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ELCIC partnership with ELCA Global Mission

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada partners with ELCA Global Mission

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC) has a new approach and a new name for its world mission program – ELCIC Global Mission. This new model for the ELCIC’s participation in God’s mission in the world comes about through a partnership agreement with ELCA Global Mission (GM).

In the ELCIC’s partnership agreement with ELCA GM, the ELCIC embraces and affirms the accompaniment methodology for mission, which practices solidarity rooted in interdependence and mutuality with companions. ELCIC GM will now use the word "companion" in the same way it is used by ELCA GM. Previously in the ELCIC, "companion" was used only to refer to a church which has a relationship with an ELCIC synod in the Companion Synods Program. "Companion" now also refers to a church outside of Canada and the United States which has a bilateral relationship at the national church level with the ELCIC. ELCIC GM will now use "companion church" in place of "partner church."

The ELCIC has companion Lutheran churches in Peru, Argentina, Colombia, Guyana, El Salvador, Cameroon, Jordan and the Holy Land and, until the end of 2009, Papua New Guinea. ELCA GM has bilateral relationships with all of these same eight Lutheran churches plus many more. The ELCIC will continue to relate directly to three of these Lutheran Churches, in Argentina, Peru and Jordan and the Holy Land. ELCA GM staff will represent the ELCIC when they relate to the other five companion churches.

There are five synods in the ELCIC and each has a companion relationship in the Companion Synods Program as follows:

British Columbia  Synod	Peruvian Evangelical Lutheran Church (ILEP)
Synod of Alberta and the territories	Evangelical Lutheran Church of Colombia (IELCO)
Saskatchewan Synod	United Evangelical Lutheran Church of Argentina (IELU)
Manitoba/Northwestern Ontario Synod	Evangelical Lutheran Church of Cameroon (EELC)
Eastern Synod	Evangelical Lutheran Church in Guyana (ELCG)

ELCIC synods can now work with the ELCA GM Companion Synods Program, which has staff available to help facilitate these relationships and, if appropriate, form new relationships with companions who have requested a companion.  

Global service is a key element of the ELCIC’s partnership with ELCA GM. The ELCIC is no longer recruiting for mission personnel directly. ELCIC members interested in global service can now contact ELCA GM Global Service personnel in Chicago who will respond to inquiries, receive applications and conduct interviews. ELCIC members who qualify for global service may be placed by ELCA GM staff in volunteer or compensated positions. ELCIC members assigned to global service by ELCA GM are included on the mission personnel poster on the ELCIC GM web site.

The ELCIC endorses and participates in ELCA global events and a representative of ELCIC GM attends the ELCA GM Program Committee meetings.

The ELCIC partnership with ELCA GM is firmly grounded and deeply rooted in a long history of cooperation. Before 1967 there was no independent Canadian Lutheran church and mission personnel from Canada served overseas for decades, always immediately accountable to a Lutheran church office in the United States. In 1967 the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada (ELCC) was formed with a head office in Saskatoon that sent missionaries of its own abroad. The Lutheran Church in America (LCA) – Canada Section members who went into overseas mission service were still supervised from the LCA office in New York.

The ELCIC came into being on 1 January 1986, with its own international personnel who were accountable to the Canadian office in Winnipeg. From time to time the ELCIC and ELCA worked together on mission personnel placements which led to the signing of an agreement regarding joint placements in 2006. The ELCIC has also supported and participated in ELCA global events since 2004. The ELCIC and ELCA are now moving forward from cooperative work to shared work in global mission.