Friday, January 10, 2020

Proposed Future for the UMC

This is the letter I sent to my congregation on the recent proposal that has come out about splitting the church:

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ:

In November I wrote about the fact that the Wesleyan Covenant Association (WCA) had released a draft of a new Book of Discipline which was the next immediate step for WCA churches to break away from the United Methodist Church to form a new denomination. This was to go along with some of the proposed legislation for the upcoming General Conference, which is the worldwide gathering of the UMC where official decisions for the church are made.

While there are thousands of petitions that will come before General Conference this year, the ones most people are concerned about are those relating to how the church will deal with the LGBTQ community and how we can live together (or not). I had been intending to write a summary of the major proposals that had been put forward, but then last week came news that has sort of changed all the dynamics of what could happen.

Sixteen leaders representing the spread of opinions from traditional, centrist to progressive, as well as Africa, Asia and the United States, had spent months in conversation, under the guidance of a professional mediator who donated his time. The purpose was to come up with a proposal that all sides could agree to and be presented to the General Conference. That proposal, called the "Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace ThroughSeparation" was released last week.

So a couple of caveats before we cover the details. The first is that these 16 people were not elected or appointed to this group, they came together of their own accord. Second, even though the Council of Bishops released the information, and there were several bishops in the group, this is not being endorsed or supported by the Council of Bishops, or at least not at the moment. The third is that this is just a proposal at this point, and it will need to be written as legislation to be presented to the General Conference.

So with that information as background, what this Protocol calls for is for allowing conservative churches to break off from the United Methodist Church to form a new denomination, and to be allowed to take their property and other assets with them without any penalty. As part of this separation, the United Methodist Church would provide this new denomination with $25 million paid out over four years, and the new denomination would then relinquish any other claims to UMC assets, including the general boards and agencies. Another $2 million would be set into escrow that could be requested by other churches seeking to form another denomination(s).

Additionally, $39 million would be set aside over 8 years to help assist and strengthen Asian, Black, Hispanic-Latino, Native American and Pacific Islander ministries and churches, which have faced historic discrimination from the Methodist church. $13 million of this will come from the new “traditionalist” denomination, although how this happens is not clear to me.

The money issue has been one of the areas that has received the most conversation in what I have seen and people wondering where this money will come from as well as the amount. But, as someone who has studied schismatic movements in the Methodist Church, we could, and probably would, easily spend $25 million in attorney and court fees if we were to start fighting over who controls assets. This proposal takes away most of those arguments.

After the separation, the United Methodist Church would then remove the restrictive language in the Book of Discipline around homosexuality, and the United States would become a central, or regional, conference like the rest of the world. This would allow the US church to make decisions that apply only to the US, which the rest of the world has already been able to do. This would actually probably make the church more “united” then it has ever been in the past.

Now there are lots of logistics for how this would happen at the General Conference level, which I am going to ignore for the moment rather than bog you down in details.  But, if this proposal was to pass at the General Conference, every Annual Conference could then decide if they wanted to remain in the UMC or to go with the new denomination. It would require 20% of the delegates to any annual conference to support taking a vote for potential separation, and then a majority of more than 57% would be required for the annual conference to actually separate. Annual Conferences would have to take this vote by July 31, 2021, and many of them may take that vote at the next annual conferences in June.

Local churches would only be required to vote if they disagreed with what had happened at the annual conference level. And the vote needed to decide to stay or separate would be either simple majority or 2/3 as decided upon by the local church. But, most local churches probably will not be required to vote on this issue. If a vote is needed, it must be done by December 31, 2024.

As I said, the protocol still needs to be drafted into legislation and there is some argument about whether it can be even proposed as the deadline for legislation has already passed. But, the signatories have agreed to only support this legislation, and to withdraw any legislation they have proposed. So, that would remove most of the other major proposals. And if the groups these leaders represent also agree to support only this legislation, it would almost certainly pass, without most of the continued acrimony we have experienced for the past 47 years. Additionally, the signers have pledged not to challenge the constitutionality of the protocol or its implementation, and to stand as one in defending any challenges before the Judicial Council.

