CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The International Disaster Response of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) has sent $50,000 to aid refugees displaced by the crisis in Kosovo.
The funds were sent through Action by Churches Together (ACT) to Norwegian Church Aid, which is working directly with refugees in and around Kosovo, according to the Rev. Y. Franklin Ishida, director for international communication, ELCA Division for Global Mission. =20
The ELCA is a member of ACT, a worldwide network of churches and related agencies meeting human need through coordinated emergency response.=20 While much relief work within Kosovo has been scaled back due to security concerns, aid to neighboring countries continues as the influx of refugees increases, Ishida said. In Macedonia, located on Kosovo's southern border, 20,000 ethnic Albanian refugees are receiving relief supplies from a local partner agency of Lutheran World Relief (LWR). The partner, ACT-Macedonian Center for International Cooperation (MCIC), is providing food and clothing to Kosovar refugees in private homes, said Jonathan C. Frerichs, LWR director of communication. LWR works overseas in relief and development on behalf of the ELCA and The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. =20 LWR has sent 17 tons of clothing and quilts to Kosovo refugees in Montenegro in recent months and is planning further material and financial aid. ACT-MCIC helped Bosnian refugees earlier in the breakup of Yugoslavia, using local resources and overseas church support. Dr. Ishmael Noko, general secretary for the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), urged all parties involved in the current Kosovo conflict to return to the negotiating table. Noko said the negotiations should include broad representation of the Kosovar people, as well as representatives of the main religious communities in the region.=20 "A strategy which pins its last and only hopes for securing peace and justice upon the threat and use of violence, is a bankrupt strategy," Noko said. On the use of violence on the ethnic Albanian community in Kosovo, Noko said the LWF "abhors" the brutality of Serbian security forces upon the people of Kosovo. Lutheran World Federation is a global communion of 124 Lutheran churches, including the ELCA. The ACT Coordinating Office is based in Switzerland with the Lutheran World Federation and the World Council of Churches (WCC). Dr. Konrad Reiser, general secretary for the WCC, condemned the violence in Kosovo in a pastoral letter addressed to the church leaders of the three WCC member churches in Yugoslavia. The churches include the Serbian Orthodox Church, the Reformed Christian Church in Yugoslavia and the Slovak Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession (Lutheran) in Yugoslavia.
For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or NEWS@ELCA.ORG
http://www.elca.org/co/news/current.html
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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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Candice Hill Buchbinder
Public Relations Manager
Candice.HillBuchbinder@ELCA.org
