Even though I am writing this Monday evening, I will start on Friday.
I went to a wedding today. Susan Laurie and Julie Bruno had a wedding in the park across the street from the convention center. It was a beautiful day in Ft. Worth and the ceremony was very nice. One of the things that we did not accomplish at General Conference was allowing this ceremony to be held in side our churches with our clergy officiating. Maybe next time.
One of the traditions of General Conference is cookies. Churches from all over Texas baked cookies and put 2 or 3 into a bag, sometimes with a note. The bags were put out on tables in the lobby for all to eat at breaks - sometimes they can turn into a lunch. I saved a note: "A gift from The China Spring United Methodist Church - Waco District." On the back is Matthew 19:26 - "With God all things are possible". I think I heard that there were over 100,000 cookies baked!
I just added up all of my expenses, and on a couple of the receipts, it says: "20 oz Draft - $10.00" The dinner at the convention center was $10.00 and the cash registers were set up for all kinds of events, and it was probably easiest to hit 1 button for a $10 charge - it just looks a little unusual.
Tie today was Dilbert (maybe that was Thursday - this is the problem with not writing it the same night).
Friday was jam packed with stuff, with the wedding just one of the highlights. The opening worship had special music sung by Barbara Johnson Tucker. There was also a special jazz dance by the worship director that was very good. Sermon by Bishop Hope Morgan Ward - quote from it: "We have so many writers because we have so much to explain," and our question as we leave GC should not be "What did you do?, but what did you learn?"
I learned that there are a whole lot of very nice people that can have very different ideas about things.
After passing the last of the consent calendars, as of 9:30 am we had 68 petitions to go.
Of the 1308 petitions done as of Thursday evening, the plenary only disagreed with the committee on 14.
There are 145 interpreters working/volunteering at GC. In case I did not mention it before, they are simultaneously translating into: French, German, Portuguese, Korean, Mandarin Chinese, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, and ASL (American Sign Language).
The budget was passed Friday morning on 11 separate votes. One of the ways that they arrive at the budget number to use is looking at the total giving of all local churches - $17,970,240,568 - almost $18 billion, and the amount for the General Church budget is 3.572% of that or $641,897,700 for the next 4 years. They had an economist explain the formula, and even my MBA from the University of Chicago didn't prevent me from being confused the way they use past performance and project future giving. I don't think it is voodoo economics, just more confusing than it needs to be.
As of 10:30 am the final bid for the basketball used in the nothing but nets promotion was $80,000 by West Ohio. With Bill Gates Sr. matching that, and bids from other annual conferences, the total is at about $428,040. Northern Illinois needs to raise $40,000 - about $100 per church to bring to Annual Conference in June.
During the discussion of the Episcopal Fund part of the budget someone from the SE Jurisdiction moved that if you cut a Bishop you get to keep the dollars saved in your Jurisdiction. At some point I asked if a bishop dies (since the Fund covers the cost of current and retired bishops) do we get the money? Somewhat tongue in cheek, but the point I made is that there is a significant cost to pay for expenses of the retirees.
There was a celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Social Creed. It started in 1908 (duh) with a list of 11 Social Reforms, notably about child labor. Harry F. Ward from Chicago was one of the 3 that worked to get it in place, and it was passed at the General Conference that year in Baltimore.
4:05 p.m. - 55 petitions to go.
We passed another constitutional amendment, that may be the biggest one yet. If I am reading this one right, it will overturn JC decision 1032. It is Article 4 and removes "without regard to race, color, national origin, status or economic condition" and leaves behind, "All persons who seek relationship in Jesus shall be eligible to . . . become professing members in any local church. . ." It passed 558-276 - 67% (it needed 2/3 approval to pass). By my count that is 2 votes more than needed. Now it, and about 30 other constitutional amendments, need to be passed by 2/3 votes of all Annual Conference members voting next year. This - if it ultimately passes, plus the Judicial Council elections are probably the two biggest things to happen this year.