There are obviously lots of things that have to happen before General Conference begins to even get this proposal to the floor of the conference, but, if those pieces fall into place, in my opinion it has the greatest opportunity for passing with a large majority of support. And if it does pass, it has the greatest opportunity for a gracious exit with the smallest amount of fighting of any of the proposals that have been presented, and there is much to be said for that.

The UMC has been operating from a win/lose perspective, as well as the idea that a simple majority gets to “win”, for far too long. You don’t run a church on a 50%+1 vote, unless you want to have constant argument and dissension, which is certainly what the UMC has been experiencing.

This has also not represented the “holy conferencing” to which John Wesley called us to participate. But, from what I have heard from this group, they did indeed have holy conferencing in truly listening and learning to compromise so that everyone gets something and loses something.  In addition, I know some of the people who participated, including one of the bishops who was my TA in a preaching class, and I trust them and their ideas and their decisions.

I have not felt that separation has been the right decision in the past, but as I said in my last letter on this topic, a friend who is a member of the WCA told me he was done and just wanted out, and that has been the WCA’s direction and desire all along. You can’t keep someone in a relationship they don’t want to be in, or at least not if you want health and wholeness to be possible. So I am at the point where I am in agreement that an amicable separation is probably the best way to go.

Now, if I had to make a guess, if this was to pass the General Conference, the New Mexico Annual Conference would vote to stay a part of the United Methodist Church. It would be close, and some churches would definitely leave, but most churches just want to stop fighting and keep doing ministry. That would also mean that we would never have to take a vote here, or at least I don’t think we would. But, if we did, it would require a decision by 2/3rds of the congregation.

There is lots more information available, and I will try to keep you up-to-date on what is happening as we get closer to General Conference. But, in the meantime, if you have questions or concerns, please come and speak with me.

