The Untied Methodist Church

The 2019 General Conference was quite a mess, and I have been reluctant to add my ramblings to the confusion.  Countless hurtful and graceless things have been said by people from  every perspective. I feel that the 2019 General Conference failed us, but not for the reasons that you might think.

Unlike the official UMC logo, these two flames are divided.

I intentionally titled this blog "The Untied Methodist Church." We are not as united as we were when the Evangelical United Brethren and Methodist Churches came together in 1968. To symbolize the merger, the cross and flame logo was created as the official logo of the UMC. Each flame represented the originating denominations, and the connection showed that they were coming from the same source -- recalling the tongues of flame present at Pentecost. I have not included a cross and flame. (It is a registered trademark and cannot legally be used for individual purposes.) Instead, I offer a cross with a broken, disconnected flame, representing the current state of our church.

In the past, our common connection has fueled the flame of the United Methodist Church as we shared more in common than we had differences. We could work in cooperation to "make disciples for the transformation of the world."

The 2019 General Conference failed us because it clearly demonstrated that we choose competition and coercion over connection and conversation. 

I am not talking about which plan we passed: Traditional, One Church, Simple, or Connectional Conference. I would be writing this blog regardless of the final decision. (I would have been satisfied to have left the 2019 gathering with no plan at all.) Instead, the path that we chose neglected our connection. A well-intentioned end does not justify our means.

Our original failing was creating a single issue General Conference. We should never separate any issue from the overall mission and purpose of the church and our overall context of ministry.  God's call in Jesus Christ should always be in the forefront and should encompass all that we do. There should never have been a separate conference that dealt exclusively with the issue of human sexuality.  This was the church bowing to the pressures of society that seeks to make everything black and white, us and them, 'for us' or 'against us.' We accepted a false premise. We isolated one part of who we are. The whole context of the 2019 General Conference inevitably led us toward conflict and division.

I appreciate that the first day of the conference was spent in prayer and worship.  There was a feeling of solidarity and unity among delegates from around the world.  I heard words of hope and optimism shared as the people called Methodist lifted their voices together in prayer.

As the conference continued, it was clear that this was a race to the finish line.  Blocks of votes coalesced around previously announced agendas. Strategies were formed. General Conference rules were bent and stretched and twisted by both sides. The floor of discussion was silenced with an episcopal invitation to an act of prayer.  It made the prayer, no matter who would have prayed, feel like a weapon wielded.  I do not think this was the intent. It is what happened.

We used to be a people that could come together for holy conferencing. We could share in conversation and discuss openly and passionately. Theological concepts like justice and mercy could be held in conversation, and even in tension. There was not even the pretense of holy conversation. Before the delegates arrived in St. Louis, many of them had made up their minds and were not interested in listening - on either side.

Would we have reached the same conclusion if we had allowed the Holy Spirit to guide an open and honest conversation? I don't know. We might as well ask if the people of Israel would still celebrate Passover if Pharaoh's heart had not hardened and he let God's people go. We cannot see clearly the hopeful possibilities that we lose when we close off our hearts to the work of God in others.

In our rush to see which group could win the race at General Conference, we became The Untied Methodist Church.

May God open our hearts and ears that we might listen to the Holy Spirit and to one another again.

Grace and Peace,