The Judicial Council came back with two rulings - it did not have time to finish them, and they will be on the October docket.
At 9:45 p.m. - 29 petitions to go.
The complete re-write of paragraph 2701 that my little 7 person sub-committee worked for 2 days on passed a few minutes later.
At 10:34 p.m. - 17 to go.
At 11:13 p.m. - we finished ! ! !
The closing worship was short - about 1/2 hour, but (we are United Methodist) still had a sermon. Greg Palmer (Iowa) - "Buoyed by Hope." (The theme of the whole conference was "A Future with Hope", so Hope was a common theme throughout. He spoke about the parable of the seeds from the perspective of the sower. We need to sow the seeds of life everywhere - they will not all work, but we must sow everywhere." Very good closing.
One final note about the worship and music. Marcia McFee (worship) and Mark Miller (music) led us through the whole conference, and it was amazing. Mark is one of the most talented musicians around. He is the director of Music at Drew Theological School in New Jersey and a lecturer at Yale. BA from Yale, and Masters from Julliard. An outstanding person and musician. Marcia has a Ph.D. from the Graduate Theological Union in Liturgical Studies, and has worked with Dave Brubeck Quartet (among others).
There were plants on the stage, and throughout the convention area. The plants were from seeds collected from United Methodists across the global connection. They were planted by churches in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and people were invited to take them home to nurture.
As part of the worship, we used the Wesley Chalice, sent to Francis Asbury at St. George's in 1785 and The Asbury Bible, a pulpit bible belonging to Francis Asbury.
It's all about the people. As I was leaving, I stopped in one of the offices to talk to, and say good by to, Janet Stephenson from Iowa. We talked for a couple of minutes, and when I got outside, I had missed the bus. I waited with a volunteer from Fort Worth who was working as a proofreader of the verbatim transcription. She was driving to one of the hotels on my bus route, parking for free and riding the shuttle to the hall, thus saving $7/day parking. She recognized my name since I had spoken a few times. Worship was over at about 11:45, and I got back to the hotel at about 1:00 am - we were the only 2 on the bus. That is when I could not log on, and why I am writing this rather long missive on Monday night.
There is life after General Conference - I got back to work today, logged on, and found 212 emails waiting for me.
Thank you again to all of you that have been reading these sometimes rambling, sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always heartfelt reactions to the daily events of a General Conference. Only two more conferences to go this year. Northern Illinois Annual Conference in June at St. Charles, IL, and the North Central Jurisdictional Conference in July at Grand Rapids, MI.
With your prayers, thoughts, and comments supporting me, I have Hope for the Future.
Peace to all, Jack
Monday, May 5, 2008
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Day 9
My choir director at First UMC LaGrange asked me to be on the lookout for any good music. Today there was a good one – from the musical, “Rent” – “Seasons of Love”. Very good, and the choir that did it, from 1st UMC of Plano was very good. The sermon was by our Bishop Jung with the title “Jesus, Remember Me”. Jesus said to the others on the cross – you will be with me in Paradise. He did not ask the others on the crosses, “Have you been good?”
There is a theme or “Vision Pathway” most days of the conference that is in the worship book. I will catch you up:
Wednesday – Opening Service of Word & Table
Thursday – “Transforming Existing Congregations”
Friday – “Developing New Congregations”
Saturday – “Strengthening Clergy and Lay Leadership”
Sunday – “Eliminating Poverty in Community with the Poor”
Monday – “Teaching the Wesleyan Model of Reaching and Forming Disciples”
Tuesday – “Reaching and Transforming the Lives of Children”
Wednesday – “Ending Racism as We Authentically Expand Racial/Ethnic Ministries”
Thursday – Memorial Service
Friday – Morning Worship and Closing Worship
Two good comments today about legislation: “Kicking a dead horse harder, don’t make it run any faster.” “I am so methodical and cautious, I might find myself on an escalator, waiting for it to start.” And then there was, "As long as Catholics keep marrying Baptists, there will always be a United Methodist Church."
