Options Among the Ruins of the UMC

The shockwaves from General Conference 2019 continue to reverberate across the church landscape. If you pay attention to social media, you have noticed that a number of churches and conferences across the country have issued statements of resistance to the Traditionalist Plan (see Jeremy Smith’s blog Hacking Christianity for a complete list of resisting churches, conferences, and regional bodies).

But the question that remains hanging in the air has to do with the future: What next for the United Methodists who can’t live in a Traditionalist denomination?

One significant possibility emerged in a Washington Post article that appeared March 29, centering on the activities of megachurch UM pastor Adam Hamilton, as well as North Texas’ own bishop. See the following relevant paragraphs:

The Rev. Adam Hamilton, who is the pastor of the largest Methodist church in the country, with 20,000 members in his Kansas City congregation, is organizing with Haupert-Johnson, Texas’s Bishop Michael McKee and a few others.

Their group has a methodical, political-organizing-style plan for drawing others into their fight: meetings this week and next week in Dallas and Atlanta, each with 30 handpicked clergy and leaders, including seven LGBT leaders. Then a meeting at Hamilton’s church in May for 500 leaders. Then another meeting in the fall, where they aim to draw 3,000 leaders of Methodist churches.

“I’ve been astounded at the number of emails, phone calls, text messages I’m receiving from churches across the country saying we can’t live like this,” Hamilton said. “These churches, they’re centrist. But they’re saying this doesn’t feel like the United Methodism that we have always known and loved. To be in a church that will be in the future led by the most conservative caucus in our denomination feels untenable for them.”

…

Hamilton said that before his group’s first meetings in Atlanta and Dallas, he envisions two possibly viable paths: splitting and resistance.

If the group opts for resistance, it would probably be financial, he said. Numerous large American churches like his would stop contributing their customary funds to the denomination, in the hope that delegates from Africa and Russia — who led the successful push at last month’s meeting to block same-sex marriage and gay clergy — would agree to a new vote at the 2020 meeting on LGBT issues, to preserve funding for their mission projects.

His second option would involve persuading all parts of the American church — both progressives and centrists who want same-sex marriage, as well as conservatives who want to separate and be done with the debate — to pool their voting power in favor of a split into separate denominations. American churches that favor same-sex marriage would opt into one denomination; most African and Russian churches as well as American churches that oppose same-sex marriage would be in the other one.

A vision for a new denomination will be a major topic at the under-the-radar meetings this week and next: both practical questions, like how a split church could share existing institutions such as schools and hospitals, and religious ones.

I don’t know anything more than what appears in this article. But I am heartened to see Bishop McKee’s name at the center of these happenings.

I disagree with Adam Hamilton’s suggestion that one option at the General Conference 2020 is sustained financial resistance. That’s a viable action in the meantime as a stopgap measure, but it’s cynical to think that the African and Russian delegates would change their votes “to preserve funding for their mission projects.” That’s just another form of bribery, of buying votes, which progressives have condemned conservatives for doing for years now.

Personally, I believe that the energy needs to be focused on the second option — separation. Since the conservative voting bloc will not decrease anytime soon, it’s best to concentrate on the opportunities that a church split would provide.

But there’s another problem looming in the discussions of what’s next. For one, Adam Hamilton himself has received the brunt of a great deal of criticism among progressives, because of what he himself represents. He’s white, male, middle-aged, heterosexual, and centrist. In other words, he’s pretty much UM status quo.

Lots of newly-energized progressives are raising the question, “Why should we listen to UM status quo? Where are the people of color, women, LGBTQ people, and why aren’t we following them instead of the same-old, same-old?”

To make things worse, the article suggests that Hamilton gathered together a small group of “handpicked” clergy and leaders. Lots of people want to know who they are; who hand-picked them? and on what basis? It sounds as if, once again, important decisions in the UMC are being made in a back room with cigar smoke lingering overhead.

In other words, there is an argument to be made that, as we struggle for the next Methodism, shouldn’t we try to do things differently? Shouldn’t we aim to build a more perfect institution, one that is not only LGBTQ-inclusive and affirming, but also racially-equitable, gender-equitable, more democratic, and less colonial?

Perhaps in the end, there will be three separate and distinct denominations that emerge from the ruins of the United Methodist Church: a conservative church that embraces the Traditionalist Plan, a centrist church that lives in a One Church Plan, and a progressive church that more energetically and actively pursues progressive values.

I would prefer the progressive denomination; but what about you?

