wfn.org | ELCA Assembly Learns How to Find Congregational Assets

[News News <NEWS@ELCA.ORG>]

ELCA NEWS SERVICE

August 11, 2001

ELCA ASSEMBLY LEARNS HOW TO FIND CONGREGATIONAL ASSETS
01-CWA35-LS

     INDIANAPOLIS (ELCA) -- Taking a glass-is-half-full approach to
ministry, congregations of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
(ELCA) are examining their assets instead of their deficiencies.
Christine Grumm, chair of an ELCA initiative committee for "asset
mapping," presented the concept to the 2001 ELCA Churchwide Assembly
Aug. 11.
     The churchwide assembly, the chief legislative authority of the
ELCA, is meeting here Aug. 8-14 at the Indiana Convention Center.  There
are more than 2,000 people participating, including 1,040 ELCA voting
members.  The theme for the biennial assembly is "Making Christ Known:
Sharing Faith in a New Century."
     Asset mapping is a community development project that allows
congregations to uncover hidden talents, said Grumm, who is former vice
president of the ELCA. It's also a refreshing change from a problem-
oriented approach, she said.  "When we look at the needs and the
problems, we become burdened down," Grumm said.
     The project grew from the ELCA initiative to "Strengthen One
Another in Mission." Final reports on each of the seven initiatives,
launched by the ELCA in 1997, are being presented at this assembly.
     Members of the initiative committee piloted asset mapping in seven
ELCA congregations. Grumm gave assembly participants a taste of the
process by asking them to vote on their hidden gifts and talents. Using
electronic voting machines, participants answered questions about
musical abilities, professional skills, community activities and
relationships with influential people.
     Looking at their assets changes a congregation's self-image, Grumm
said, and increases community involvement. "We begin to see ourselves as
a church without walls," she said.
     Luther Snow, an ELCA member from Chicago, said the initiative
taught participants and organizers four lessons. They learned that asset
mapping generates positive energy, renews vision of mission, widens
circles of relationships and develops leaders. In one congregation that
tested asset mapping, five people ran for two church council positions,
Snow said.
-- -- --
     Information about assembly action is at
http://www.elca.org/assembly/01 on the ELCA's Web site. Recorded updates
during the assembly are available by calling 773/380-2477.

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