At the morning break, there was a continuation of the witness from, and reaction to, yesterday’s hurtful votes that continue our institutional discrimination. Many of those that were hurt by the votes came into the hall and formed a cross in the aisles, facing the delegates, and silently stood as the pain was described. Bishop Talbert spoke about the 1939 racism (the creation of the Black Central Conferences), and the parallel today with our policy of exclusion. I later learned that he did that on his own, and was not part of the plan - but as it turned out - very welcome. We were invited to go to the communion table that was draped in black and place a piece of black cloth on it and pray for those harmed and in pain. We then sang a couple of hymns and it was over – very dignified, painful, respectful, prayerful, and the right thing to do. We will press on. At the end, a group of Bishops went out with them and said that they were going to meet and see what could be done.
We then had 17 constitutional amendments to consider – all that would change the name of conferences outside the US from “Central” to “Regional”. There was a motion to have only one set of debate on all 17, and the presiding Bishop asked the house, and we agreed. But, he also said that since they were constitutional amendments, and needed a 2/3 approval vote, that we would have to vote on them individually “because of the constitution.” I got up and appealed the ruling of the chair that we could not vote them all at once, and just record the same number vote for each one. He conferred, then asked me where in the constitution I was looking – I told him – and he conferred again with the 2 parliamentarian bishops that were helping him as well as the petitions secretary and the secretary of the General Conference for a while, and then came back and said I was right. He asked the house if they wanted to vote on them all at once –they agreed, and we eventually were able to take one vote instead of 17. Probably saved ½ hour - likely more.
Well, the fat lady has sung. The Book of Discipline will be codified in 2012. 12 years from when Rod and I first got it to a General Conference, and it will happen. Actually the 2012 Discipline will probably really look different and the real benefit won't be till 2016 when there are no real changes. It passed on consent calendar B05 by an 824-29 vote just before 10:00 am today. As of 8:13 am there were still 117 individual petitions to go.
Bill Gates Sr. spoke this afternoon about the Nothing But Nets (NBN) program that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is helping. He quoted John Wesley a couple of times, using the "All the world is my parish" line to emphasize that it is the world's will to end Malaria, not just in the US. "People are dying, we can save them." Last week when the NBN program was presented, the Bishop making the presentation used a basketball as part of his visual aids. The Kansas delegation offered $420 for the basketball because they won the NCAA basketball and they challenged N Carolina, Memphis and California (UCLA) to mach or beat it. Well, as of tonight the bidding for the ball is up to $75,000 (I forget from where), and during his speech Bill said that he had heard about this challenge, and that his foundation would match the winning bid. They have also said that any losing bids should pay too, and I think we are up to a total of about $400,000 and climbing. NIC is involved, but I will let others share how, and how much. (We are not the leading bidder) Suffice to say, First UMC LaGrange will be accepting donations for those of us going to Annual Conference in June to bring with us. Oh yea, he was a pretty good speaker too.
Somebody asked for a ruling from the Judicial Council about one of the petitions and something about Local Pastors being able to choose if they want to be part of the clergy pension system. It was read fast, and asked about a conflict between two parts of the Discipline. All I got was that it involved calendar item 866 - I think.
At 7:30 p.m. - the start of the evening session - went till about 10:25 p.m. - they announced that there were 99 petitions left to go. They told us by the petitions committee coming on stage and starting to sing: " 99 petitions on the floor to go, 99 petitions to go, you talk about one, amend it and then, 98 petitions on the floor to go. . ." Then one of them interrupted and said, "I move to reconsider", so they went back to "99 petitions . . . "
I lost count of how many times I got up tonight - 3 or 4. Each time with a question or parliamentary question. The one about the constitutional amendments that I described above was one. Then tonight we had a another CA that had legislation linked to it for the book of discipline. They were starting to amend the linked petitions, and I pointed out that the Constitution says (I KNOW what it says since Rod & I wrote it 4 years ago) that you pass the CA first then immediately consider the linked stuff. I did rub it in a little when I said that this is the rule, but it is not in your Discipline since we passed 4 years ago. Some were saying to divide the question, and I said, no, it already is divided by the Constitutional requirement. I miss not having Rod & Dan next to me to help tell the Bishops what to do.
