The following is shared from the Lutheran Advocacy Ministry in Pennsylvania (LAMPa) newsletter for Wednesday, April 9, 2025. 

In honor of Arab American Heritage Month, ELCA Racial Justice Ministries will be elevating the voices of our Arab and Middle Eastern Descent peers and reposting their works from others sources around the ELCA. The following article is cross-posted from Living Lutheran online. The original post can be found here.

Rodny Said, a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL), leads a children’s sermon at the Church of Hope in Ramallah. Photos: ELCJHL

Said leads a bible study with youth during a youth retreat in Jordan.

Sani Ibrahim Azar, bishop of the ELCJHL, delivers a sermon at the Church of Hope.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two spouses living in two places—kept apart by two kinds of government ID.

It may sound like Romeo and Juliet, but that was life for Rodny Said, a pastor of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land (ELCJHL).

With a Jerusalem ID, Said could cross the checkpoints between his East Jerusalem home and his congregation, the Lutheran Church of Hope in Ramallah. His wife lived with her parents because she couldn’t enter East Jerusalem with her Palestinian ID.

“We started the process of reunification, as the Israeli government calls it,” he explained during an Advent Pilgrimage 2024 webinar, “but it can take years for a person from East Jerusalem and a person from the West Bank to live together.”

Fortunately, Said’s wife received her permit shortly after the webinar, and the couple can now live and travel together between the two communities.

The webinar series was a program of Sumud, the ELCA’s initiative for justice in Palestine and Israel. Previously the ministry was known as Peace Not Walls, named after the 440-mile barrier wall that the Israeli government was building to separate Palestine from Israel. The wall is complete today.

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“To us, sumud means to in our country and continue bearing witness.”

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Sumud, an Arabic word meaning “steadfast,” conveys the determination it takes to be a Palestinian Christian. “Palestinians struggle to get to work, to universities, to churches and schools,” Said noted in the webinar. Since the onset of the Gaza War in 2023, many lost their jobs because they are no longer allowed to work in Israel. Many families are separated even though they live just a few blocks apart.

Life has gotten so difficult that the number of Christian families—already only 1% of the West Bank population—who are leaving is increasing. “They don’t see a future,” he said.

Emigration “means more pressure on us as a Christian community,” Said noted—especially for the ELCJHL, whose six congregations and four schools are supported by only 2,000 members.

“I think the easiest way is to leave,” Said added, “and the hard and painful way is to stay.”

Staying put, enduring and never giving up hope—that’s sumud. Through the initiative, the ELCA seeks to accompany Palestinians in their daily lives and advocate for peace with justice in Palestine and Israel.

Creating possibilities

For Maddi Froiland, program director for Sumud, a prime goal is making ELCA members more aware of what life under occupation is like.

As someone who spent four years in East Jerusalem and the West Bank—one as a Young Adult in Global Mission (YAGM) volunteer and three years as communications officer for the ELCJHL—Froiland watched Christians live out Luke 6:31 (“Do to others as you would have them do to you”) even with soldiers who had arrested their sons. “The experience,” she said, “made me redefine what it means to be a Christian.”

Froiland said Sumud’s webinar series drew over 100 viewers who heard ELCJHL pastors and youth group members share stories of “resistance through existence” by living and worshiping together under occupation. Attendees heard their main message: Christians living in the Holy Land need to know someone is listening to and supporting them.

The Sumud initiative, Froiland said, “underscores that justice in Israel and Palestine means everyone has dignity and human rights. Right now the people who are lacking human rights are our Palestinian partners.”

Froiland is building synod-level networks of Palestinian Christians, YAGM alumni and others who can share their experiences in the region. “These networks will build communities that are both aware of the context of our siblings in the ELCJHL and are empowered through their faith to advocate for justice in Palestine and Israel,” she said.

A new ceasefire currently being negotiated between Israel and Hamas could open the door for healing and recovery from a war marked by violence and displacement. The ELCA supports that process through Sumud, Lutheran Disaster Response, the ELCA Middle East and North Africa desk, and deployed personnel in the region. Witness in Society, the ELCA’s public advocacy team, continues to advocate for a negotiated resolution to the Israeli occupation of Palestine and to ongoing acts of violence.

On the ground, the ELCJHL creates possibilities for Palestinian Christians. “We do this through offering quality education for our youth, diaconal ministry for the vulnerable, environmental ministry for God’s creation, gender justice ministry and supporting our youth,” said Sani Ibrahim Azar, bishop of the ELCJHL.

