Lutheran Services in America Trading Graces on eBay

By Holy Trinity Lutheran Feb 06, 2006

Lutheran Services in America (LSA) will host “Trading Graces,” its first annual online auction, from noon Feb. 26 to noon March 8 on eBay to benefit Lutheran social ministry organizations across the United States and Caribbean.

“Congregations and all sorts of people can partner with Lutheran social ministry organizations on this and spread the word, donate, volunteer and buy,” said Jill Schumann, LSA president. “We’re inviting everybody into this project, and we’re partnering with those 100 million-plus existing eBay users to reuse, recycle and tell the LSA story,” she said.

LSA is an alliance of nearly 300 social ministry organizations, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod. eBay is an Internet platform where millions of items are traded each day.

Lutheran health and human service organizations in thousands of communities provide care — ranging from health care to disaster response, from services for children and families to care for the elderly, from adoption to advocacy — to 6 million people annually, and employ a quarter of a million staff and volunteers.

One purpose of Trading Graces is to raise public awareness, Schumann said. “For a long time we’ve heard that Lutheran social ministry is one of the best kept secrets. We’ve been working hard to liberate that secret and make sure people know more about Lutheran social ministry,” she said. (Source: ELCA News)

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