Since I had been up a few times tonight, at the end, we were looking at another CA that I think is really bad law, and I wanted to move it to the Book of Discipline, and the Bishop was looking right at me, and would not call on me. We ended up passing about 25-30 CAs that will need to be approved by an aggregate vote of all of the annual conferences at their 2009 sessions. The bad one is: "a new paragraph, somewhere near p5 - "All official organizations, groups, committees, councils, boards, and agencies of The United Methodist Church shall adopt ethics and conflict of interest policies, applicable to both members and employees, which embody and live out our Christian values." My proposal would have been to move it to paragraph 807 and add, as one of the duties of CF&A (top finance group of the UMC) an additional duty to "establish and publish policies that may be used by All official . . .".
It passed 744-86, and I voted for it so that I have the option tomorrow - if I can find some that agree - of moving to reconsider to move the above action. I may not do it, I will have to see how things go. As I found out tonight I may need to save my times of speaking to times when it really matters.
This evening the Bishops (16 of them) that had gone to meet with the witnesses from this morning. I read a report that was very positive. It will be in the DCA tomorrow, and may be on the UMC website. A couple of things that I noted were that the UMC is broken, and that faithful people disagree about things.
We will see. Peace to all, Jack
There is a theme or “Vision Pathway” most days of the conference that is in the worship book. I will catch you up:
Wednesday – Opening Service of Word & Table
Thursday – “Transforming Existing Congregations”
Friday – “Developing New Congregations”
Saturday – “Strengthening Clergy and Lay Leadership”
Sunday – “Eliminating Poverty in Community with the Poor”
Monday – “Teaching the Wesleyan Model of Reaching and Forming Disciples”
Tuesday – “Reaching and Transforming the Lives of Children”
Wednesday – “Ending Racism as We Authentically Expand Racial/Ethnic Ministries”
Thursday – Memorial Service
Friday – Morning Worship and Closing Worship
Two good comments today about legislation: “Kicking a dead horse harder, don’t make it run any faster.” “I am so methodical and cautious, I might find myself on an escalator, waiting for it to start.” And then there was, "As long as Catholics keep marrying Baptists, there will always be a United Methodist Church."
At the morning break, there was a continuation of the witness from, and reaction to, yesterday’s hurtful votes that continue our institutional discrimination. Many of those that were hurt by the votes came into the hall and formed a cross in the aisles, facing the delegates, and silently stood as the pain was described. Bishop Talbert spoke about the 1939 racism (the creation of the Black Central Conferences), and the parallel today with our policy of exclusion. I later learned that he did that on his own, and was not part of the plan - but as it turned out - very welcome. We were invited to go to the communion table that was draped in black and place a piece of black cloth on it and pray for those harmed and in pain. We then sang a couple of hymns and it was over – very dignified, painful, respectful, prayerful, and the right thing to do. We will press on. At the end, a group of Bishops went out with them and said that they were going to meet and see what could be done.
We then had 17 constitutional amendments to consider – all that would change the name of conferences outside the US from “Central” to “Regional”. There was a motion to have only one set of debate on all 17, and the presiding Bishop asked the house, and we agreed. But, he also said that since they were constitutional amendments, and needed a 2/3 approval vote, that we would have to vote on them individually “because of the constitution.” I got up and appealed the ruling of the chair that we could not vote them all at once, and just record the same number vote for each one. He conferred, then asked me where in the constitution I was looking – I told him – and he conferred again with the 2 parliamentarian bishops that were helping him as well as the petitions secretary and the secretary of the General Conference for a while, and then came back and said I was right. He asked the house if they wanted to vote on them all at once –they agreed, and we eventually were able to take one vote instead of 17. Probably saved ½ hour - likely more.
