For Starters — A mix of faith, finances and volunteerism

FOUNDATIONS
No Walls

It has long been a tenet of the Christian faith that the church is not a building, but rather the living, breathing body of Christ. Christ the King Lutheran Church in Chicago embodies this tenet.

In 1955, a group of Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) synods joined together to form a mission outreach to Chicago's Loop neighborhood. Later, the church developed a mission statement that reads in part: "The church is never a building, but always people brought into a relationship with God, that they might serve other people and themselves."

True to its mission, Christ the King, an ELCA congregation with about 30 members, has never owned a building. Instead, the congregation has worshiped in more than 10 rented spaces over 50 years, including office buildings and community rooms.

The mobility and freedom from expenses, such as facility maintenance, has allowed Christ the King to focus its efforts and resources on community outreach. It does this through innovative worship styles (including a jazz service every first and third Sunday), weekly communion services where the entire congregation gathers in a circle to receive the elements and partnerships with local food banks.

"Part of our mission was to not invest resources in a building, but in its people. Christ the King has never been large, but there's always been a sense that we're a Lutheran church for people coming through downtown Chicago. On any given Sunday, one quarter of our worshipers are people passing through," says the Rev. Scott Chinburg, Christ the King's pastor, who also works three days a week as a registered nurse.

Those "passing through" include college students, business people and young professional couples. They join a core group of members for Sunday morning worship at its newest location, the school building of Old St. Mary's Catholic Church, the oldest Catholic congregation in Chicago. This agreement allows the church some stability, says Chinburg, as well as a place to call home—at least for now.

—Sarah Asp

FINANCIAL FACT
A Degree More Expensive

The cost of a college education is continuing to outpace inflation. You can call your Thrivent Financial representative or visit www.thrivent.com/planning to learn new strategies for higher education saving for your child or grandchild.

Source: 2005 College Board Report

HIGHER ARTS
Juggling Act

The Fitz family isn't your typical family. For one thing, their name isn't really Fitz, it's Schoepp. The family of six adopted the stage surname (and first names, Father, Mother, Miss, It, What and Quitz) when they started a juggling troupe in 1992.

After working in various ministry roles for The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS), Mark Schoepp and his wife, Becky (Father and Mother Fitz), were looking for an activity they could do with their four children. Mark, who was already an accomplished juggler, started to teach the kids. It wasn't long before they were performing for family gatherings, birthday parties and state fairs.

"As soon as that happened, doors just kept opening this direction and seeming to close everywhere else," says Mark. "The Lord's hand was in there the whole time. So many things came together in ways we couldn't have planned."

In 1994, with encouragement from friends and the LCMS, the Fitz Family took their act on the road full time, traveling 10 months out of the year. Shows combine juggling, balancing, unicycles and more. But the Fitz Family isn't just clowning around—each performance revolves around a positive Christian message. The family even adopted a mission statement: "encouraging people to discover, celebrate and use unique gifts in the Lord's service."

"Our message is what Luther said about vocation. It doesn't matter what it is, God calls you to do it well, in a way that gives God glory and honor," says Mark.

Though the Fitz Family is self-supported, over the years they have partnered with Lutheran organizations and have been supported by local efforts, which helped them buy a touring truck.

After more than a decade together, the Fitz Family is changing. The two oldest children have left the troupe, and the next in line, Samuel, is set to graduate from high school this spring. With the children leaving the nest, Mark and Becky have expanded their ministry to include seminars on working together as a family to fulfill God's greater purpose. Mark has also taken a part-time ministry job with St. Paul's Lutheran Church in Aurora, Illinois.

"This has been such a blessing for our family over the years," says Mark. "What keeps us coming back is people who say, 'It's made a difference in how we think about things, how we look at our family.' Those are the things that make it worth it."

—Sarah Asp

THE BOTTOM LINE
3 Tax Refund Tips

According to the IRS, the average taxpayer's direct-deposit refund was $2,447 in 2004. While a refund may feel like "free money"—perfect for that flat-screen TV you have your eye on—consider these ideas:

Tithe—Give 10 percent of returned withholdings to charity, just as you would any other income.

Give yourself a raise—No more interest payments! Retire that credit card bill once and for all.

Open an IRA—Save for retirement and you may even save on future tax bills. Call your Thrivent Financial representative for more information.

SERVICE SCENE
Building a World Away

Kevin Tesch's neck, arms and back ached from building all day, but he and his coworkers felt fulfilled knowing their hard work would help a Romanian family move from the rat-infested basement they were living in illegally to their new Habitat for Humanity home in Cluj, Romania. Tesch, a customer service professional at Thrivent Financial's Operations Center in Appleton, Wisconsin, along with 19 other Thrivent Financial for Lutherans employees, traveled to Cluj last fall to build Habitat for Humanity homes. The pilot Thrivent Builds Worldwide service trip was part of the Thrivent Builds with Habitat for Humanity initiative. The Thrivent Builds program will provide $100 million and thousands of volunteers to build 500 homes annually nationwide and hundreds more worldwide by 2008.

Cluj, a university town of 300,000 (a third of which are students) where most families live in cramped apartments, desperately needs new, affordable family housing. Habitat is building three, four-unit row houses to house 12 families. The 750-square-foot units consist of a kitchen, living room and bathroom on the main floor and two bedrooms and a small bath on the second floor.

Heavy rain put the project two months behind, so the team eagerly dug trenches, prepped foundations, poured cement, built and insulated walls and applied stucco and roofing.

They finished a month's worth of work in five days despite language differences and rudimentary tools and materials-a beverage bottle cap passed for a washer.

