04393
September 7, 2004

Lutheran World Federation faces tough financial future 

by Stephen Brown
Ecumenical News International 

GENEVA — The grouping representing more than 62 million Lutherans worldwide booked a deficit in 2003 and it has been warned it faces shortfalls in future years unless ways can be found to increase income or decrease expenditure.

      “The income is less than we need to fulfill all our tasks,” Lutheran World Federation (LWF) treasurer Peter Stoll told the yearly meeting of the LWF’s council, its main governing body, on Sept. 2. “We need a proper priority setting process where some less important priorities will be set aside to wait for better times.”

      The LWF had a total income of $94.8 million and total expenditures of $97.8 million in 2003, which includes funds for its extensive World Service humanitarian and relief work, Stoll reported. Of this total amount, there was an income of $10.7 million and an expenditure of $11.2 million for the organization’s Geneva coordinating operation.

      Stoll warned that some of the LWF’s biggest member churches were facing great financial difficulties which have had an impact on their support to the Lutheran federation.

      “If the income does not increase then our task as good stewards will be to balance the budget and that means to cut activities or to increase efficiency,” Stoll told a press conference after giving his report.

      Among ideas to save money put forward by Stoll for consideration was the suggestion of moving the LWF headquarters office to a cheaper location than Geneva, where offices of other inter-church ecumenical bodies including the World Council of Churches are based.

      “The best thing of course would be if the ecumenical movement remained in one place, but then the WCC needs to ask itself if it is absolutely necessary to be in one of the most expensive cities in the world,” the LWF treasurer told journalists.

      Another suggestion was the idea that English be considered as the only working language of the LWF as this could cut down on the costs of interpretation and translation.

      But this led to protests from some council members, including one from Latin America who said English was an “imperial” language and the LWF “shouldn’t succumb to this imperialism.” Currently English, German, French and Spanish are working languages of the LWF.