National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women

May 5th is an annual National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Women, Girls, & Relatives (MMIWGR). MMIWGR is a movement that works to raise awareness about this crisis, seeks to offer support to communities and families with missing and murdered individuals and address the underlying causes of this crisis.

In the Declaration of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America to American Indian and Alaska Native People, this church committed itself to “...advocacy for and being in solidarity with Tribal nations, MMIWGR organizations, families, and friends who have long been searching for their loved ones—Indigenous women, girls, and relatives—who have gone missing or who have been murdered”.

This toolkit has been created by the ELCA Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women Taskforce for individuals and teams from across and beyond the three expressions of this church to be able to learn more about, and join in the participation of, this National Day of Awareness.

Below you will find resources and stories that you are invited to amplify in the spaces you are part of and on platforms you have access to. This crisis is not limited to one day in the calendar year. The last section of this resource invites you to consider how what your ongoing commitment to name, resist, and participate in, or accompany, healing from the ongoing manifestations of colonization.