wfn.org | Native American task force asked to tighten strategies in report

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Note #6021 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

27-June-2000
GA00073

	Native American task force asked to tighten strategies in report

	by Alexa Smith

LONG BEACH, June 27 – After hours of wrangling, the Assembly Committee on
Evangelism and Church Development opted to commend the "Comprehensive
Strategy for Ministries with Native Americans" onto the plenary floor, but
to send the core of the report back to the task force that wrote it.

	According to Task Force on Native American Ministry moderator June Lorenzo
of Falls Church, Va., that's not bad.

	"The committee," she said, "really wants to put teeth into the
recommendations; and it asked if we were willing to stay on two years to
give more direction to the partnership process ... [to] design a
consultation to begin a dialogue between middle governing bodies and native
churches."   It is an idea the task force, appointed in 1996, considered but
dismissed as too expensive.

	But finding ways to connect the 109 Native American churches with
presbyteries is really what Lorenzo's task force wants, since, she estimates
that only five of those congregations are self-sufficient.

	So far, the task force is  proposing expanding support for developing
congregations beyond five years, developing thorough training for lay
pastors, both of which have begun; increasing the recruitment of Native
American students for seminaries and developing service opportunities for
volunteer service in Native American communities, both of which are under
discussion; conducting an inventory of Native American church properties,
which is to be complete by 2004; and providing funds for young adult
ministries, an item that the National Ministries Division has budgeted for
the next three years.

	But the Assembly committee would like to see more.  In addition to a
consultation, it wants statistical research on Native Americans within the
denomination's presbyteries.  So it is recommending sending Lorenzo and the
9-member committee back to the drawing board.

	The problem for Native American churches, according to Lorenzo, is
overcoming patterns of paternalism that were established by old styles of
mission.  "In the '60s, the denomination decided to move Native Americans
from the care of the National Mission Board to presbyteries ... though there
was no prior relationship.  The missing piece was that the church did not
work with native congregations to be self-supporting churches.  And without
that transitioning, they are floundering," she said, adding that cultural
and language barriers only make the problems worse.

	The challenge for both presbyteries and congregations, she said, is to
connect themselves better so that congregations may learn the processes for
calling a pastor, to begin to pay larger portions of pastors' salaries and
to lift up local leadership.

	"I can count on one hand the number of presbytery executives who have a
relationship with native communities.  I'd love to say there are more, but I
really honestly don't think I can," Lorenzo told the General Assembly News
Service.

	Others on the task force are Lou Deer, vice-moderator, of Seminole, Okla.;
the Rev. David Dobler, Anchorage, Ala.; the Rev. Harry E. Fawcett, Dubuque,
Iowa; the Rev. Kenneth Lehman, Naperville, Ill.; Elona Street-Stewart, St.
Paul, Minn.; the Rev. Mary Ann Warden, Barrow, Ala.;  Marilyn Yazzie,
Holrook, Ariz.; Randel Bohanon, the Native American Coordinating Committee,
Smithville, Okla.; and Mary McQuillen, Port Townsend, Wash.

	In committee, Native American advocates told commissioners this report is
the first time Native Americans have been included in decision-making about
their role in the life of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

	In other business, the committee voted to send on to the Assembly:

	* an amended Overture 00-84, from the Presbytery of Blackhawk, instructing
the Church Financial Campaign Service to make available to each new church
development or redevelopment site one campaign that would require the site
to pay only half the cost, with the General Assembly picking up a quarter
and either the appropriate presbytery or synod the last quarter.  It was
speculated that funding would be drawn from the annual $5 million budget of
the Church Loan Fund.

	* a slightly amended Overture 00-88 (from the Presbytery of San Jose)
directing the General Assembly Council to seek means to increase financial
support for new church developments with commitments to social justice and
evangelism ministries.

	* a commissioner's resolution asking that an education program be developed
for presbytery, synod and General Assembly leaders that establishes
culturally sensitive strategies for new church development and redevelopment
in racial-ethnic communities.

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