[Oe List ...] UMC Judicial Council

[aiseayew]

Jaime, et. al.,

I really appreciated your editorial and found it a powerful voice over 
against the despair I was experiencing with several decisions of the 
Judicial council (specifically 1027, 1031 and 1032).  I had the joy just a 
couple of days after recieving it of participating in a meeting called by 
our bishop and it was so well structured and such a prayerful consideration 
of the crisis (danger and opportunity) within the demonimation that I 
thought I would send along a couple of notes.

The first, most hopeful, is that this decision does not have to wait until 
the General Conference in 2008 to be addressed.  It is possible to challenge 
and call for a review of a decision of the Judicial Council and this process 
in underway.  The Council of Bishops were meeting at the time the decision 
was handed down.  (The anger and frustration of my bishop was obvious when 
he spoke of the council agenda being hijacked by the judiciary.)  They were 
willing to challenge, demand an immediate review, of this decision and were 
asked by the bishop whose decision in this issue had been overturned to 
allow her conference to issue the first administrative challenge to this 
decision.  The bishops agreed to wait to lodge their objection until her 
administrative challenge was in place.  (This seemed a fair and civil 
response to me, a positive discretion exercised in relation to the larger 
covenental commmunity.)  The Board of Ordained Ministry also has a challenge 
waiting to be filed.

The Bishop went on to say that although some of the other decisions 
specifically had to do with issues of how the church related to sexual 
orientation and questions of openness, this decision was not really centered 
in that issue.  (Among other things he commented that it was time for the 
church to repent of being "single isssue oriented" to the neglect of other 
issues and the balance that is required of  us.)  This decision he said had 
four problems all rooted in the interpretation of the constitution of the 
church in relation to 1) the nature of the church, 2) the nature of church 
membership, 3) the nature of grace, and 4) the nature of pastoral authority. 
Nothing short of the rewriting of the church constitution could begin to 
deal with the unintended consequences of such a decision and he has every 
confidence that the judiciary will back down when they recieve the bishops 
work on how this undermines the entire understanding of covenental 
accountability within the structure of the church.  Since one of the lines 
of their decision was the "may means may, not shall" he discussed the 
response of the bishops that the word "may" is not an entitlement.

Representatives to the General Conference of 2004 spoke to how this decision 
does not in any way reflect the spirit of the consensus that was built at 
that time.  There was a clear awareness in the group of pastors gathered of 
how the press will relate to this as an issue of sexual orientation and how 
it is much bigger.  There were powerful witnesses to the process of 
congregations admitting physically, mentally and socially challenged 
members.  I left feeling very hopeful.

Margaret Aiseayew

>
> A disclaimer to ‘Open hearts, Open minds and Open doors’
>
> The Judicial Council, the Supreme Court of The United Methodist Church,
> decided on October 29, 2005, that the ordained clergy in the denomination 
> is vested
> the right to accept or refuse membership to a professing member seeking
> fellowship with a local congregation.  It ruled that it is acceptable for 
> pastors
> to refuse membership into The United Methodist Church on the grounds of 
> sexual
> orientation and practice.
>
> There is no appeal to this decision.  Procedurally, the Church will have 
> to
> wait for the next meeting of its General Conference in 2008 to try to 
> reverse
> this decision.  If the last General Conference is any indication, where 
> the
> more conservative and Evangelical wing got the upper hand in electing 
> members to
> the Judicial Council, there is reason to believe that this judgment will 
> stay.
>
>  The affected case leading to this judgment involved the membership of an
> openly homosexual person.  The local pastor said, "No," to acceptance into 
> the
> rolls; the presiding Bishop said, "Yes."  In the UMC, a Pastor is 
> appointed and
> sent to a charge by the Bishop in consultation with a superintending 
> Cabinet.
> Clergy is not called by the local church, as in the case of congregational
> types of churches.  The non-complying Pastor was taken out of the 
> appointive
> system, so he sought review and judgment from the denomination’s Judicial 
> Council.
> The Bishop’s judgment was decreed non-operative and the local Pastor was
> adjudged to be in line with pastoral provisions, thereby, to be 
> reinstated.
>
> This is a wake-up call for the denomination to reexamine its procedures 
> and
> criteria of church membership and its polity structure.  In the 
> connectional
> nature of the denomination, the basic unit of polity is beyond the local 
> church
> in the Annual Conference (comparable to a Diocesan level in the Roman 
> Catholic
> tradition).  The local Church’s Conference is presided over by a Bishop’s
> representative called a District Superintendent who is a member of the 
> Bishop’s
> Cabinet.
>
> Reports indicate that more than half of local churches within the
> denomination are carried by the other half.  Further, policies and actions 
> by Commissions
> and Boards beyond the local church level are often alien to the members 
> they
> represent.  The onus of responsibility for the existence of local
> congregations has been by default on the Annual Conference rather than the 
> local church.
> This judgment puts the responsibility on a local church’s identity and
> survival in the hands of the local, particularly the local pastor.
>
> This judgment empowers local congregations; threatens bureaucrats.  It 
> will
> also allow for autocratic local pastors, a condition already prevailing 
> within
> sufficiently endowed or vibrantly self-sustaining local churches. 
> Already,
> the Council of Bishops is being asked to renounce this decision in clear 
> and
> emphatic words, a most unlikely prospect.
>
> Further, UMC congregations are urged to declare a day of mourning and
> repentance on Thanksgiving Sunday, November 20, 2005.  Prayers and sermons 
> "against
> this hurtful and non-Biblical ruling of  the Judicial Council" are to be 
> made.
> I’ll be happy if 30% of the denomination complies.
>
> For now, the United Methodist Church will just have to change it’s 
> corporate
> slogan to "Closed Hearts, Closed Minds, Closed Doors," until further 
> notice.
> That, or continue with the current one with a disclaimer to read the fine
> prints!
>
> (Jaime R. Vergara is a pastor of the United Methodist  Church.)
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> OE mailing list
> OE at wedgeblade.net
> http://wedgeblade.net/mailman/listinfo/oe_wedgeblade.net
>