“To us, sumud means to stay in our country and continue bearing witness as the Indigenous Christians of this land. This important and meaningful Arabic word … gives us strength—that we are not alone, we have our partners, our brothers and sisters, who will be steadfast in accompanying us.”

Anne Basye
Basye, a freelance writer living in Mount Vernon, Wash., is the author of Sustaining Simplicity: A Journal (ELCA, 2007).

In honor of International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (March 21), ELCA Racial Justice Ministries invited the Dr. Robin Lauermann, Ph.D. to share some thoughts about the annual board retreat held in Montgomery, AL of the ELCA Association of White Lutherans for Racial Justice and their work to end racism and dismantle white supremacy.

Front exterior of The Legacy Museum, a civil rights museum, explaining the civil rights movement in the US, in Montgomery Alabama, United States. Photo: Equal Justice Initiative

One of the first exhibits in the Legacy Museum. Photo: Equal Justice Initiative/Human Pictures

The National Memorial for Peace and Justice. Photo by Equal Justice Initiative https://legacysites.eji.org/about/memorial/

In late January, as part of the annual board retreat of the ELCA Association of White Lutherans for Racial Justice, I moved attentively through the Legacy Museum, established in Montgomery, Ala., by the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI). With my mind spinning from its stark and stimulating exhibits, which present the history of white supremacy from slavery to segregation to mass incarceration, I entered the final exhibit hall to see a familiar face: that of Anthony Ray Hinton. My heart leaped in instant recognition, with a mix of lament and joy.

I had learned about Hinton when I first visited Montgomery in 2016 as part of a multistate civil rights tour, meeting with veterans of the movement and visiting such important sites as the EJI offices. Staff members there explained the initiative’s work challenging injustice in the legal system, through both legal representation and policy advocacy. Their remarks expanded what I had learned from the book Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, whose author, Bryan Stevenson, is founder and executive director of the EJI.

Due to mistaken identity, Anthony Ray Hinton was wrongly convicted of two murders and spent 30 years on death row. Ultimately EJI secured his release. Most poignant to me was a video that covered Hinton’s reentry into society: the scope of the years taken from him was shown by his learning to use technology unavailable before he was incarcerated — not a cell phone, not satellite radio, but an ATM. An ATM! As soon as Hinton’s book, The Sun Does Shine: How I Found Life, Freedom, and Justice, was published in 2019, I read it and reflected anew on the challenges his story revealed about the criminal justice system.

When I saw Hinton’s face in a museum display, he gazed at me from a row of visitation carrels. He wore prison scrubs and sat in a stark room. I approached the display, lifted a phone handset from the wall and listened as Hinton briefly recounted his story, his gaze never breaking from mine. His visual state contrasted with my knowledge of his freedom, and I thought again of him learning to use the ATM.

I continued around the room, stopping to hear from others. I listened intently to Kuntrell Jackson, who shared how his sentencing to life in prison at age 14; EJI would later represent him before the Supreme Court in a case that would overturn mandatory life sentences for children. Monica Washington told me about her sexual assault by a prison guard; EJI’s complaint would lead to a federal investigation of widespread abuse and to prosecutions of corrections staff. Hinton, Jackson and Washington were just three of the people whose stories were shared in the exhibit and for whom EJI has advocated.

The retreat weekend was both intense and inspiring. In addition to the museum, we visited EJI’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which commemorates of racial terror lynchings that began in the South at the end Reconstruction. These visits renewed my lament at the way white supremacy has dehumanized others, disregarding their creation in the image of God. However, the visit also inspired hope, even amid backsliding government policies designed to protect the rights of marginalized communities.  Encounters with history provide us with models of courage and strategy by leaders. The work of EJI shows the possibility of contemporary nonprofit and other collective efforts to promote change. Hinton’s story likewise stands at the crossroads of two legacies: one of disregard and violence, the other of advocacy and hope.

Robin Lauermann holds a Ph.D. in political science and is currently completing a certificate in theological studies at United Lutheran Seminary. She teaches and researches political behavior, institutions and change in U.S. and comparative politics. Robin currently serves as a board member of the ELCA Association of White Lutherans for Racial Justice.

In case you missed it:  In honor of Black History Month, ELCA Racial Justice Ministries will be elevating the voices of our African Descent peers and reposting their works from others sources around the ELCA. The following article is cross-posted from Living Lutheran online. The original post can be found here.

