Lutheran Services in America Board Discusses Unions, Church

CLEVELAND (ELCA) -- A canceled conference workshop on unions and a Lutheran church's statement on economic life set the stage for an in-depth discussion by the board of Lutheran Services in America (LSA) here March 29, preceding the LSA annual conference.
"We think the conversations ought to occur in an appropriate environment," said the Rev. Nelson C. Meyer, LSA board chair. "A national conference is not the place where you discuss or try to resolve issues between parties."
LSA is one of the largest human service networks in the United States and Caribbean. Its 296 social ministry organizations, in alliance with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, form a national network of social service and long-term care programs providing more than $3 billion in services in 3,000 communities each year.
Advance materials for the conference offered 26 workshops, including one called "Unions -- A Help or a Hindrance in Lutheran Services?" The workshop was described: "This participatory workshop begins by exploring the common values shared by social ministry organization [SMO] leaders and union leaders. Then discussion will consider how unions help and/or hinder the institution's mission. Panel members will represent SMO leaders as well as Service Employee International Union."
That workshop was canceled. "LSA staff decided wisely," said Meyer, "that a national conference isn't really the appropriate environment to settle differences constructively, because there were some differences between a union perspective and some of our members' perspectives."
The LSA Disability Network raised objections to the workshop, David A. Jacox, executive director, Bethphage Mission, Omaha, Neb., told the board. Advance material about the workshop was the focus of a "passionate" discussion at the network's January meeting, he said.
The workshop description implied there was a problem -- that directors of social ministry organizations don't care about their workers, said Jacox. To offer unions as a remedy would have put directors on the defense at the annual conference, he said. "The workshop would have looked like 'The Jerry Springer Show,'" he said, referring to a confrontational daily, one-hour television talk show syndicated through Studios USA.
The 18-member board represented a wide range of positions -- from those who worked closely as allies of union leaders to those who considered unions as threats to the missions of their organizations. Many board members considered labor organizers as sharing similar values as church directors but their methods often conflict.
"I was very pleased," Meyer said afterward. Board members spent more than an hour to look in depth at several facets of the issues, he said.
"They exercised the self-discipline necessary not to get emotionally involved, but really to look at it from a policy perspective," said Meyer. Board members were able to see the issues from the perspectives of LSA, its member organizations, the employees and the people their ministries serve, he said.
"LSA is indeed a forum where discussions on these issues need to take place, and we see ourselves as a forum which inspires that discussion," Meyer said.
The ELCA's 1999 Churchwide Assembly adopted a social statement on economic life, "Sufficient, Sustainable Livelihood for All," which committed the church to "honor the right of employees to organize for the sake of better working conditions" among other management practices.
"It is a statement that some of our social ministry organizations take exception to -- all or in part," Meyer told the board.
"That statement from one church body is binding on all of our social ministry organization members who are affiliated with that church body. It is not binding, however, on the second church-body member -- the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod," said Meyer. He called the board's discussion "an opportunity to deal with the issue of how we react when one church body holds one position that is not necessarily held by the other church body."
"We do not see ourselves as a judicial body which would decide which church statement is right," said Meyer. "That would be clearly inappropriate. We need to respect the polity and theology of all of our members, and we need to do that in an open, discussing environment -- not in one that takes sides."
Meyer said the discussion will continue on several levels. "One level that's very important to LSA is that we look at worker justice and the workplace environment," he said. "We think it's desirable to be as proactive as possible and to do everything we can to help educate, train, nurture our organizations to provide as much worker justice and as enriched and just working environment as possible."
LSA will continue "to lift up the competing values which we are responsible for holding together in tension," said Meyer. LSA staff will be available to consult with members and to put members in contact with "peers within LSA who have exemplary models of workplace environments," he said.
The desired outcome is to "resolve the issue so that, instead of deciding pro or con union, we can put all our energies into having an environment where people want to work, where people feel they are paid justly, where people feel they have a legitimate voice in determining the direction and, when there are complaints and things to correct, management listens to them," Meyer said.

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