Photo Courtesy of Mary John Dye/Facebook
"Good riddance" is the phrase I have often heard in regard to those who have chosen to disaffiliate from the UMC. And, especially for those pastors who — though in covenant with the UMC by sacred vow and appointment — actively undermined the UMC in the congregation given to their care. Good riddance is an understandable impulse/reaction to the damage done to our connection.
But I wept all through the clergy session of Western North Carolina Conference's special called Nov. 3 session. Not an occasional, dainty tear that could be discreetly wiped away. But weeping that made me very glad we were on Zoom and people were not around to say “What is wrong with her?” It was weeping from a broken heart.
Mary John Dye Ident
I am as angry and disappointed as anyone else with the same kind of holy grief that we see in a Jesus’ heart as He wept over Jerusalem. I am grieving for those who have wounded the Body of Christ. They carry a heavy load of conscience. And I weep for those wounded in the fight — the United Methodists caught in the crossfire. Longtime faithful people who are already struggling with painful challenges of health and family and work and the changing and always conflicted world. The last thing they needed was a bitter battle in their church. I serve these people. I hear their pain in literally every conversation. Disaffiliation has, by its nature, been divisive. With all my heart, I pray that those who pressed for it will turn to focus on their ministries with no more need to undermine or attack or criticize or discredit our denomination.
Given the ongoing pain that church members have suffered that I see every day, I could cry a river. But I have dried my tears with the lifeline hope of Scripture: that God works for good in all things for those who love Him. And it is a profound live for Him that is the source of the holy tears to begin with.
So pass the Kleenex and let us move on to be a more holy church, a more welcoming church, a more righteous church. I know I will be ready to claim the promise of the day when God will wipe away every tear from our eyes—a beautiful and precious hope for the future of the faithful.