Thrivent Financial News— A roundup of news and features

Help Keeps Truckin’ | Milwaukee ‘Blitz Build’ | Art on Tour | Community Saving | A++ For Thrivent Financial | Home Ownership Survey Results In

GIVING

Help Keeps Truckin’
There’s a new truck rolling through eastern Washington and northern Idaho. This one is providing food for people in need, and it has Thrivent Financial for Lutherans’ fingerprints all over it.

The 24-foot refrigerated truck, which is called the Thrivent Homegrown Help truck in reference to the text on its colorful side panels, was a contribution from the Northern Rocky Region of Thrivent Financial to Second Harvest Inland Northwest, a regional distribution site of America’s Second Harvest, a national food bank network.

“We were looking for a way to give our members the opportunity to get involved in a project that would have high visibility and high impact,” said Mike Feiler, manager of Lutheran community services for Thrivent Financial in the Northern Rocky Region. “This project does that in multiple ways.”

In conversations with Second Harvest, Feiler learned that the organization was dealing with two primary issues: no food pantries or volunteer networks in place to meet the needs in many communities, and the inability to get the fresh produce to people in a timely manner.

The truck, which holds 7,000 to 10,000 pounds of food, will provide the means for delivering the produce; local Thrivent chapters in the Northwest will provide the volunteers.

“We’re encouraging our chapters and Lutheran churches to form service teams to sponsor stops in their communities,” said Feiler.

The truck debuted in June at a Join Hands Day event in Spokane, Washington. Three Thrivent chapters held a countywide food drive that included collecting, then delivering and inventorying the food at Second Harvest.

“We’re planning to use the truck for at least one delivery a week made possible by Thrivent Financial,” said Scott Schuldt, managing partner, Northern Rocky Region of Thrivent Financial. “This is more than writing a check—this is actually seeing the people we are helping and hearing them say ‘thank you.’ That one-on-one contact is really powerful.”

VOLUNTEERING

Milwaukee ‘Blitz Build’
Hundreds of Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity volunteers and homeowners framed eight homes in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in a “Blitz Build” in early May, including one at Miller Park, the home of the Milwaukee Brewers. These eight homes are part of an effort by the Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Southeast Wisconsin Region and Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity to construct 10 homes in 2006.

“The best part was working side-by-side with the homeowners and seeing the joy in their faces,” said John F. Walther, a member of the Thrivent Metro Milwaukee Chapter from Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.

Thrivent Financial presented $639,100 to Milwaukee Habitat for the 10 homes, which represent a 45 percent increase in Milwaukee Habitat’s homebuilding capacity.

“Thrivent Financial’s support has been a Godsend and boosted our base of congregations that we work with, because more Lutheran congregations are involved,” said Sara Kierzek, executive director of Milwaukee Habitat.

All 10 homes in Milwaukee are expected to be finished by November.

HERITAGE

Art on Tour
A special exhibition, The Inspired Line: Selected Prints of Albrecht Dürer and Rembrandt van Rijn from the Thrivent Financial Collection of Religious Art, may be coming to a museum near you.

This exhibition features 40 Old Master prints. Starting at the Trout Gallery in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 1, the exhibition will spend the next three years traveling to small and mid-size museums all over the U.S.

“Although they created their artwork a century apart, the connections between their prints are significant, intriguing and often remarkable,” said Joanna Reiling Lindell, curator of the Thrivent Financial Collection of Religious Art.

The exhibition, which is being toured by ExhibitsUSA, a nonprofit arts exhibitions touring organization, includes several pairs of works in which the two artists each executed his own version of the same subject matter, including The Crucifixion.

The Thrivent Financial art collection comprises more than 800 prints and drawings that range from 13th century illuminated manuscripts to 20th century modern master works. In addition to Dürer and Rembrandt, the collection features the art of Lucas Cranach, Hendrik Goltzius, Edouard Manet, George Bellows and Pablo Picasso.

The collection began in 1982 when the Rev. Richard L. Hillstrom, a retired Lutheran pastor, began collecting religious art on behalf of the organization. He served as the collection’s curator for nearly 20 years.