Well, the fat lady has sung. The Book of Discipline will be codified in 2012. 12 years from when Rod and I first got it to a General Conference, and it will happen. Actually the 2012 Discipline will probably really look different and the real benefit won't be till 2016 when there are no real changes. It passed on consent calendar B05 by an 824-29 vote just before 10:00 am today. As of 8:13 am there were still 117 individual petitions to go.
Bill Gates Sr. spoke this afternoon about the Nothing But Nets (NBN) program that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is helping. He quoted John Wesley a couple of times, using the "All the world is my parish" line to emphasize that it is the world's will to end Malaria, not just in the US. "People are dying, we can save them." Last week when the NBN program was presented, the Bishop making the presentation used a basketball as part of his visual aids. The Kansas delegation offered $420 for the basketball because they won the NCAA basketball and they challenged N Carolina, Memphis and California (UCLA) to mach or beat it. Well, as of tonight the bidding for the ball is up to $75,000 (I forget from where), and during his speech Bill said that he had heard about this challenge, and that his foundation would match the winning bid. They have also said that any losing bids should pay too, and I think we are up to a total of about $400,000 and climbing. NIC is involved, but I will let others share how, and how much. (We are not the leading bidder) Suffice to say, First UMC LaGrange will be accepting donations for those of us going to Annual Conference in June to bring with us. Oh yea, he was a pretty good speaker too.
Somebody asked for a ruling from the Judicial Council about one of the petitions and something about Local Pastors being able to choose if they want to be part of the clergy pension system. It was read fast, and asked about a conflict between two parts of the Discipline. All I got was that it involved calendar item 866 - I think.
At 7:30 p.m. - the start of the evening session - went till about 10:25 p.m. - they announced that there were 99 petitions left to go. They told us by the petitions committee coming on stage and starting to sing: " 99 petitions on the floor to go, 99 petitions to go, you talk about one, amend it and then, 98 petitions on the floor to go. . ." Then one of them interrupted and said, "I move to reconsider", so they went back to "99 petitions . . . "
I lost count of how many times I got up tonight - 3 or 4. Each time with a question or parliamentary question. The one about the constitutional amendments that I described above was one. Then tonight we had a another CA that had legislation linked to it for the book of discipline. They were starting to amend the linked petitions, and I pointed out that the Constitution says (I KNOW what it says since Rod & I wrote it 4 years ago) that you pass the CA first then immediately consider the linked stuff. I did rub it in a little when I said that this is the rule, but it is not in your Discipline since we passed 4 years ago. Some were saying to divide the question, and I said, no, it already is divided by the Constitutional requirement. I miss not having Rod & Dan next to me to help tell the Bishops what to do.
Since I had been up a few times tonight, at the end, we were looking at another CA that I think is really bad law, and I wanted to move it to the Book of Discipline, and the Bishop was looking right at me, and would not call on me. We ended up passing about 25-30 CAs that will need to be approved by an aggregate vote of all of the annual conferences at their 2009 sessions. The bad one is: "a new paragraph, somewhere near p5 - "All official organizations, groups, committees, councils, boards, and agencies of The United Methodist Church shall adopt ethics and conflict of interest policies, applicable to both members and employees, which embody and live out our Christian values." My proposal would have been to move it to paragraph 807 and add, as one of the duties of CF&A (top finance group of the UMC) an additional duty to "establish and publish policies that may be used by All official . . .".
It passed 744-86, and I voted for it so that I have the option tomorrow - if I can find some that agree - of moving to reconsider to move the above action. I may not do it, I will have to see how things go. As I found out tonight I may need to save my times of speaking to times when it really matters.
