Hungry for confession

Lutheran, The, Feb 2004 by Miller, David L

Jesus makes it clear that how we treat the poor is how we treat God

An old cover of The Lutheran hangs on Pastor Mark Reitan's office wall at Trinity Lutheran Church, Lynnwood, Wash. It shows a Sudanese boy, his ribs shrink-wrapped by starvation and dehydration. The boy wails in hunger and fear. And he is doomed, beyond relief workers' efforts to save him.

The image is shocking, and it remains the most controversial cover The Lutheran has published in 16 years. It is, in fact, hard to look at. I should know: I took the photo. Still, Reitan leaves it on the wall because, as he says, "I don't want to forget that this is the reality millions live with daily."

It's easy to forget. Popular culture fans our narcissism, making our needs the measure of all we see. Even religion becomes a commodity to be consumed for what it will do to improve lives, salve wounds and fill empty hearts.

Prayer petitions at Sunday worship are revealing in this regard. On one hand, they reveal the depth of struggle that exists in even the most average congregation-disease, grief, wayward children, unemployment, broken relationships, shame. We take it all to Jesus. But often missing in those prayers is the same fervency for the 840 million who are hungry every day. We ask God to "give us this day our daily bread." But in our minds does that our include those who look like the Sudanese boy?

Our forgetfulness makes a proposal from Craig Nessan significant. Associate professor of contextual theology at Wartburg Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa, Nessan urges Lutherans to make addressing the scandal of hunger a core component of Christian faith and identity. He says we should declare it a matter of status confessionis (see resources).

By declaring something status confessionis we say it's an essential element of confessing Christ in the world. Confession of the Trinity and the divinity and humanity of Christ are core confessions for Christians in all ages. But in specific times of challenge, the church has declared other issues to be part of the core of what it means to confess Christ. The Lutheran World Federation, for example, opposed South Africa's apartheid policies as a matter of status confessionis.

Nessan lays out the overwhelming biblical witness to God's compassion and justice for the poor. Then he asks a provocative question: "How can we theologically and morally tolerate a status quo in which the reality of 800 million malnourished human beings is considered 'normal' and 'acceptable?' " How-when ending hunger is a possibility?

Given the biblical witness, addressing hunger can't be seen as ancillary in Christian identity, something to think about if we have the time and inclination. Jesus makes it clear that how we treat the poor is how we treat God (Matthew 25:31-45). And the same Spirit that works saving faith in Christ in our hearts also labors to set us free to love as God loves.

Nessan argues that status confessionis would improve Lutherans' strong hunger ministries (although hunger giving in the ELCA averages $3 a year per member). Hunger education would become more central, increasing giving and unleashing more volunteers and service ministry. Advocacy by congregations and Lutheran agencies would evaluate government programs and economic policies for their impact on the poor.

And more ELCA congregations might look like Trinity, where hunger ministry is central. Once a month, worshipers-including children-process forward and pour into a well their offerings for water projects, a central issue in fighting world hunger.

By Christmas, members poured more than $50,000 in the well. The goal is to build a well a week, which requires $3,000 a week. They will give their offerings to ELCA World Hunger projects and other ministries.

The shining faces of children processing forward to pour out their offerings is a vision of God's kingdom. And those processions will continue "for as long as people are hungry," Reitan said. At Trinity, addressing hunger is becoming status confessionis.