To honor and celebrate the contributions of Black Lutherans, Nicolette Peñaranda, ELCA program director for African Descent Ministries, created a quiz that highlights key figures, congregations and milestones in ELCA history. This interactive challenge is an opportunity to test your knowledge and deepen your understanding of the rich legacy of Black Lutherans in the ELCA.

In honor of Black History Month, ELCA Racial Justice Ministries will be elevating the voices of our African Descent peers and reposting their works from others sources around the ELCA. The following article is cross-posted from Living Lutheran online. The original post can be found here.

My take: Still Black. Still Lutheran

By Nicolette Peñaranda |February 3, 2025

It wasn’t long ago that Gov. Tim Walz was first announced as the Democratic nominee for U.S. vice president, alongside presidential candidate Kamala Harris. Moments after Harris declared her running mate, posts about Walz being a Lutheran began to pop up across social media.

“One of us!” I remember cheering as I sat on the couch in the faculty lodge of Pinecrest Lutheran Leadership Ministries. This ticket would be one of those rare moments when my identity would be fully displayed to the American people. A powerful, competent, multiethnic Black woman and a Midwest Lutheran represented the Democratic Party for the highest offices. What a rare and divine moment!

I know I wasn’t alone in this sentiment. One of my colleagues is, like Harris, a Black woman from Northern California who attended a Historically Black College and University (HBCU), pledged to a Black sorority and has had to work twice as hard as her white counterparts to get where she is today. Her story is my story. Our story is the story of thousands of other Black women in this church.

Many of us in ministry are aware that the odds are stacked against us. We intern in ministerial contexts that counter our lived experiences. Some of us complete second master’s degrees while waiting for a call or a work opportunity. If we attend a Lutheran seminary, we spend most of our education completing coursework while acting as racial justice translators in the classroom, fielding questions about our blackness and Lutheran identity.

Our nonclergy sisters do the same in their contexts. Black women in medicine must explain that they are the doctor and not the social worker. Black women in education must teach their 22-year-old counterparts from Teach for America about trauma-informed approaches to learning. Because of the additional work we are tasked with while working or completing our education, we are experts in both the content and in navigating white mediocrity, the truth that many professional settings are skewed in favor of white Americans.

This story is not about who won the presidential election nor about political parties. Rather, it’s about holding in tension the struggle that Black women face in the professional world. Regardless of our qualifications and professional experience, we aren’t considered for leadership positions, a situation not exclusive to the secular world.

An abusive relationship

I bring up Walz, a lifelong Lutheran who said yes to supporting a Black woman for president. Walz accepting the vice presidential nomination was more countercultural to most ELCA congregations than we realize. For over a decade, Black women candidates for ministry have waited three to five years for their first call. This means that if they were fortunate enough to interview at even four congregations a year, 1 out of every 12 to 20 congregations affirms a Black woman’s call to word and sacrament ministry. After nearly 40 years of Black women being ordained in the ELCA, only three have been elected as a synod bishop.

Since the inception of the ELCA, only two Black women have served as executive director for a home area. One of them saw her position eliminated, and the other works in People Solutions, which is mostly a human resources team. Wyvetta Bullock, an ELCA pastor, has held one of the highest offices in the ELCA as the executive for administration, but no ELCA seminary, college or university has had a Black woman as president. In 2022 at least four Black women were forced out of their ELCA congregations within two months.

The sobering truth is that Black women have been in an abusive relationship with the ELCA for a long time. Perhaps that is why the Walz announcement for the Harris ticket felt so special. Maybe this would start a trend in our denomination.

The reality is that Harris did not win the presidency. It didn’t matter that she was only the second presidential candidate ever to have worked inside all three branches of government. It didn’t matter that she had clear and concise policy proposals or that some of her positions even aligned with the Republican Party. She lost support in most demographics except the Black community and millennials. It’s challenging to find hope for ministry in a church with the same demographics as those who didn’t see one of the people most qualified for office as fit to serve.

What does this mean?

What, then, does this mean for those of us asked to educate the masses within the ELCA? At what point do we just become a broken record for racial justice to ears that refuse to hear it? When is it appropriate to call the time of death for these DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) workshops and cultural competency talks?

I’m not quite sure how we move forward to pay homage to Black leaders in our church when we refuse to address the elephant in the room. Some leaders still don’t think we should be in the pulpit nor the Oval Office. For years we have documented, celebrated and named the historic contributions Black leaders have offered our church, and still we have not seen our white counterparts build a base of people to support our ministry and advocate for equitable work opportunities.

