Since Hinderaker is a Lutheran and I am an ex-Lutheran, I went to the ELCA's website to see what the leadership had to say about the massacre. Here is what I found:
It is possible that this search was flawed, and the the information I was looking for is elsewhere. However, I have yet to run across it. If the leadership of the ELCA - ostensible a Christian denomination - has any official expression of concern over the slaughter of their brothers and sisters in Christ, it is very well concealed.
Puzzling over the apparent lack of concern, Hinderaker had this to say:
Maybe "mainstream" Christianity is dead, except as an appendage of secular liberal opinion. Maybe, as the world's largest religion, Christianity has become so diffused that New World Christians don't much relate to their co-religionists in Africa and Asia.
Perhaps. But I think that much more is going on here. The ELCA is not merely post-Christian, it is in the process of transforming itself into a far-Left political party that pursues a purely secular political agenda. While I do not think that we will ever see a "Lutheran Party" that nominates and runs candidates for elective office (I could be wrong), I do believe that eventually we will see the ELCA using the tax-exempt status that churches enjoy to pursue political goals and ends that would otherwise require them to follow campaign finance laws.
One of the more common phrases that my wife and I heard during our time as ELCA missionaries was "speaking truth to power". But never once did we hear it used outside of a purely political context. Opposing the Iraq War, capital punishment and the Bush tax cuts was "speaking truth to power". Supporting immigration reform and increased social welfare and public education spending was "speaking truth to power". And so on. Ironically, many of these same individuals were scandalized every time Jerry Falwell or James Dobson or some other non-liberal Christian opened his/her mouth.
As I wrote previously, the ELCA acts and feels like an ecclesiastical version of MoveOn.org - complete with crackpot conspiracy theorists (I lost count of the number of 9/11 Truthers I met in the ELCA) and prejudice (Southern Baptists were probably the favorite target). Given the Left's growing hostility towards traditional Christianity, and the fact that the ELCA eschews preaching the Christian Gospel in favor of "speaking truth to power", is it any wonder that the deaths of so many Christians fails to arouse any outrage?
UPDATE 3/12/10: Here is a screen shot of the ELCA's news releases:
Among the stories listed, there is one about peace building in Senegal, another one about several Minnesota bishops releasing a pastoral letter to the Minnesota state legistature asking for ... something, a report by ELCA lobbyists in Washington on the 2011 Federal budget, and a response to Lutheran CORE. Still nothing about Nigeria.
UPDATE 3/13/10: I can find nothing on the Word Alone website about the killings. Same for LCMC website and the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod website. I don't expect Lutherans to be marching in the streets waving the blood shirt, but this is alarming.
Perhaps this issue bothers me because my wife is African. For me Africa is more than a place with beautiful parks, wild animals, and starving children in need of Western help. It is home - a place where I have friends and family.
The secular media coverage of Africa tends to be shallow and frequently misleading. Nevertheless, they reported on this slaughter. I with that someone in the Lutheran community would at least mention the deaths of over 500 Nigerian Christians.