Blessings,
John

Wednesday, January 1, 2020

What I Read In 2019

Here are the books I read in 2019. Goodreads tells me that it was 34,268 pages.  This is more for my information, but I would recommend most of them.
  1. 21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari
  2. 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff
  3. A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing: The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland by DaMaris B. Hill
  4. A Call for Revolution: A Vision for the Future by The Dalai Lama with Sofia Stril-Rever
  5. A Complaint Free World by Will Bowen
  6. A Good Dog: The Story of Orson, Who Changed My Life by Jon Katz
  7. A Small Place by Jamaica Kincaid
  8. Aftermath by Chuck Wendig
  9. All-American Murder: The Rise and Fall of Aaron Hernandez, The Superstar whose Life Ended on Murderers' Row by James Patterson
  10. American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America by Chris Hedges
  11. American Prison: A Reporter's Undercover Journey into the Business of Punishment by Shane Bauer
  12. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth by Col. Chris Hadfield
  13. An Ordinary Man: An Autobiography by Paul Rusesabagina
  14. Artemis by Andy Weir
  15. Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou
  16. Barnum: An American Life by Robert Wilson
  17. Baseball Cop: The Dark Side of America's National Pastime by Eddie Dominguez
  18. Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande
  19. Bowlaway by Elizabeth McCracken
  20. Boy: Tales of Childhood by Roald Dahl
  21. Breaking and Entering: The Extraordinary Story of a Hacker Called "Alien" by Jeremy N. Smith
  22. Brief Answers to the Big Questions by Stephen Hawking
  23. Burn Before Reading: Presidents, CIA Directors and Secret Intelligence by Stansfield Turner
  24. Can You Ever Forgive Me?: Memoirs of a Literary Forger by Lee Israel
  25. Choosing Gratitude: Learning to Love the Life You Have by James A. Autry
  26. Confessions of a Rogue Nuclear Regulator by Gregory B. Jaczko
  27. Death Need Not Be Fatal by Malachy McCourt and Brian McDonald
  28. Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul by Eddie S. Glaude, Jr.
  29. Dreaming the Beatles: The Love Story of One Band and the Whole World by Rob Sheffield
  30. Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment is Killing America's Heartland by Jonathan M. Metzl
  31. Earn. Save. Give. Wesley's Simple Rules for Money by James A. Harnish
  32. Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover
  33. Faith by Jennifer Haigh
  34. Filthy Rich: The True Story Behind the Jeffrey Epstein Sex Scandal by James Patteron, with John Connolly and Tim Malloy
  35. Forgotten: The Untold Story of D-Day's Black Heroes, at Home and at War by Linda Hervieux
  36. From Here to Eternity: Traveling the World to Find the Good Death by Caitlin Doughty
  37. Genesis: The Deep Origin of Society by Edward O. Wilson
  38. Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo
  39. God Help the Child by Toni Morrison
  40. God's Favorites: Judaism, Christianity and the Myth of Divine Chosenness by Michael Coogan
  41. Grateful: The Subversive Practice of Giving Thanks by Diana Butler Bass
  42. Gridiron Genius: A Master Class in Winning Championships and Building Dynasties in the NFL by Michael Lombardi
  43. Guardians of the Whills by Greg Rucka
  44. Hamilton: The Revolution by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jeremy McCarter
  45. Help. Thanks. Wow: The Three Essential Prayers by Anne Lamott
  46. Here and Now by Henri J.M. Nouwen
  47. Home by Toni Morrison
  48. Humans Need Not Apply: A Guide to Wealth and Work in the Age of Artificial Intelligence by Jerry Kaplan
  49. I Must Say: My Life as a Humble Comedy Legend by Martin Short
  50. In My Father's House: A New View of How Crime Runs in the Family by Fox Butterfield
  51. In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson
  52. Inventing Los Alamos: The Growth of an Atomic Community by Jon Hunner
  53. Jesus Feminist: An Invitation to Revisit the Bible's View of Women by Sarah Bessey
  54. Just Kids from the Bronx: Telling it the Way it Was: An Oral History by Arlene Alda
  55. I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer by Michelle McNamara
  56. Lady Almina and the Real Life Downtown Abbey by Fiona Carnarvon
  57. Laika's Window: The Legacy of a Soviet Space Dog by Kurt Caswell
  58. Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris
  59. Life's Too Short to Pretend You're Not Religious by David Dark
  60. Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by Dava Sobel
  61. Lord, Teach Us: The Lord's Prayer and the Christian Life by William Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas
  62. Lords of Discipline by Pat Conroy
  63. Meet Me in Atlantis: My Obsessive Quest to Find the Sunken City by Mark Adams
  64. Monday Morning Leadership: Eight Mentoring Sessions You Can't Afford to Miss by David Cottrell
  65. Mountains of the Pharaohs: The Untold Stories of the Pyramid Builders by Zaho A. Hawass
