Lutheran AIDS Network

February 1, 1996

LUTHERAN AIDS NETWORK FORMALIZES (71 lines)
96-02-004-FI

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- The Lutheran AIDS Network (LANET) has been a part of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod (LCMS) for years. A series of decisions have formalized the organization and given it new energy.

A national gathering in St. Louis on Sept. 30, 1995, elected LANET's first board of directors. Participants also approved the mission statement: "The ministry of Lutheran AIDS Network is HIV/AIDS prevention, caregiving and advocacy in the Lutheran community."

At its first meeting here Jan. 26, the LANET board elected the Rev. Michael Pozar, retired ELCA pastor, Pacifica, Calif., president; the Rev. Bruce Davidson, ELCA chaplain, Betak hospice, Doylestown, Pa., vice president; Dr. Kristine Gebbie, professor of public health, Columbia University, New York, and first director of the White House Office on AIDS, secretary; and the Rev. Gerald Garret, Christ Victor
Lutheran Church (LCMS), Foster City, Calif., treasurer.

The board gave preliminary approval to articles of incorporation, "establishing a structure for the Lutheran AIDS Network that will enable it to fulfill its mission and its ministry in better ways for the coming years," said Pozar.

The Rev. H. George Anderson, ELCA bishop, met with the board. Pozar said the group "gave him our support and encouraged him to speak out more forcefully and to give greater exposure to issues around the AIDS pandemic."

LANET received a grant from the Centers for Disease Control to design several models for congregation-based HIV/AIDS prevention programs. The Rev. Tom Carlson, LANET board member and retired LCMS pastor, Washington D.C., reported to the board on the project's progress.

Another grant from Aid Association for Lutherans, a fraternal benefits society based in Appleton, Wis., will establish an HIV/AIDS clearinghouse for information about such programs. The ELCA's AIDS steering committee is coordinating that work.

"Worship and study resources continue to be created by congregations, synods and regional committees," said Ruth Reko, ELCA director of leadership development and LANET board member. "To ensure that the widest distribution possible is effected this clearinghouse will identify contacts in each synod and as many
congregations as possible."

The ELCA's 1995 Churchwide Assembly adopted a resolution outlining eight steps "to give strong leadership in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic." LANET plans to help various ELCA units address those steps, which include "encouraging the establishment of an AIDS ministry committee or task force" in each of the church's 65 synods.

LANET is a member of the National Council of Religious AIDS Networks sponsored by the AIDS National Interfaith Network, chaired by the Rev. Sherman Hicks, First Trinity Lutheran Church, Washington, D.C., and former bishop of the ELCA#s Metropolitan Chicago Synod.

Other members of the LANET board are:
Loretta Horton, ELCA director of congregational social ministry, Chicago; the Rev. Joyce Lindh Moore, ELCA pastor, Reidsville, N.C.; and Robert Smith, assistant dean of students, LaFayette College, Easton, Pa.
Pozar was one of 130 to participate in "the first ever White House Conference on HIV and AIDS' on Dec. 6. U.S. President Bill Clinton called the meeting "an opportunity to examine and consider the impact of HIV and AIDS on our people, our institutions, our communities, and our society as a whole."