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	October 4, 2005 .................... LCMSNews -- No. 66

	Outpouring of Synod love, generosity
	for Katrina 'phenomenal,' says official

	By Joe Isenhower Jr.

	"The unprecedented outpouring of Christian love and generosity
of our people is phenomenal," said Rev. Matthew Harrison, executive
director of LCMS World Relief/Human Care, as he summed up the Synod's
response to Hurricane Katrina.

	"Congregations and groups all over the Synod -- many of them in
the area slammed by this massive storm, pastors and other church
workers, the auxiliaries, organizations, volunteers in untold numbers --
have stepped up to the plate to help in whatever ways they can," he
said.

	Harrison said that by Sept. 30, financial gifts for hurricane
relief through World Relief/Human Care in the month since Hurricane
Katrina stood at just under $8 million -- an amount surpassing gifts for
tsunami relief in the same amount of time earlier this year, which
itself was a record.

	Those hurricane-relief gifts do not include matching funds from
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, which pledged $1 for every $2 its
members in the LCMS and two other Lutheran church bodies give for
hurricane relief, up to a $300 match and a total of $2 million in
Thrivent funds.

	"Our districts and congregations have responded magnificently
after the hurricane," Harrison said. "They have become distribution
centers for food and volunteer assistance, helping the elderly and
anyone else affected -- the whole gamut. Our pastors have been involved
in everything from rescue to housing people in need."

	He said that in the Southern District, congregations -- "many of
them with property and members hard-hit by the hurricane -- are serving
their communities, caring for displaced people, and volunteering to help
each other."

	Harrison visited the Gulf Coast the week after the Category 4
storm struck, preaching at Trinity Lutheran Church, Baton Rouge, for
weekend services.

	Trinity became a drop-and-distribution center for material goods
(food, emergency supplies, and clothing) shortly after the hurricane. It
also temporarily housed the Southern District office when floodwaters
from the storm cut off roads leading to the office in New Orleans.

	"They asked for volunteers at the end of the service," Harrison
said, "and en masse, maybe 200 people pressed forward."

	Harrison said he has heard that members of LCMS congregations
"dropped everything and headed south to help in any way they could, from
as far away as the upper Midwest and Pacific Northwest -- convoys of
members with supplies, chainsaws, and backhoes -- you name it."

	Synod President Gerald B. Kieschnick was one of those who saw
that chainsaws got delivered to the Southern District.

	Kieschnick flew to Baton Rouge on Labor Day to tour Synod
congregations in the area Katrina hit. That was the day after he
attended the installation of Dr. Dale Meyer as president of Concordia
Seminary and two days after returning from Berlin, where he participated
in the meeting of the International Lutheran Conference.

	He said that when he asked Harrison and Southern District
President Kurtis Schultz what he might bring along with him, they
replied, "chainsaws!"

	"To the credit of American Airlines -- in the person of
manager-on-duty and LCMS member Paul Hechsel -- I was able to check
eight 20-inch Husqvarna and Poulan chainsaws, purchased the night before
by my senior assistant, with the $80 extra-baggage surcharge for each
generously waived by the airline," Kieschnick writes in the October
issue of "The Lutheran Witness."

	For that same issue, Harrison wrote the cover article, titled
"Katrina's Impact, the Synod's Response."

	"Thanks to the generosity of our donors, and owing in no small
part to hardworking staff and volunteers, the response of LCMS World
Relief and Human Care to Katrina has been unprecedented," Harrison
wrote. "In terms of the scale of the relief being sent and the help
being provided to thousands of hurting people, the capabilities of the
Synod have swung into action like never before, and that includes the
volunteer capacity of LCMS World Mission and the strength of the
Lutheran Laymen's League and the Lutheran Women's Missionary League. The
scope of this catastrophe requires nothing less."

	Through the work of Lutheran Social Services of the South,
Harrison notes in his article for the magazine, "Lutheran Disaster
Response [LDR] is poised to make a huge impact not only on affected LCMS
people but also on many outside the scope of the Synod."

	Within two days after Katrina hit, Norfolk, Neb.-based Orphan
Grain Train had necessary food and water on the ground in the Southern
District.

	"We provided several hundred thousand dollars," Harrison said,
"which Orphan Grain Train then probably quadrupled with donations from a
food supplier."

	LCMS World Relief/Human Care purchased four full-size
refrigerated units and a St. Louis-area trucking firm waived most of the
costs for getting five shipments of "specifically requested equipment
and supplies" to Orphan Grain Train drop centers in the Southern
District.

	"Orphan Grain Train is an unbelievable LCMS entity, with
fantastic capacity to bring aid to people in need," Harrison said.

	He added, "Until the last few years, we basically did not fund
Orphan Grain Train. Here's an operation founded by an LCMS pastor that
provides $10 million in material aid a year, and it was not part of our
normal network. But we changed the paradigm, or rather Orphan Grain
Train changed the paradigm."

	"Our people have unbelievable qualifications, unbelievable
connections, unbelievable abilities," Harrison said.

	"The LCMS cannot be passive and simply assume others will deal
with everything," he said. "LDR, the social ministry agencies, the
districts, our congregations, everybody's stronger if the LCMS dares to
step up to the plate with its national capacity.

	"Without bringing LCMS capacity and developing LCMS capacity to
handle issues such as responding to hurricanes like this," Harrison
said, "we would never have a response that was anything close to what it
could be -- what it is in this case of response to Hurricane Katrina."

	"The agencies with LDR bring fantastic capacity to the
intersection," Harrison said. "Most notably, in situations like
hurricane relief, Lutheran Disaster Response's forte is long-term
program and assistance for people in deep need. We affirm that and we
support it 100 percent. And I believe that we should be at the
inter-Lutheran intersection for cooperation in externals, which is
theologically justified.

	"The great strength of building and bringing LCMS capacity is
that it keeps the assistance close to congregations and close to pastors
-- close to Word and Sacrament ministries," Harrison said. "Keeping this
tied closely to congregations is very significant.

	"In this model, we're saying our pastors, our church workers,
our congregations are on the front line of responding to disaster. And
so, we need to make sure we care for them, provide what they need, as
they are deep in the fray of ministering with Christian love and
compassion for people in need, especially in times of disaster."

	"This isn't the first time all that has happened," he concluded.
"But this time, it has happened in a very big way."

	Gifts for hurricane relief may be made out to LCMS World Relief
and sent to LCMS World Relief/Human Care, P.O. Box 66861, St. Louis, MO
63166-9810; designate checks to "2005 Hurricanes." Or call the Credit
Card Gift Line, (888) 930-4438, or visit worldrelief.lcms.org
<http://worldrelief.lcms.org>  and click on the "Give Now" button. The
Web site also is regularly updated with hurricane relief news and
information.

	***************************************

	If you have questions or comments about this LCMSNews release,
contact Joe Isenhower Jr. at joe.isenhower@lcms.org or (314) 996-1231,
or Paula Schlueter Ross at paula.ross@lcms.org or (314) 996-1230.

	***************************************

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