wfn.org | ELCA Council Re-Elects Thompson, Names Committee Members

[News News <NEWS@ELCA.ORG>]

ELCA NEWS SERVICE

November 14, 2001

ELCA COUNCIL RE-ELECTS THOMPSON, NAMES COMMITTEE MEMBERS
01-293-FI

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Church Council of the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) elected Else Thompson to a second
four-year term as director of the ELCA Department for Human
Resources.  The council also made appointments to several churchwide
boards and committees.
     The Church Council is the ELCA's board of directors and serves
as the legislative authority of the church between its churchwide
assemblies. The council met here Nov. 9-11. Assemblies are held every
other year; the next is Aug. 11-17, 2003, in Milwaukee.
     On the recommendation of the presiding bishop, the council re-
elected Thompson, 54.  She has served as director of the department
since 1998.  Her second term begins Jan. 1, 2002.
     Among her duties, Thompson oversees personnel policies of the
churchwide organization, guides staff selection, provides for
employee assistance programs, ensures equitable employee-relations
practices and maintains personnel records.
     Before joining the ELCA, Thompson was director for human
resource planning at Aid Association for Lutherans.  AAL is a
fraternal benefits organization based in Appleton, Wis.; it plans to
merge soon with Lutheran Brotherhood, a fraternal benefits
organization based in Minneapolis.
     The ELCA Church Council appointed several of its own members to
advisory committees in the church: the Rev. Michael G. Merkel,
Bethesda Lutheran Church, New Haven, Conn., to Corporate Social
Responsibility, a program of the ELCA Division for Church in Society;
the Rev. Joseph G. Crippen, St. John Lutheran Church, Northfield,
Minn., the Rev. Fred S. Opalinski, Trinity Lutheran Church, Latrobe,
Pa., and the Rev. Karen S. Parker, assistant to the bishop, Pacifica
Synod, Huntington Beach, Calif., to the ELCA Department for
Ecumenical Affairs; and Grieg L. Anderson, Portland, Ore., to The
Lutheran, magazine of the ELCA.
     The council named Rosemary Bennett, Grace Lutheran Church,
Phoenix, and James E. Tremain, Salem Lutheran Church, Fremont, Neb.,
to complete the unexpired terms of Donna A. Coursey, Seattle, and
Bolivar Roman, San Juan, Puerto Rico, on the board of the ELCA
Division for Higher Education and Schools.
     It named Frank Hanna-Williams, St. Peter Lutheran Church,
Tillamook, Ore., to replace the Rev. Loren E. Halvorson, St. Paul,
Minn., who completed his six-year term on the steering committee of
the ELCA Commission for Women.  It ratified the appointment of the
Rev. Lawrence J. Clark, Bethany Lutheran Church, Chicago, to complete
the unexpired term of the Rev. Michele L. Robinson on the steering
committee of the ELCA Commission for Multicultural Ministries.
     The council re-elected the Rev. Marlene Whiterabbit Helgemo,
Central Lutheran Church, Minneapolis, to the board of trustees of the
Endowment Fund of the ELCA and board of advisors of the ELCA
Foundation and elected three new members to serve six-year terms on
those boards: Brian Hofland, Trinity Lutheran Church, White Plains,
N.Y.; Tonia J. Lindquist, Gethsemane Lutheran Church, Portland, Ore.;
and the Rev. Richard W. Martyn, First Lutheran Church, Fullerton,
Calif.
     It ratified the reappointment of Bradford E. Cook, Gethsemane
Evangelical Lutheran Church, Manchester, N.H., and the Rev. J. Philip
Wahl, Lutheran Church of the Ascension, Savannah, Ga., to six-year
terms on the Churchwide Committee of Hearing Officers, and named the
Rev. Leslie G. Svendsen, St. John Lutheran Church, Northfield, Minn.,
to that committee.
     The council ratified the appointment of Alfred V. Sagar,
Ascension Lutheran Church, Jackson, Miss., to the advisory committee
of the ELCA Department for Human Resources, to complete the unexpired
term of Paul E. Brammeier, Wheaton, Ill.  The Rev. Mark S. Hanson,
ELCA presiding bishop, made the appointment.
     The council named several members to the board of trustees of
the Mission Investment Fund of the ELCA.  Each was nominated by a
related churchwide board.  Robert C. Gorsuch, Good Shepherd Lutheran
Church, Madison, Wis., and Lisa K. Stump, St. John Lutheran Church,
Des Moines, Iowa, were nominated by the ELCA Church Council's budget
and finance committee; Norma J. Larson, Spirit of Life Lutheran
Church, Port Orchard, Wash., by the Division for Outreach; and Willis
"Bill" O. Serr II, Epiphany Lutheran Church, Dayton, Ohio, by the
Division for Church in Society.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
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