wfn.org | ELCA Division Focuses on Poverty and Hunger in Strategic Plan

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ELCA NEWS SERVICE

March 9, 2001

ELCA DIVISION FOCUSES ON POVERTY AND HUNGER IN STRATEGIC PLAN
01-052-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
(ELCA) Division for Church in Society (DCS) has a vision and goals to
"deepen and expand the ELCA's efforts" to eliminate poverty and hunger
in its pursuit of justice.  The DCS board met here Feb. 22-24, approved
the vision and goals in a strategic plan for 2001-2003, and affirmed the
staff's implementing work plan.
     The division began work on the new strategic plan in June 1999,
said the Rev. Leslie F. Weber Jr., associate executive director of DCS.
Sixty-four staff, board members and other "stakeholders" participated in
a "Future Search" planning conference in January 2000.
     "One of the outcomes of the Future Search conference was to see
congregations as a principal audience," said Weber.  So, focus groups
were assembled with pastors and lay leaders of congregational social
ministry.
     Several drafts of the DCS strategic plan were revised in 2000,
Weber said.  The process took the opinions of stakeholders into account,
narrowed the division's focus while accepting greater responsibility,
and charted a challenging yet achievable course toward God's vision for
the world, he said.
     The process leading up to adoption of the vision and goals "really
engaged the board in great depth and wide participation," said the Rev.
James M. Childs Jr., DCS board chair.  Childs is director of academic
development and professor of theology and ethics, Trinity Lutheran
Seminary, Columbus, Ohio.
     Board members devoted a great deal of time on the emphasis of
"helping the church to understand and commit to the fact that our social
justice concerns are integral to our gospel mission in the world," said
Childs.  "That is essential to seeing how the Division for Church in
Society's mission is very much at the center of the church's gospel
mission."
     Childs said the goals to eliminate poverty and hunger emerged from
that emphasis.  "So much of the work of the division gets involved in
those goals and those priorities," he added.
     Titled "Vision for Ministry," the plan included the vision
statement:  "The Division for Church in Society seeks a future in which
the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's understanding of and
commitment to justice as integral to the gospel are deepened and
expanded, moving this church to join with others to work for local and
global communities in which people are no longer oppressed by poverty
and hunger."
     The plan presented three goals:
 + Deepen and expand the ELCA's understanding of and commitment to
justice as integral to the gospel
 + Deepen and expand the ELCA's efforts to eliminate poverty
 + Deepen and expand the ELCA's efforts to eliminate hunger
     "This new strategic plan completes a process which brings into
harmony the major focus of this division's program with the unit's
annual budget.  We can display with ease the total financial resources
managed by this division that connect directly with our three strategic
goals," said the Rev. Charles S. Miller, executive director of the
division.
-- -- --
     The ELCA Division for Church in Society maintains a site at
http://www.elca.org/DCS/ on the Web.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://listserv.elca.org/archives/elcanews.html