“This traveling exhibition is one opportunity to share this extraordinary and unique collection with our members across the country and with the national arts community,” Lindell said.

Tour Schedule
The tour already includes stops in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and Oshkosh, Wisconsin, in 2006; Shawnee, Oklahoma; Corpus Christi, Texas; Tallahassee, Florida; Great Bend, Kansas; and Topeka, Kansas, in 2007; and Maui, Hawaii, in 2008. For more information and a link to the complete listing of tour dates, visit www.thrivent.com/magazine/links.

Read More
There’s more information on the Thrivent Financial Collection of Religious Art at www.thrivent.com/magazine/links.

GIVING

Community Saving
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans contributed $2.6 million and collaborated with Bethel New Life Inc., a Lutheran nonprofit agency, and Park National Bank to create the Community Savings Center on Chicago’s west side. The Center, which opened in January 2006, offers banking products, financial education and counseling services under one roof in order to help low-income working individuals achieve financial security.

“Clearly, we would not have been able to do this without our other allies—Park National Bank, which opened a branch at the Community Savings Center, and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans, which is providing $2.6 million to fund the Center’s educational programs and services,” said Steven McCullough, CEO of Bethel New Life, Inc.

Thrivent Financial contributed $1 million for an individual development account program called $mart $avers, co-run by Thrivent Financial and Bethel New Life, Inc. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has matched the Thrivent Financial grant. Thrivent Financial will contribute an additional $1.6 million for operational costs over the next five years.

“We have expertise, products and services to help people achieve financial security, but more than that, we make caring for others and responding to community needs a top priority,” said Dennis Gorski, managing partner of the Chicagoland Region of Thrivent Financial.

$mart $avers combines financial education with a 2:1 savings incentive to help economically disadvantaged families save. Participants are required to enroll in a financial education class. After completing the course, every dollar they save is matched by both Thrivent Financial and the U.S. Government. Savings can only be used to purchase a first home, start or expand a small business or finance post-secondary education.

INSURANCE

A++ for Thrivent Financial
A.M. Best Company, Inc., a leading insurance ratings agency, has affirmed Thrivent
Financial for Lutherans’ A++ (Superior) rating, the highest an organization can receive among A.M. Best’s scale of 15 ratings. A.M. Best also noted that its outlook for Thrivent Financial is stable.

A.M. Best’s ratings are based on a comprehensive quantitative and qualitative evaluation of a company’s balance sheet strength, operating performance and business profile. Thrivent Financial also maintains an Aa2 (“excellent”) rating from Moody’s Investors
Service, the third highest on Moody’s scale of 21 ratings.*

*These ratings do not apply to the investment performance of Thrivent Financial investment products.

RESEARCH

Home Ownership Survey Results In
Nine in 10 American adults say that home ownership contributes either a great deal to their sense of financial security (63 percent) or moderately so (27 percent), according to a survey by Thrivent Financial for Lutherans.

“A safe, affordable home remains the foundation for most Americans’ financial goals and dreams,” said Mark Andrews, executive director of Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity, a national alliance to build homes with low-income families. “Unfortunately, many American families simply are not able to obtain this critical asset.”
 
“Home ownership remains the embodiment of the American dream for most people, and this is why Thrivent Financial is eager to partner with more low-income families to achieve this goal,” said Brad Hewitt, senior vice president of fraternal operations with Thrivent Financial.

Thrivent Financial has committed $105 million and approximately five million volunteer hours over the next four years to help Habitat for Humanity International increase its capacity through Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity programs.

Telephone Interviews were conducted for Thrivent Financial by Synovate TeleNation Research, Chicago, Ill., between Dec. 2-4, 2005, among a nationwide sample of 1,000 U.S. adults aged 18 and older. The margin of error for questions posed to all 1,000 respondents is +/- 3 percent.

Get Involved
Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity will build homes in 43 states in 2006. To get involved, visit www.thriventbuilds.com.