CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Two missionaries of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America work providing food to the hungry in Russia through the Moscow Protestant Chaplaincy. The Revs. Twila K. Schock and William P. Swanson arrived in Moscow in October to work in the ecumenical and intercultural congregation of Protestant Christians.
The Board of the ELCA's Division for Global Mission, meeting here Oct. 23-25, heard a report and viewed a video of the Soup Kitchen Ministry and the Food Sharing Ministry of the congregation. Schock and Swanson, serving as pastors for the congregation, succeed two Presbyterian missionaries.
Hunger among the aged is a serious problem in Moscow, according to Andrea Vedanayagam, who assists with the division's work in Europe. The Soup Kitchen Ministry provides a hot midday meal for needy Russian senior citizens, refugees and invalids, she told the board.
Volunteers who help prepare and serve the meals are young people, mostly refugees themselves from countries affected by war, stranded in Russia with no way of going back home. They too receive a hot meal.
The congregation initiated the feeding program in 1991, "seeing no hope of help from the government," Vedanayagam reported. The elderly people who benefit receive a monthly government pension, but it only covers the cost of groceries for about two weeks because of ever-rising inflation. "The Soup Kitchen Ministry meets a vital need in supplementing their diet," Vedanayagam said.
Russian staff and student volunteers use three cafes to prepare and serve about 5,000 hot meals each week at a cost of about $3,000 per week, or 61 cents per meal. The ELCA World Hunger Fund provides support as do funds from the Reformed Church in America, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), United Methodist Church and American Baptist Church.
The board voted to ask the ELCA Church Council to grant formal "Recognition of Relationship" to Sister Parish Incorporated. Sister Parish, based in West Fargo, N.D., links congregations in North America with congregations in Central America, allowing them to experience and encounter each other's lives and cultures.
Sister Parish "relates to numerous ELCA congregations in assisting them to travel and relate with congregations in Latin America," the board affirmed. Sister Parish and the Division for Global Mission's Companion Synod program can mutually benefit from the relationship, according to the board's action.
The first delegation from Sister Parish visited Mezquital, Guatemala, in 1989, beginning a relationship that continues to today. Sister Parish reports about 40 linkages between Catholic, Lutheran, Presbyterian, United Church of Christ, Episcopal and other congregations in the United States with faith communities in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, Costa Rica, El Salvador and Mexico.
The Rev. Winston D. Persaud, Wartburg Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa, was elected chairperson of the board.
The board accepted the retirement of two long-term missionaries. Eileen Murray, an educator and school administrator, served in India beginning in 1965 and since 1995 in Namibia. Murray has relocated to Punta Gorda, Fla. The Rev. Paul and Marie Senff worked in Papua New Guinea since 1965. Paul Senff was a missionary pastor and seminary professor; Marie Senff worked in the area of women's development and administration. They are living in Austin, Texas.
The appointment of two new staff members was announced to the board. Kathy J. Magnus, Chicago, will be associate director for international personnel; she succeeds Joyce Bowers who is staffing a global mission story project in the ELCA archives. Thomas F. Schaeffer will be program director for East Asia, succeeding the Rev. Delbert E. Anderson who is retiring. Magnus served for six years as vice president of the ELCA; she also was on the staff of the church's Rocky Mountain Synod. Schaeffer has been a missionary pastor and administrator in Malaysia and Singapore for the past ten years. He will move to Chicago from Singapore.
Two representatives from the missionary staff addressed the board: Karen Anderson, nurse and organizer of Popular Education for Health (Educacion Popular En Salud) in Chile; and the Rev. Thomas P. Olson, pastor and agriculturalist in the Central African Republic.
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Ann Hafften, Director (773) 380-2958 or
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About the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America:
The ELCA is one of the largest Christian denominations in the United States, with 2.8 million members in more than 8,500 worshiping communities across the 50 states and in the Caribbean region. Known as the church of "God's work. Our hands.," the ELCA emphasizes the saving grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ, unity among Christians and service in the world. The ELCA's roots are in the writings of the German church reformer Martin Luther.
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