News Archives - 2004
Thrivent for Lutherans donates $150,000 to Nobel Peace Prize Forum endowment
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans has awarded a $150,000
grant to the Noble Peace Prize Forum, an annual conference on world issues
and peacemaking hosted by a consortium of Lutheran Church-affiliated
colleges and endorsed by the Norwegian Nobel Institute.
The $150,000 Thrivent grant will help establish an endowment fund for the Nobel Peace Prize Forum. The NPPF colleges plan to build a $2 million endowment that will provide revenue to help pay the costs of conducting the conference each year.
Thrivent Financial for Lutherans is a three-million-member fraternal benefit society that provides insurance, financial products, education programs and volunteer opportunities that help families, communities and churches. Thrivent also supports the work of education institutions and civic and social betterment organizations.
In cooperation
with the Norwegian Nobel Institute, five Midwestern colleges
of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America sponsor the annual
Nobel
Peace Prize Forum on a rotating basis: Augsburg (Minneapolis),
Augustana
(Sioux Falls, S.D.), Concordia (Moorhead, Minn.), Luther (Decorah,
Iowa)
and St. Olaf (Northfield, Minn.). This prestigious event is the
Norwegian
Nobel Institute's only such program or academic affiliation outside
Norway.
The colleges, all founded by Norwegian immigrants, sponsor the
forum to
recognize Norway's international peace efforts and offer opportunities
for
Nobel Peace Prize laureates, diplomats, scholars and the public
to share in
dialogue on the dynamics of peacemaking and the underlying causes
of
conflict and war.
Begun in 1989 with annual support from Lutheran Brotherhood (now Thrivent Financial for Lutherans), the forum's programs have involved over 25,000 participants and reached a broader audience through national and regional media coverage.
Now entering its 17th year, the Nobel Peace Prize Forum is a unique, transforming learning opportunity for students and other U.S. citizens, inspiring future generations to become full participants in peacemaking efforts around the world.