  66. Names for the Messiah by Walter Brueggemann
  67. No One at the Wheel: Driverless Cars and the Road of the Future by Samuel L. Schwartz and Karen Kelly
  68. No One is Too Small to Make a Difference by Greta Thunberg
  69. Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin
  70. One Stick Song by Sherman Alexie
  71. Out of Step: A Memoir by Anthony Moll
  72. Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track: Letters of Richard P. Feynman edited by Michelle Feynman
  73. Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
  74. Retrograde by Peter Cawdron
  75. Saving Italy: The Race to Rescue a Nation's Treasures from the Nazis by Robert M. Edsel
  76. Seven Practices of a Mindful Leader: Lessons from Google, Search Inside Yourself and a Zen Monastery Kitchen by Marc Lesser
  77. Squeezed: Why Our Families Can't Afford America by Alissa Quart
  78. Star Wars: From a Certain Point of View edited by Elizabeth Schaefer
  79. Stealing Your Life: The Ultimate Indentity Theft Protection Plan by Frank Abagnale, Jr.
  80. Storm Kings: The Untold History of America's First Storm Chasers by Lee Sandlin
  81. Tell Them of Battles, Kings and Elephants by Mathias Enard, translated by Charlotte Mandell
  82. The Art of Death: Writing the Final Story by Edwidge Danticat
  83. The Banished Immortal: A Life of Li Bai by Ha Jin
  84. The Battle of Fort Negro: The Rise and Fall of a Fugitive Slave Community by Matthew J. Clavin
  85. The Bible Doesn't Say That by Joel M. Hoffman
  86. The Corrosion of Conservatism: Why I Left the Right by Max Boot
  87. The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to do About It by Michael Gerber
  88. The Escape Artists: A Band of Daredevil Pilots and the Greatest Prison Break of the Great War by Meal Bascomb
  89. The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race edited by Jesmyn Ward
  90. The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold
  91. The Future of the Mind: The Scientific Quest to Understand, Enhance and Empower the Mind by Michio Kaku
  92. The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers by Maxwell KIng
  93. The Greatest Prayer: A Revolutionary Manifesto and Hymn of Hope by John Dominic Crossan
  94. The Guardians by John Grisham
  95. The Heart Led Leader: How Living and Leading from the Heart Will Change Your Organization and Your Life by Tommy Spaulding
  96. The Last Jedi by Michael Reaves and Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff
  97. The Library Book by Susan Orlean
  98. The Lord and His Prayer by N.T. Wright
  99. The Man Who Loved Books too Much: The True Story of a Thief, a Detective and a World of Literary Obsession by Allison Hoover Bartlett
  100. The Mouse that Roared: Disney and the End of Innocence by Henry A. Girouz
  101. The Professor in the Cage: Why Men Fight and Why We Like to Watch by Jonathan Gottschall
  102. The Real All-Americans: The Team that Changed a Game, a People, a Nation by Sally Jenkins
  103. The Real Lolita: The Kidnapping of Sallry Horner and the Novel that Scandalized the World by Sarah Weinman
  104. The Reckoning by John Grisham
  105. The Revisioners by Margaret Wilkerson Sexton
  106. The Second Founding: How the Civil War and Reconstruction Remade the Constitution by Eric Foner
  107. The Sin of Certainty by Peter Enns
  108. The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels by Jon Meachem
  109. The Story of My Father by Sue Miller
  110. The Tao of Leadership: Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching Adapted for a New Age by John Heider
  111. The Tao of Happiness: Stories from Chung Tzu for Your Spiritual Journey by Derek Lin
  112. The Time is Now: A Call to Uncommon Courage by Joan Chittister, OSB
  113. The Unmaking of the President 2016 by Lanny David
  114. The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606 by James Shapiro
  115. There There by Tommy Orange
  116. Three Simple Rules: A Wesleyan Way of Living by Reuben P. Job
  117. Treason by Timothy Zahn
  118. Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging by Sebastian Junger
  119. Truth in Our Times: Inside the Fight for Press Freedom in the Age of Alternative Facts by David E. McCraw
  120. Trying to Save Piggy Sneed by John Irving
  121. Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics by Stephen Greenblatt
  122. Under Pressure: Confronting the Epidemic of Stress and Anxiety in Girls by Lisa Damour
  123. War Dogs: The True Story of How Three Stoners from Miami Beach Became the Most Unlikely Gunrunners in History by Guy Lawson
  124. We Cast a Shadow by Maurice Carlos Ruffin
  125. What in God's Name? by Simon Rich
  126. What Truth Sounds Like: RFK, James Baldwin and Our Unfinished Conversation about Race in America by Michael Eric Dyson
  127. Why Religion? A Personal Story by Elaine Pagels
  128. Why Women Have Better Sex under Socialism and Other Arguments for Economic Independence by Kristen R. Ghodsee
  129. Wild Bill: The True Story of the American Frontier's First Gunfighter by Tom Clavin
  130. You Throw Like a Girl: The Blind Spot of Masculinity by Don McPherson