The team also helped promote volunteerism in a country new to the concept because decades of communist rule had discouraged volunteerism. The team met the Bishop of the Lutheran Church in Romania and discussed how Thrivent Financial organizes service teams through congregations. A team member spoke to a group of young adults who had formed a Rotary club and weren't sure how to find and organize volunteer opportunities; several members of the club later joined the Thrivent Financial team to volunteer on the Habitat site. Local radio and newspapers covered the team's visit, a coup for Habitat.

"For me it wasn't just about helping, but also inspiring the younger generation to volunteer," says Tesch.

—Lisa Harden

You Can Build—Worldwide!
You can have a life-changing volunteer experience by participating in one of many Thrivent Builds Worldwide service trips this year to Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America or the United States.

• Sign up with your Lutheran congregation, school or college, Thrivent chapter, or as an individual member.
• All benefit members qualify for an $800 benefit to help offset your expenses.

See the www.thriventbuilds.com/worldwide Web site for more information, including trip locations and application details.

Read More
Read more about volunteers' experiences in an online journal on www.thriventbuilds.com.

Read Marie Uhrich's newspaper blog from www.startribune.com/abroad chronicling their adventures below:

LABORS OF LOVE
Tales From the Front Line

Convoys rolling through the desert; mortar shells exploding in the night; soldiers singing "Amazing Grace" at a church service, accompanied by guitar.

These are the sounds of the war in Iraq as recorded by the Rev. Eric Olsen, an Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) chaplain and Thrivent Financial for Lutherans member, during a 10-month deployment with the 2nd Unit of the 108th Infantry Battalion of the New York Army National Guard at Camp Orion, north of Baghdad.

Maj. Olsen, a chaplain in the National Guard for 20 years, who hails from Saranac Lake, New York, took a hand-held tape recorder along and sent back weekly audio diaries for use on WSLU-FM, North Country Public Radio in Canton, New York.

"I wanted to get the soldiers' experience known," says Olsen, who had never worked with radio before. "The recordings helped me document the feelings, emotions and air of the environment."

Olsen had tape rolling as he traveled in planes, rode in supply convoys, sat in machine-gun posts on cold nights, stood in chow lines and led memorial services for soldiers killed in action. Experienced soldiers talked about beating boredom and the scorching heat. New arrivals shared their hopes and fears. Local Iraqis spoke through interpreters.

His frontline stories helped the radio station win the national Edward R. Murrow Award for Continuing Coverage, Radio Small Market, from the Radio-Television News Directors Association.

Olsen, now a lieutenant colonel in the National Guard, has returned to his regular job as chaplain at Adirondack Correctional Facility in Ray Brook, New York, and is the 27th Brigade Combat Team Chaplain.

Olsen says soldiers still keep in touch with him, and he has performed many weddings back home. He expects to remain in the Guard for at least five more years, until retirement. "I will be here as long as the Lord keeps me here," he says.

—Lisa Harden

Listen to Rev. Olsen discuss serving as an Army National Guard chaplain at North Country Public Radio.
Note: you will need RealPlayer to play this audio. A free version can be downloaded here.

MOVING FORWARD
The Peace of Planning

Paul and Melinda Batz were at a crossroads. Paul, the vice president of a public relations firm, was looking to change jobs. Melinda, who was working part time, wanted to spend more time with their three children, ages 16, 14 and 10. At the same time, the Batzes wanted to start saving for their kids' college educations. Could their current financial program weather all of these changes?

The Batzes recruited Ted Contag, a Thrivent Financial for Lutherans senior financial consultant, to find out.

"They wanted to feel comfortable with what they were doing," says Contag. "By putting together a financial program to show them where they would be at different points in the future, it gave them the freedom to make some choices and achieve some of their personal goals."

Contag began by helping the Batzes set up an emergency cash reserve in case of a job loss or other unforeseen emergency. He then outfitted the couple with enough term life insurance to cover their needs, as well as a tax-advantaged life insurance contract that provided them additional insurance protection and a supplemental long-term investment opportunity. Next, he helped the couple roll their respective multiple retirement accounts into more manageable and cost-effective IRAs, and opened Roth IRA accounts for them as well. Finally, college savings plans were established for each child.

"We consolidated the financial products that made sense to consolidate and built a diversified plan to lower some of the risk," says Contag.

"We came up with some tax-advantage strategies, too," Paul says, "and we just put dollars that were in multiple sources into more single places."

Paul, now managing partner and president of a leadership consulting firm, and Melinda, a full-time mom, say meeting with Contag gave them much-needed peace of mind.

"In some ways you're taking a big leap of faith, and it's nice to have somebody there to help you stay sane through the process," says Paul.

—Sarah Asp

A LUTHERAN MOMENT
Chief Justice William Rehnquist

Late U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who died Sept. 3, 2005, of thyroid cancer at age 80, was an active member of Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in McLean, Virginia.

"Chief Justice Rehnquist never took his faith for granted," says the Rev. George W. Evans Jr., pastor at Redeemer. "It was strong, central and, like him, without pretense."

The Wisconsin native served 33 years on the Supreme Court — 19 as Chief Justice.

Robert Tuttle, professor of law at George Washington University Law School and co-author of Church and State: Lutheran Perspectives, commends Rehnquist for his "deep and abiding sense of the importance of religion for this nation and its people.

"He has led a change in the constitutional law of church and state that now allows that importance to be recognized," Tuttle says.

Rehnquist's wife, Natalie, who died in 1991, also had strong Lutheran ties, serving as the director of volunteer services at the National Lutheran Home for the Aged in Rockville, Maryland, for eight years.

Source: The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America News Service

DID YOU KNOW?
Lutherans By State

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