Missionary in Residence Program Files 1970-1987.

ArchivalResource

Lutheran Church in America. Division for World Mission and Ecumenism. Missionary in Residence Program Files 1970-1987.

Missionary in Residence Program Files 1970-1987.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/48086340

The director for interpretation had oversight of the deputation work of furloughed missionaries. Initially this deputation followed the common pattern, with a missionary traveling extensively to give one or two presentations each to small groups in multiple locations. In 1969 the Interpretation Committee of the Board of World Missions (BWM) tried out a Missionary for a Year program, placing Walter Hitchcock, missionary to Chile, in the Southeastern Synod and Vernon Swenson in the Iowa Synod for a full year. This plan worked well. A modified version, called Missionary in Residence (MIR), was adopted in 1970. The MIR was given a home base in a synod, metropolitan area, or seminary, and a relatively small area for deputation, thereby enabling the missionary's family to achieve some stability during furlough and eliminating the extensive traveling often associated with missionary deputation. While in residence the missionary was expected to relate the mission work of the larger church to all programs of the synod. A prospectus for the program, prepared by the Division for World Mission and Ecumenism (DWME), explains it as follows. "Helping church members to keep the wholeness and universality of the Church's life and mission in view in their worship, study and outreach is a goal of DWME interpretation. The outreach of the congregation in its own community is related to the outreach of the Church in the world, and interpretation helps develop a sense of involvement in those expressions of mission beyond North America. The DWME can make a contribution to this interpretation effort by appointing missionaries on furlough to synods (and in some instances to metropolitan or district areas) both as missionary interpreters and as resource persons for synod committees and programs. This appointment assumes a recognition by the synod that interpretation is an essential responsibility of the synod and that, consequently, the missionary will not serve only as a representative of the Division, but will work on behalf of the synod's program of interpretation of the total mission of the Church. Rather than missionary itineraries over a 2-to-3 week period, the missionary would be 'in residence' for periods of 3 to 12 months." The records were collected by Arthur O.F. Bauer, director of interpretation from 1964-1987. The initial file contains the prospectus quoted from above, and the second contains general information about the program. The remainder of the files are arranged in alphabetical order by missionary name, with the synod, metropolitan area, or seminary of residence included in the file folder title.

2 boxes.

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Library, ELCA Library