Risk Big

    I walked out of a church committee meeting recently with something weighing on my  mind. We had made some solid decisions, but something bothered me. I couldn’t figure out exactly what it was.
    The dog woke me up early the next morning as she often does, and as I was trying to go back to sleep, in the fog of drowsiness, I had an epiphany. I suddenly realized what was wrong with our meeting: we had made our decisions out of anxiety and fear, out of a kind of fear of what might happen if, instead of from a sense of anticipation and hope.
    As I lay there in bed, I reviewed our decision-making. We had voiced concerns about “what to do”; we had discussed worst-case scenarios; we spent plenty of time talking about why we couldn’t, or shouldn’t, do something.
    That’s what committees do best, to be honest. Committees are inherently conservative; they exist to protect institutions, and safeguard what the institution does and owns.
    There’s nothing wrong with that, except that institutions have to also grow and adapt to change. Organizations must experiment and risk and dare. There have to be counterbalances to committees.
    This is especially true of a church. A church is supposed to represent the presence of Christ in the world, and so it must be quickly responsible and adaptable to the leading and guidance of the Holy Spirit. And it must be resistant to anxiety.
    We are to be led by faith, not by fear; we are not supposed to act out of anxiety. As Paul put it in II Timothy 1:7, “God didn’t give us a spirit that is timid but one that is powerful, loving, and self-controlled.” The old King James Version put it like this: “For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”
    Sometimes I wonder if I act like I have a “spirit of fear” rather than the Holy Spirit. Sometimes I wonder if our church committees do the same.
    When we make decisions based on anxiety, we are too cautious for our own good. We start looking inward, we worry about things we can’t control, and we stop dreaming.
    I know that this is a dangerous world. This is a world in which there are too many guns, too many wounded and damaged people, too many addictions. This is a world where too many nations have nuclear weapons, and too many world leaders think only of their job security. This is a world where fewer and fewer people go to church, more and more activities compete with Sunday morning worship, and the public reputation of Christians has never been lower. This is a world where the United Methodist Church as a denomination is irreparably divided, and on the verge of a split.
    These things are all true, but they don’t mean that we should close our doors, fire all the staff, and go home. Not at all.
    The way forward is in the opposite direction. The world needs Jesus, and the world needs us. We’re needed now more than ever. And so, rather than being cautious, we ought to go bigger. Now is the time to find more resources, spend more money on kingdom work, become more active, do more mission, find more social justice causes to support, sing more songs, and preach more sermons!
    If this makes you nervous and anxious, just remember what I say every week in our benediction — “May God give you the grace to risk something big for something good.”
    It’s time to risk big.

The Church on Trial

Bishop Karen Oliveto after being elected in July 2016.

As I write these words, the Judicial Council of the United Methodist Church has just begun hearing arguments in its April docket. One of those cases dominates the denomination’s attention and interest.

It’s the question of whether Karen Oliveto’s election as bishop last year in the Western Jurisdictional Conference is lawful under present church rule. Oliveto is a “self-avowed, practicing homosexual” and is married to a same-sex spouse. This is forbidden by current United Methodist Church law, which is contained in the Book of Discipline (BOD).

The case was forwarded to the Judicial Council by the South Central Jurisdiction shortly after Bishop Oliveto’s election last year. Of course, the actual legal ruling has to do with matters of authority, jurisdiction, and precise terminology.

But in reality, this case mirrors the present impasse within the church, with implications that go far beyond the case of one particular bishop. If the election is upheld, then a great many people will argue that our laws have no force and that each jurisdiction will be independent. That is indeed, part of the Western Jurisdiction’s argument; they believe that church law gives authority to determine the credentials and qualifications of pastors and bishops solely to annual (regional) conferences and jurisdictions. Already, I have seen a conservative UM pastor complain on Twitter that, “We are basically in the position where each jurisdiction will become its own denomination if JC does not intervene here.”

If the election is rendered null and void, however, this will send a clear(er) message that LGBTQ folks are not to be considered candidates for ordination, much less the episcopacy. It will enshrine the BOD’s current language that “homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching.” And it will make it even tougher for future change.

As if anticipating the anxiety that this case is dredging up, the Council of Bishops yesterday announced that there will be a special session of General Conference called for February 23-26, 2019 in St. Louis, Missouri, to hear the findings and recommendations of the Commission on a Way Forward, which was created upon the decision of the 2016 General Conference in Portland, Oregon.

If all this simply confuses you, with its Methodist terminology, acronyms, and legalese, then let me simplify matters for you:

The United Methodist Church is headed for a decision point — finally. That decision point will NOT be reached this week. Regardless of what happens to Bishop Karen Oliveto, the real date to circle in red is the special session beginning on February 23, 2019. The decision on Bishop Oliveto will make half of the church around the world angry, and half will be satisfied, but it won’t really matter. The special session will be the event at which we decide whether we’re going to stay together, or get a big fat messy divorce.

I am aware that some observers believe there are three factions at play — conservatives, liberals, and moderates who just want everyone to get along. But I believe there is a much simpler division. Despite all the talk about orthodoxy, authority of Scripture, and denominational heritage, it all comes down to whether or not one believes that homosexuality is a “sinful practice.”

To date, there have been more Methodists who believe that, yes, homosexuality is a “sinful practice,” than those who don’t. That’s a sad commentary on the contemporary United Methodist Church, but it is the reality.

To date, the United Methodist Church has, in practice, opted for a “big tent” approach, meaning that it has been willing to overlook the fact that gays and lesbians already serve as clergy and lay leaders. But that is changing — from both ends of the spectrum.

Conservatives believe that the purity of the church is at stake; if homosexuality is a sinful choice and lifestyle, then it simply can’t be “accepted” by the church at large, and certainly not in church leadership. In this thinking, the immorality of homosexuality threatens the overall witness of the church.

Progressives are, quite frankly, tired of waiting for church doctrine to change. We don’t believe that homosexuality is a choice, nor is it a “practice.” We believe that a great injustice has been done to gay people, which has caused lasting damage. We know that our denomination’s teachings have contributed to self-harming behaviors, including addiction and suicide. In our understanding, the discrimination and shame foisted upon LGBTQ persons threatens the overall witness of the church.

I don’t think these two viewpoints can coexist in the same denomination. Either homosexuals are living in sin and need to change, or they are living out the fullness of their God-given being and are to be affirmed and encouraged to live out their vocations. It’s one or the other.

This is one of those times when the church is called to make an either/or decision. I think of Joshua, who stood in front of the people of Israel as they were about to cross over into the Promised Land. He challenged them: “Choose this day whom you will serve … but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord” (Joshua 24:15).

Long before we voted to become a “Reconciling Congregation,” Kessler Park UMC made its decision. We decided to serve the Lord by standing firmly on the side of LGBTQ persons, because they “are” us. We refuse to go backward on the path of justice, and we extend our arms to those who have been excluded by the church from living their full personhood.

The rest of the United Methodist Church must also choose ...