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Perspectief 24 Werk van jonge theologen Chapter 2: Lutheran responses Whereas the Catholic Church has developed a clearly defined and universally binding social teaching since the late 19 th century, the various Lutheran churches do not have a similar unifying magisterium. This absence of a clear-cut perspective on refugees has had as a consequence a lack of academic enquiry into Lutheran perceptions of refugees. However, the Lutheran community itself experienced exile and flight on numerous occasions in history, experiences that have undoubtedly marked the way Lutheran churches view themselves and refugees, as well as their mutual relationship. In this chapter we will look at the Lutheran World Federation, the Lutheran body most similar to the Catholic Magisterium, although the significant differences between the two will not be overlooked. We then proceed to discuss academic articles by David L. Balch and Wayne N. Miller. Balch is a New Testament professor who has from this perspective written on a wide variety of topics, including migration, family life and ethnicity. Miller is the Lutheran bishop of the Metropolitan Chicago Synod, and is amongst other social outreach positions a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s (ELCA) episcopal immigration reform task force. In this function he has also been involved with the Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service. Balch and Miller’s articles on migration discussed below were published in the ELCA’s Journal of Lutheran Ethics, which aims to be “[a] bridge between the academic study of Christianity and the contemporary life of the Church” 81 . Paralleling the previous chapter on Roman Catholic perspectives, we will finish with an analysis of the voices of individual Lutherans who are neither affiliated with the Lutheran World Federation nor with an academic institution. 81 Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (undated) About JLE accessed September 12, 2016 at http://www.elca.org/JLE/Pages/About.