This evening the Bishops (16 of them) that had gone to meet with the witnesses from this morning. I read a report that was very positive. It will be in the DCA tomorrow, and may be on the UMC website. A couple of things that I noted were that the UMC is broken, and that faithful people disagree about things.
We will see. Peace to all, Jack
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Day 8
Well, we did it again. We, as a denomination, continue to discriminate against people. The 3 guiding principles that we are supposed to be operating under come from Wesley – “Do no Harm, Do all the good you can, and grow in love with God.” We say that, and then we vote to 501-417 to pass a change to paragraph 161G – Social Principles – to say talk about “sexual relations are affirmed only within the covenant of monogamous heterosexual marriage.” It was a very trying time to be involved in this process, where we intentionally hurt people.
I have met a man here from Omaha who wears a placard around his neck with the picture of his son on it that says, “My child is of sacred worth.” His son Scott is gay, and cannot be a part of this church. The picture is of his son when he was 8. On the back is a picture of his son (now 40) with his partner. When Scott came out to his parents during college, he said that when he was about 8 was when he realized that he was different. I said to Dave – your son is no different than you or I.
After the vote, there was a silent witness as many of us stood on the floor and in the visitor’s gallery silently. While we were doing this, there was a Judicial Council Ruling about the ability of the General Conference to dictate to the JC some rules. It is about 8 pages, and while it was being read, we just stood. Then someone started singing quietly, “Jesus Loves me (us)” It was somewhat surreal as we all just kept quietly singing and the Secretary of the General Conference just kept reading. The cameras that record and are showing the proceedings on the big screens just kept focused on the Secretary, never showing those of us standing. It was a very powerful statement, but reserved, dignified, and not at all disruptive.
One thing that was confusing was that it appeared that votes were heading in the right direction. On votes on amendments, I was voting with the side that prevailed in several of the votes.
I have signed a document to lift a change to the constitution from a consent calendar so that we might address the ruling from the JC. If we are successful, I think that we can also take the 3 petitions that they ruled unconstitutional, and link them to the constitutional change (cc) (with a cc change that Rod and I wrote and got passed 4 years ago to allow just that). We will see.
As I am writing this at 7:00 p.m. we still have 115 individual petitions to go. That may grow. I don’t know what is happening tonight.
We have a new Social Creed, but apparently we didn’t get rid of the old one, and this is just being called a liturgical addition or something like that. Very strange. I wasn’t on the floor when that was happening this morning because I was trying to get in touch with Deb – and I did – she got back from Lagos, Nigeria successfully this morning. Long flight, and she is tired, but Barrett’s 3rd birthday party was a true highlight of the trip. Under the most trying circumstances – not enough eggs, power going out 3 or 4 times – she got a cake made and put a fire truck and firemen on top. He could have cared less about the cake, but took the truck & firemen to bed that night.
Tie today - golfer on a par 3.
Midnight now. I think the codification petition will come up for a vote tomorrow. It is on Consent Calendar B05, and is calendar item 1241, on page 2357 of the DCA. Petition # is 80795. It is recommended to adopt and was amended to read, "The 2008 General Conference directs that the 2012 Book of Discipline . . ." be codified.
We only worked on about 6 or 8 petitions all day today.
After dinner, we had more of the same discriminatory kind of debate and results. We had a petition about membership that came as a result of Judicial Council 1032. This was the one where a Virginia pastor denied a gay man membership in the church. It was a very poorly written decision and had no real Disciplinary language behind it. So this petition 80088 would have fixed that. There was a minority report that was defeated 384-515, so things looked good. Then the main report which would have fixed things lost 436-448. 12 votes out of 884
But we weren't done yet. The next, and last for today was about paragraph 304.3, qualifications for ordination. Currently it says, "The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in the UMC." The minority report was to replace that with, "The standard for candidates is to do good, to do no harm, and to continue to grow in love with God." (sound familiar?) The minority report lost 298-599, and then the main motion which was to reject a change to delete the offensive language lost 335-579.
