LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1979, Page 188

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188 LATE REPORTS AND OVERTURES

ecumenical support for recognition of these tribes.

The annual meeting plus the central, eastern, south-
west, and northwest NILB regional conferences held
last year also concentrated on legislative efforts to
abrogate Indian treaty rights, attempts to limit Indian
fishing and water rights, other expressions of so-called
“white backlash,” and the importance of counting
Indians in the 1980 census.

The February 1978 annual meeting of the board
created a theological consultation task force with Sol
Bird Mockicin, a Cherokee from Rapid City, S. Dak., as
chairman. Its purposes include: “. .. provide American
Indian Lutheran congregations and individuals with
the encouragement and opportunity to assess and define
their leadership development and ministerial needs in
ways consistent with Christian theology and American
Indian integrity; also to facilitate in specific instances
the most resourceful and mutually acceptable pro-
visions possible for satisfying such needs under existing
and changing circumstances.”

Lutheran congregations were urged to help support
the NILB grants program for Indian self-help projects
on Indian Concerns Sunday each April. The ’78 theme,
“Point of Partnership—Promise,” stressed the oppor-
tunities for the NILB and Lutheran congregations to be
partners in responding to critical issues and needs as
identified by Indian leadership and to explore mutual
ministries, and the ’79 theme, “Point of Partnership—
Perseverance,” emphasized the words of Hebrews 12:1:
“Let us run with perseverance the race that is set before
us.”

In the most recent funding of Indian projects a total
of $193,400 was distributed, including $70,500 from the
LCMS. In most instances these modest grants provided
seed money that generated other funding to improve the
level of services for Indian people. They remain among
the country’s “poorest of the poor,” plagued by high
infant mortality, low life expectancy, low levels of
education, high unemployment, and extremely low per-
capita income.

Advocacy work during the past two years has
included getting Congress to pass the following mea-
sures considered beneficial to the welfare of the tribes:
the Indian Child Welfare Act, which provides juris-
diction for tribal courts in the foster and adoptive
placement of Indian children and authorizes funds for a
variety of programs aimed at strengthening Indian
families; a joint resolution setting forth a clear policy of
religious freedom for American Indians; and authori-
zation of funds to operate tribally controlled community
colleges.

Lutheran Housing Coalition

August 1, 1977, marked the fifth anniversary of the
Lutheran Housing Coalition, which is governed bya
three-member policy committee including Executive
Secretary Leslie F. Weber of the LCMS Board of Social
Ministry and World Relief.

Last year consultation services were given to 59
newly proposed housing projects, almost all of which
are intended for the elderly, and consultation continued

for 150 previous referrals. Sponsors are individual
congregations, clusters of congregations, and social
service agencies.

In 1977 Lutheran sponsors secured funding through
the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Develop-
ment for 1,005 units costing $29.9 million and in 1978,
779 units costing $26.8 million. These include a 150-
apartment building sponsored by Wollaston Lutheran
Church, an LCMS congregation in Quincy, Mass.

Advocacy work over the past two years, carried out
primarily through the Interreligious Coalition for
Housing and the Ad Hoc Elderly Coalition, has concen-
trated on sustaining in the Federal budget enough
money for no less than 300 subsidized units of housing
annually (the projected minimum needed is 600,000)
and getting money for a five-year demonstration pro-
gram whereby residents of elderly housing projects
would receive limited personal care and nutritional
services.

Division of Campus Ministry
and Educational Services

The Division of Campus Ministry and Educational
Services is mandated to provide the church bodies with
the means for consultation and coordination in campus
ministry, church college education, and theological
education; to undertake requested programs to accom-
plish this; and to conduct campus ministry on behalf of
one or more of the churches.

The LCMS supports two of the division’s units
resulting from this mandate: campus ministry “com-
mon work” and the separately funded Campus Ministry
Communications (CMC). It does not support the divi-
sion’s services to Lutheran colleges and universities, to
national Lutheran student organizations, and in theo-
logical education. On behalf of the ALC, LCA, and
AELC the division conducts campus ministry under the
name of National Lutheran Campus Ministry (NLCM).

Personnel changes include the addition in September
1978 of an assistant to the executive director. He is
Philip Schroeder, an LCMS pastor who was for five
years director of the Center for the Study of Campus
Ministry at Valparaiso (Ind.) University and as part of
his new job spends one day a week continuing to guide
the center’s training and study programs. The CMC
editor since its beginning in 1969 and a veteran of 25
years in campus ministry, Tecla Sund Reklau, was
succeeded in January 1979 by Audrey Neff Hiney, a
campus minister at the University of North Dakota,
Grand Forks, for the past decade.

Common Work

Sixteen campus ministry agencies serving 32 cam-
puses are now fully coordinated. They have received
consultative and advisory staff services, including the
election of new staff members and term renewals, and
districts and synods have received help in organizing
new coordinated ministries.

“What is ‘metropolitan campus ministry’ anyway?”
was the question addressed at a four-day conference
held in Milwaukee, Wis., in November 1978 and made