UMNS Photo
Bledsoe Hearing
OKLAHOMA CITY--Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe (left) with his advocate, the Rev. Zan Holmes, a retired clergy member of the North Texas Annual Conference, before the start of the July 16 personnel hearing that will decide Bledsoe's fate.
UPDATE AS OF 6:22 PM:
The hearing on Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe has recessed for the evening. Don House, chair of the South Central Jurisdiction Committee on the Episcopacy, told UMNS that no vote is expected tonight. The hearing will continue on Tuesday morning.
The South Central Jurisdictional Conference begins Wednesday afternoon with opening worship at St. Luke UMC in Oklahoma City. Business sessions will be held at the Cox Convention Center.
UPDATE AS OF 5:22 PM:
About 100 United Methodist clergy and lay people have traveled from the North Texas and Arkansas annual (regional) conferences to Oklahoma City to show support for Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe, who faces the possibility of involuntary retirement.
An attorney for the bishop was waiting to find out whether video testimony in Bledsoe’s favor could be presented during the closed-door hearing today, July 16, with the South Central Jurisdiction Committee on the Episcopacy. Earlier in the day, the committee denied Bledsoe’s request that the hearing be open to the public.
Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe (left) and his advocate, the Rev. Zan Holmes Jr., a retired pastor, before the start of Bledsoe’s hearing with the South Central Jurisdiction Episcopacy Committee.
The hearing began at 2 p.m. in a meeting room at St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in downtown Oklahoma City. Just a few yards away, Bledsoe’s supporters sat at round tables in the church’s fellowship hall, where they shared conversation while some wrote prayers for the proceedings.
“We’re praying for justice to be done,” said Cheryl Hopkins, a lay member of Hamilton Park United Methodist Church in Dallas. She and other supporters spoke highly of Bledsoe’s leadership and outreach to laity.
Jonathan Wilson, a member of Highland Park United Methodist Church and Bledsoe’s attorney, said he has video testimony in support of Bledsoe from two laity and five clergy, including Highland Park’s pastor, the Rev. Mark Craig. Wilson, a lawyer with the firm Dallas firm Haynes & Boone, is representing Bledsoe pro bono.
However, Bledsoe, 61 and in his fourth year as bishop, is facing strong criticism of his administration of the North Texas Conference, which encompasses the Dallas metroplex and parts of East Texas.
The South Central Jurisdiction episcopacy committee, to which he reports, is weighing whether to compel Bledsoe’s retirement from the bishop’s office.
The chair of the South Central Jurisdictional Committee on the Episcopacy, which oversees Bledsoe, released a statement on June 8 explaining why the panel asked Bledsoe to retire early.
“The results of our evaluation of Bishop Bledsoe were mixed,” said the statement from Don House, the committee chair and lay church member of the Texas Conference. “While having some skills as a spiritual leader, his administrative skills, relational skills, and style remain in question based upon our own evaluation tools and through conversations with North Texas Annual Conference leaders. We discussed these results, reports, issues and specific examples with Bishop Bledsoe.”
Additionally, the statement said, committee members did not think Bledsoe “would be an effective episcopal leader” in another annual conference.
EARLIER POST:
Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe, who leads the North Texas Annual (regional) Conference, will face a hearing July 16 that ultimately could determine whether he remains an active bishop or must retire early.
The South Central Jurisdiction Committee on the Episcopacy, which oversees Bledsoe, has scheduled the closed-door meeting at 2 p.m. Monday. July 16 at St. Luke’s United Methodist Church in Oklahoma City.
Some United Methodists from the North Texas Annual Conference were reported to be traveling to Oklahoma City by chartered bus in support of Bishop Bledsoe, despite the closed-door nature of the meeting. Closed meetings are permitted by the United Methodist Book of Discipline when personnel matters are involved.
The South Central Jurisdictional Conference, which elects bishops, will follow July 17-21 in the same city.
The hearing is the latest turn in a public dispute between a bishop and a jurisdictional episcopacy committee that many longtime church observers call unprecedented in The United Methodist Church’s 44-year history.
