of human skills and development
of people as a priority," said Tsele.
     A majority of ELCSA's membership is impoverished, he said.
"If the economy in the country doesn't function, the first church
to feel the pain would be ELCSA, so it has an interest both for
its membership and for the broader South African society to
engage economic strategies and models and to make sure they
work."
     ESSET takes advantage of "a very healthy tradition in South
Africa" by working ecumenically, said Tsele.  All religious
organizations in the country work together to combat apartheid,
promote human rights and tackle various social issues.
     "As we in the church help the new government to correct the
imbalances of the past, developing economic strategies, it is
important that we work ecumenically.  At the end of the day it
will be to the greater benefit of society as a whole," he said.
     Tsele is in North America to describe the work of ESSET to
those working for economic justice in other churches, to learn of
ways to work together toward similar goals and to learn from each
other's work.  He visited the churchwide of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America here on Oct. 31.
     Lutheran churches around the world share a tradition that
stresses involvement in public life, said Tsele.  "Public
officials are representatives of God, and they have a function to
perform," he said.
     Government is God's means "to create a space for life to
happen," and politics is "a sphere that God has availed to
everyone," said Tsele.  "Neglect of one's duty to vote should be
seen as one of the most irresponsible acts of any adult person
who has family, who has children, who has brothers, sisters or
parents."

For information contact: Ann Hafften, Dir., ELCA News Service,
(312) 380-2958 or AHAFFTEN@ELCA.ORG; Frank Imhoff, Assoc. Dir.,
(312) 380-2955 or FRANKI@ELCA.ORG