GC 2020: Can we avoid a shotgun wedding?

Frank Holbrook 3 GC 2020

The Bard Jones Plan (“Bard Jones”) recognized a number of possibilities for “moving into the future to address our division and the animosity which often accompanies it”. The possibilities listed by Bard Jones are summarized as follows:

1. Move into the future as we have lived in the recent past, relying on the legislative processes of General Conference to help us make needed change.
2. One “group” or the other (progressives or traditionalists) simply decides to leave and start something new.
3. A “forced schism” either through countless judicial processes leading to the removal of progressive pastors and bishops and the disaffiliation of more progressive churches, or by massive resistance and disobedience by progressives which they hope might lead to the withdrawal of traditional pastors and bishops and the disaffiliation of more traditional churches.
4. Begin with a vision of what we would like The United Methodist Church to look like in 2022.

The plan went on to state: “We believe that annual conferences are the crucial vehicles for achieving this new form of unity with as little disruption and conflict as possible.”

This focus on Annual Conference as the decision maker appears in many, if not all, of the proposals for new expressions being considered. This may or may not be required to make the change legal under the BOD. But making the Annual Conference the decision maker ignores a few common sense problems that, based on my readings, do not appear to have been raised previously.

In an earlier post I alluded to another potential outcome of our current division. Isn’t it possible that any action will result in an accelerated decline of the denomination’s membership in the United States? I certainly believe this is a distinct possibility. What are the reasons this might occur? I believe one reason may be that the proposed processes for potential realignment may alienate many members.

The Constitution makes clear that the Annual Conference is the basic body in the Church. ¶ 33 BOD. It is also clear that the Annual Conference is a body composed of delegates equally divided between the clergy and laity. ¶ 32 BOD. But as many frequently observe and opine, the body is not representative; delegates to annual conference vote their conscience, not as representatives. For example, in this post from the blog Hacking Christianity the distinction, made by an Elder from Oklahoma, is noted with approval: “You are not representing our conference. You are a delegate. That means we have delegated our collective authority to you. You vote your conscience as a delegate and pay no heed to “representing” your state. Authority has been delegated to you: take it and vote as a United Methodist who loves their church.” Although the quote deals with delegates to General Conference, the same rationale applies to delegates to Annual Conference.  So any Annual Conference taking a vote on joining a new expression will have delegates vote, not as representatives of the Annual Conference’s members, but by voting their own conscience.

Currently left out of the equation are the polity and common sense impacts the proposed approval process has on the vows of the actual members of the United Methodist Church. One of the vows of membership is that each individual member vows “To be loyal to Christ through The United Methodist Church and do all in their power to strengthen its ministries.” ¶ 217 BOD. That is a personal vow that each member has made. As such it is a serious covenant made to God and witnessed by the local Church. Is it being addressed in any plan creating new expressions? I sense that most plans are focused on the denominational institution, with some thought given to local churches but little thought given to local members. Certainly the wishes of the local church are generally an afterthought with local churches’ ability limited to opting out of the Annual Confernce’s decision.  Such a process sets up a recipe for acrimony immediately after a decision by an Annual Conference.

Under the processes being contemplated, at some point it is entirely possible that on some future Sunday each member of a local church will be informed that they are no longer bound by one of their personal vows of membership because the Annual Conference unilaterally decided to make a change.  Practically speaking it may not be much of a problem to many members. Some will view the change as being something akin to a sign hung outside a local store announcing “Under New Management”. Others will be loyal to their local church because of complacency, because doctrine and polity don’t matter to them, or because their ancestors attended church in the building for generations

But I suspect that many members will have an increased sense of alienation from the church. It’s human nature, especially in the United States, to say “Well I didn’t vote to move my membership to a new denomination, and I’m not going. I’m going to start going to the [fill in the blank] church down the street.”  That’s a possibility that also must be considered when thinking about the future.  Although there is currently a debate about where the majority of the United Methodist Church’s membership stands on various issues, that debate seems to be heavy on assumptions and using delegate count to bolster theories, the debate seems to be light on data.  It also has been suggested that the clergy is generally more progressive then the membership at large. If this last point is accurate, the sense of alienation will be compounded.

In my experience, most UMC members know little about what Annual Conference does or what powers it possesses. I think in many cases, members equate Annual Conference with the annual meeting of a trade or professional organization. Most members are generally much more focused on the activities of their local church than they are on the the activities of Annual Conference. If on some future Sunday there is a mass announcement that every church within the geographical bounds of in the conference is now a part of something new, the sense of shock following such an announcement may make the aftermath of GC 2019 seem like a minor dust up.  Moreover, not only is the member now involuntarily a part of something that they didn’t join, there is no successor United Methodist Church expression within the geographical boundaries of the Annual Conference for the person to move their membership.

I am offering these observations to raise the point that if multiplication occurs, the process not only must meet the legal requirements of the BOD, it needs to meet the common sense requirement of insuring that members are engaged in the process. The first step towards seeing the church prosper in the future is to have members engaged and understand that their voice matters in the present.

The only apparent alternatives to seeking some way to have members engaged in the process is to say, after the fact, either (a) part of your vows didn’t matter because Annual Conference just made them null and void or (b) a vote by persons who voted their conscience transferred your vow of loyalty from the United Methodist Church to a new expression. It’s hard for me to believe that a shot gun wedding, resulting from the vote of the delegates to an Annual Conference, is not going to get off on the wrong foot.

Even if the Annual Conference must vote for a new expression, perhaps an opportunity to engage the process with voice but no binding vote could be offered to all members of every local church before Annual Conference. Such a non-binding vote could be taken during a defined period before Annual Conference with each local church being a “polling place.” While the vote wouldn’t be binding, the result of such a vote should be made public both at the local and conference level. Even if delegates later vote their conscience and it is contrary to the expressed views of a majority of the conference, I believe the delegates should prayerfully consider the impact their conscience-based vote will have on all of the Annual Confernce’s members.

Granted, we can’t base theological and doctrinal norms on a popular vote of all members, but we also shouldn’t base those norms on the decisions made by a few delegates voting in a vacuum with vague assumptions about what the conference membership is seeking. By taking a route that doesn’t allow a non-binding vote, wouldn’t General Conference be implicitly saying that doctrinal discernment is something that can’t be trusted to individual members, it’s a limited gift bestowed on a few.

Is this an issue we can have Virtual Holy Conferencing about before General Conference?  I hope so.  Feel free to leave a comment.

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