It also comes on the heels of efforts to increase accountability for church leaders at all levels of the denomination. These moves include the vote at the recently concluded 2012 General Conference, the denomination’s top lawmaking body, to end guaranteed full-time appointments for ordained elders in good standing.
Bledsoe, 61, and in his fourth year as bishop, first announced plans to retire in a video on June 1. But days later on June 5, the bishop stunned many at the North Texas annual gathering when he declared that he was being forced out and he would not stand for it.
He said he made his decision after prayer and seeing the conference’s positive statistical data, which included a second consecutive year of increased worship attendance. According to conference reports, North Texas since 2009 is now averaging an additional 769 people in worship in its local churches.
“We have worked hard over the last four years, and I believe that work is just beginning to bear fruit,” Bledsoe told United Methodist News Service. “To give up the fight and quit in the midst of this is not who I am as a Christian.”
He also said he was not facing any formal complaints of violating church law.
Late on June 8, the chair of the South Central Jurisdictional Committee on the Episcopacy released a statement explaining why the panel asked Bledsoe to retire early.
“The results of our evaluation of Bishop Bledsoe were mixed,” said the statement from Don House, the committee chair and lay church member of the Texas Conference. “While having some skills as a spiritual leader, his administrative skills, relational skills, and style remain in question based upon our own evaluation tools and through conversations with North Texas Annual Conference leaders. We discussed these results, reports, issues and specific examples with Bishop Bledsoe.”
What church law says
Under the Book of Discipline, the denomination’s law book, jurisdictional and central conference episcopacy committees can place a bishop in involuntary retirement by a two-thirds vote.
Just as jurisdictional committees assign and evaluate U.S. bishops, the central conference bodies do the same with bishops in Africa, Asia and Europe. Each jurisdictional committee on the episcopacy includes a clergy delegate and a lay delegate from each of that jurisdiction’s conferences.
The Book of Discipline says a bishop can appeal a vote for involuntary retirement to the United Methodist Judicial Council, the denomination’s top court.
Reactions across denomination
The situation involving Bledsoe, an African-American bishop, has drawn attention from groups across The United Methodist Church.
The United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race, the agency charged with monitoring racial matters in the denomination, released a statement on June 13 expressing concern about the dispute. The commission said it was not making an allegation of racial discrimination, but, in its statement, it raised the question of whether clergy at all levels of the church receive evaluations under “rigorous, consistent and commonly understood policies and processes.”
Black Methodists for Church Renewal Inc., which represents African-American United Methodists and congregations across the United States, was more pointed in an open letter released June 15.
“Our greatest concern regarding the issues related to Bishop Bledsoe is the process of evaluating bishops of the church; particularly the process that has taken place in the South Central Jurisdiction,” said the letter signed by the Rev. Ronnie Miller-Yow, the group’s chair and a clergy member of the Arkansas Conference. “We would like to know what rubric is used to measure the benchmarks of effectiveness.”
The United Methodist News Service asked representatives of the five United Methodist jurisdictional episcopacy committees, which evaluate and assign U.S. bishops, to share what metrics they use in assessing bishops. House was the first to respond with three documents — the bishop’s questionnaire, and two episcopal area questionnaires, Part A and Part B.
In a blog post on the North Texas Conference website, Bledsoe emphasized “This issue is not about race!”
Bledsoe said, for him, the single issue is “about fairness and due process in assessing leadership and procedures that lead to more effective ministry at all levels of the church.”
What could happen next?
If the South Central Jurisdiction episcopacy committee votes to compel Bishop W. Earl Bledsoe’s retirement and he appeals, he will remain as the North Texas Conference bishop until the Judicial Council renders a ruling. If the Judicial Council upholds an involuntary retirement, the Council of Bishops, in consultation with the episcopacy committee and cabinet, could fill the vacancy with a retired bishop. Or the South Central Jurisdiction College of Bishops could call a special session of the jurisdictional conference to elect and appoint a new bishop.
Heather Hahn is a multimedia reporter for United Methodist News Service.