Update: $9 million for tsunami  The ELCA's long-term aid response to the southeast Asian tsunami is now "sufficiently funded," says Kathryn Sime, director of the ELCA Hunger and Disaster Response Appeal. Congregations and individuals donated more than $9 million, she says.Several of the ELCA's ministry companions in the crisis, including the Lutheran World Federation, Church World Service, Action by Churches Together and the United Evangelical Lutheran Church in India, indicated that the ELCA's part of a five-year response plan has adequate funds, Sime says. The plan involves restoring livelihoods, rebuilding homes and communities, assisting orphans, and providing counseling and scholarships while making sure resources are shared in ways that build economic justice, not forgetting women and the lower castes. "Now we're encouraging congregations and individuals to consider gifts to general international disasters to help us respond quickly to the next disaster or to give to the Hunger Appeal so we can continue to respond to forgotten places of chronic hunger and poverty, such as Sudan, Haiti and Uganda," Sime says. "It's our job to remember those subject to disaster and hunger even when CNN isn't around to take pictures." |
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