A United Methodist Insight Exclusive
Beloved in God’s vineyard, peace and grace to you from God our Father through our Lord Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit!
We are writing as children of the United Methodist Church and of our late fathers, Mr. Kalaba Nkangalesa Kapundu, a Conference lay leader in the Congo Central Conference, and Rev. John Miles, a pastor in the Arkansas Conference. We remember their legacy of faithfulness in making disciples of all nations as Christ has commissioned us to do (Matt 28:18-20).
We write to express our deep reservations about the Traditional and Modified Traditional Plans, especially the accountability provisions.
First, these provisions are not traditional but radical within United Methodism.
Second, in the very ways that they are not traditional, they will likely have grave unintended consequences, especially as they undermine the pastoral authority of Bishops and other conference leaders.
Third, they will not be effective and will likely make things even worse. It is because of our conservative impulses and Christian faith that we are most worried about these plans.
In October, delegates from our South Central Jurisdiction gathered in Oklahoma City and listened to our Bishops as they explained the different plans. As Bishop Scott Jones talked through the Traditional Plan, with its tough minimum penalties and church trials, the mood in the room became subdued. We noticed something striking. The people who looked the most saddened were the conservatives. We realized then that the people who are supporting the Traditional Plans are doing so with reluctance and even heartbreak. We share this heartbreak, and we seek a better, more conciliatory path.
•The Traditional and Modified Traditional Plans are not traditional within United Methodism. Their key components, designed to hold progressive annual conferences accountable to specific provisions in the Discipline, would undermine the central, long-standing authority of the annual conference to determine its clergy membership and to handle all other matters concerning the character and conference relations of its clergy. This authority of the annual conference stretches back more than two centuries. Weakening this key authority of the annual conference could have serious unintended consequences that have nothing to do with our current conflicts about sexuality.
•The plan also undermines the pastoral authority of Bishops and district superintendents. Under our current discipline, Bishops and district superintendents may use their pastoral wisdom and authority to resolve problems and complaints personally and informally. The Traditional plans would make it harder for our Bishops and other annual conference leaders to resolve complaints informally, whether they are about sexuality or some other matter. Weakening this central pastoral authority of the Bishops and district superintendents could have serious ramifications for the healthy functioning of an annual conference and its mission.
•The Modified Traditional Plan undermines the pastoral authority of our Bishops to handle problems and conflicts with other brother and sister Bishops in their region. By establishing a Global Episcopal Committee, designed to hold Bishops accountable, we would take pastoral authority from the Bishops in their specific region, who know most about the issues and can respond pastorally, and we would give that pastoral authority to a global body that does not know the region and cannot function pastorally. A hallmark of United Methodism is that we honor leaders chosen from within a cultural context rather than sending a Bishop from outside the area. A Global Committee on Episcopacy would return us to the past by taking away the authority of the Bishops of a region and giving that authority to outsiders. Under the Modified Traditional Plan, this global committee would have broad authority over our regional Bishops, not just on issues around sexuality but on other matters as well. This Global Episcopacy Committee would also oversee annual conferences on some matters, taking away local oversight. Again, this would have grave unintended consequences. We understand that United Methodists in some parts of the world do not trust their Bishops, but this is not the right answer to that problem.
•The new provisions would also allow for appeals of the decisions of church trials beyond the annual conference on certain rulings of law and fact, not just on process. We recognize that the intention is to hold the progressive annual conferences accountable to the provisions of the Discipline on issues of sexuality, but this is applicable to any church trials and could play out in unfortunate ways the authors of the plan did not intend. Again, this undermines the basic constitutional authority of the annual conference and its clergy leaders.
•Unlike these previous provisions, the mandatory minimum penalties would apply specifically to officiating same-sex marriages and not other church trials. But that creates a different problem. We would find ourselves in the strange and hypocritical position of having harsh mandatory minimum penalties for a pastor officiating at a same-sex wedding but not for other offenses such as adultery or mismanagement of church funds.
•The intention of these provisions is to decrease the incidence of United Methodist clergy officiating at same-sex weddings, deterring clergy by making it much more likely they will be brought to trial and convicted and, then, ensuring stiff penalties if they are. But the likely result would be to increase the number of church trials, because we have weakened the authority of Bishops and district superintendents to handle their conference problems pastorally and informally, not just on issues around sexuality but for other complaints as well.
•And within the United States of America, making it more likely that those who officiate at same-sex weddings are brought trial and given stiff penalties, will not reduce the public disputes about sexuality but, instead, make them more public and more fractious. In the United States, these new provisions would likely result in more clergy taking more risks to create so many church trials that the annual conferences have insufficient human resources to handle them. We do not have enough clergy members to form twenty-five or fifty trial courts in an annual conference.
•None of us believes that more church trials, and the awful publicity that accompanies them, would be a good thing for our church and its witness in the world. This would hurt the church in different ways around the world. In the United States, for example, where Christians have often shown their anger and conflicts publicly, most young people (87% and 86%) describe Christians as judgmental and hypocritical.* In many parts of Africa, on the other hand, Christians discourage open conflict about these issues because it is a poor witness to the faith.
•We can draw wisdom from our brothers and sisters from Central Conferences in the continent of Africa on how they resolve church issues through non-trial means. When the church becomes known through its many public trials, we will lose our cordial and grace-filled examples of dealing with disputes that the church offers to the world. On the pastoral role of some among us, the Apostle Paul reminds,
The gifts he (Christ) gave were that some would be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until all of us come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to maturity, to the measure of the full stature of Christ (Eph 4:11-13).
We are convinced that the Traditional and Modified Traditional Plans would be disastrous for our church, especially in the unintended but still predictable consequences and the undermining of the authority of the annual conference and its clergy, district superintendents, and Bishops. We are writing to ask that you seriously and prayerfully consider, given the gravity of the problems, not supporting the Traditional or Modified Traditional Plans.
We know how hard you have been working to listen to the spirit of God, the spirit of peace in the midst very difficult and uncertain times. We leave you with the words of peace from our Lord Jesus the Christ. Jesus promises, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid” (John 14:27).
Grace and Peace from our Lord Jesus Christ,
Kalaba Chali, a son of the Congo Central Conference, clergy member of the Great Plains Conference, and Conference Justice and Mercy Coordinator
Rebekah Miles, a daughter and clergy member of the Arkansas Conference and Professor of Ethics at Perkins School of Theology
* Barna Group, “A New Generation Expresses Its Skepticism and Frustration with Christianity,” https://www.barna.com/research/a-new-generation-expresses-its-skepticism-and-frustration-with-christianity/