Remember how you had to learn to carefully merge from an on-ramp into highway traffic?  Maybe you had to merge some e-mail address lists when you changed internet providers.  Or perhaps you “merged” monetary accounts when you married.  Or even refrigerators and closets.  We have had experience in merging and know why it brings better results for everyone.

The ELCA knows about merging, too.  Their new emphasis on important justice issues bring together areas which have long been more isolated and emphasized individually. Acknowledging that these are not discrete issues and do not/cannot stand alone helps bring together better strategies and leads to better outcomes in working to end hunger, too.

Learn to recognize the importance of how these five core justice issues MERGE:

            Migration justice,

            Economic justice,

            Racial justice,

            Gender justice and

            Environmental justice.

As someone who is part of the Saint Paul Area Synod’s Care of Creation work group and also meets with the bi-synodical (Saint Paul and Minneapolis Area Synods) Hunger group, I was delighted to read about and learn more about the MERGE efforts.  I have participated in two webinar calls between ELCA World Hunger and Lutherans Restoring Creation.  Breakout groups in those calls with people from around the United States have made me aware of work in other synods in bringing together work for hunger and for environmental justice.  We’ve talked about community gardens, plastics, and food waste, for example. 

 MERGE helps us talk about these related issues in more concrete and understandable ways as we talk about, understand, and remember their relatedness.

Let’s continue to MERGE together.