So, rather than provide more resources and community discussions, I hope congregations will watch all three seasons of “Talks at the Desk” this Black History Month. Use the discussion guides and pledge to make a special offering all month for the African Descent Lutheran Association or the 66th Synod Reparations Fund. But until we start using the resources we already have and apply change, then we will never be free.

The following is cross-posted from Living Lutheran. You can find the original post here.

I’m a Lutheran: Glory Godwin Lekashu

By John Potter|December 20, 2024

Medical laboratory technician, Essentia Health
Trinity Lutheran Church, Moorhead, Minn.

Growing up, I was highly involved with the youth ministry of my home church, Kimandolu Lutheran Church in Arusha, Tanzania, and was on the church praise and worship team. I started going to Trinity Lutheran Church in 2019 as a college freshman at Concordia College [in Moorhead, Minn.]. Currently, I serve on the hospitality team for Trinity. I usher and read Scripture.

This involvement is very important to me because there is nothing else that gives me more purpose than serving the Lord and being a servant to my local congregation. This also gives me peace and joy. Every second I spend in church makes me so happy that I could never trade these moments with anything else in the world.

I graduated from Concordia this year with a major in biology—premed—minoring in religion and environmental and sustainability studies.

I was always fascinated with science and wanted to know more about human bodies and how to heal and restore them using different biological procedures and scientific findings. This passion drew me close to biology. But as I was learning this, I realized the importance of faith when it comes to healing and restoring, so my minor in religion was a complement to biology and an approach to healing the whole body, not just the physical [aspect]. And who said religion and science don’t go together?

In the same spirit of healing and restoring comes the environmental issue. As we all know, our environment is changing, our climate is changing—and these changes are not necessarily the best changes. Knowing and acknowledging this drove me into environmental and sustainability studies.

All these areas of study, to me, were just one big picture addressing one thing, which is healing—healing the body, the soul and our world. I love how these different areas of studies have shaped me and made me more informed.

The International Women Leaders [IWL] program was the best thing that has ever happened to me. IWL allowed me to experience education from a whole different angle. It gave me choices and opportunities that I wouldn’t have had if I was not in the program. I have had the greatest experience in the program; I got introduced to opportunities and connections that I cherish dearly. IWL helped me to understand my leadership roles and envision what I can do as a leader in my community and the world at large. It opened doors and placed me in spaces I would have never dreamt of. Every time I introduce myself as an IWL scholar, things just sparkle, and I am forever grateful for this program.

All my areas of study were just one big picture addressing one thing, which is healing—healing the body, the soul and our world.

Serving on the logistics team for the 2024 Youth Gathering was eye-opening. I learned a lot about myself as a leader regarding areas that I need some improvement in and areas that I’m really good at. In general, serving the Youth Gathering was a blessing. To witness over 16,000 Lutheran youth come together to praise, worship, learn, serve and be who they were created to be was just phenomenal.

My role as a medical laboratory technician entails multitasking, ensuring patients’ safety, properly explaining details of procedures to patients in a clear way of understanding, performing intravenous blood draws, efficiently handling patient specimens in a proper manner to ensure non-contamination for transportation and running different tests in proper equipment. All this is in order to make a healthy difference in people’s lives.

I’m enrolled at North Dakota State University in a Master of Public Health program. My desire for health care justice is what drew me close to public health. It is my hope to see communities being able to access the best medical care they need and being well-informed about their health, regardless of where they are or who they are.

I plan to use my master’s degree to influence the health care system and work to create policies that will give health care access to marginalized communities. [I also want to] come up with projects that will inform communities about determinants of health.

I hope to live my faith through my vocation by serving with love, justice, grace and honesty to all. I hope to be a helping hand and a voice to those around me and to shine the light of Christ to the lives of people I get to interact with.

In my free time, I practice Aikido, which is a Japanese martial art, play drums and do puzzles.

I’ve witnessed God’s presence in my life through my journey to the U.S., the doors that God opened when I thought they were closed, and the opportunities that God gave me.

I pray, especially in this season, that the light of Christ will shine on every land and that the peace of the Lord will prevail on earth.

Grace is an undeserving favor from God, not because of what I did or what I did not [do] but just pure favor.

I’m a Lutheran because I continue to believe that I am saved by grace alone, through faith in Jesus and nothing else.