The sermon this morning was, again, excellent. Bishop Violet Fisher on "The Necessity of the Call". She was at my table Monday evening at the higher education dinner - very nice lady, and a good preacher. At one point she really got into it, and said, "I'm not angry, I'm just passionate." She talked about Samaria, and then said that Jesus didn't need a meeting, and didn't need a 3-6 month new member class. It was good, but some obviously were not listening, or did not remember later in the day. She shared that we need radical hospitality - "Come into my Father's House."A couple of more people came up to me today and said that they voted for me on that first ballot. I think there are now almost 30 that voted for me to get 18 votes. Obviously there were some defective machines. Maybe I should push for a re-vote (like the Dems need to do in Florida and Michigan).
We are up to page 2372 in the DCA and adding more every day.Tomorrow Bishop Jung is preaching at the morning worship which is a Memorial Service for Bishops that have died since the last General Conference - there have been 14. Then in the afternoon we are hearing from Bill Gates. No, not that one, but close - his father.
Another long, tiring day. Only two to go. When I logged on to the PC tonight I had 33 emails, and about 1/2 of them were from some of you reading these. Thanks for all the supportive comments. There has been at least one comment on the blog site too.
Peace to all, Jack
I have met a man here from Omaha who wears a placard around his neck with the picture of his son on it that says, “My child is of sacred worth.” His son Scott is gay, and cannot be a part of this church. The picture is of his son when he was 8. On the back is a picture of his son (now 40) with his partner. When Scott came out to his parents during college, he said that when he was about 8 was when he realized that he was different. I said to Dave – your son is no different than you or I.
After the vote, there was a silent witness as many of us stood on the floor and in the visitor’s gallery silently. While we were doing this, there was a Judicial Council Ruling about the ability of the General Conference to dictate to the JC some rules. It is about 8 pages, and while it was being read, we just stood. Then someone started singing quietly, “Jesus Loves me (us)” It was somewhat surreal as we all just kept quietly singing and the Secretary of the General Conference just kept reading. The cameras that record and are showing the proceedings on the big screens just kept focused on the Secretary, never showing those of us standing. It was a very powerful statement, but reserved, dignified, and not at all disruptive.
One thing that was confusing was that it appeared that votes were heading in the right direction. On votes on amendments, I was voting with the side that prevailed in several of the votes.
I have signed a document to lift a change to the constitution from a consent calendar so that we might address the ruling from the JC. If we are successful, I think that we can also take the 3 petitions that they ruled unconstitutional, and link them to the constitutional change (cc) (with a cc change that Rod and I wrote and got passed 4 years ago to allow just that). We will see.
As I am writing this at 7:00 p.m. we still have 115 individual petitions to go. That may grow. I don’t know what is happening tonight.
We have a new Social Creed, but apparently we didn’t get rid of the old one, and this is just being called a liturgical addition or something like that. Very strange. I wasn’t on the floor when that was happening this morning because I was trying to get in touch with Deb – and I did – she got back from Lagos, Nigeria successfully this morning. Long flight, and she is tired, but Barrett’s 3rd birthday party was a true highlight of the trip. Under the most trying circumstances – not enough eggs, power going out 3 or 4 times – she got a cake made and put a fire truck and firemen on top. He could have cared less about the cake, but took the truck & firemen to bed that night.
Tie today - golfer on a par 3.
Midnight now. I think the codification petition will come up for a vote tomorrow. It is on Consent Calendar B05, and is calendar item 1241, on page 2357 of the DCA. Petition # is 80795. It is recommended to adopt and was amended to read, "The 2008 General Conference directs that the 2012 Book of Discipline . . ." be codified.
We only worked on about 6 or 8 petitions all day today.
After dinner, we had more of the same discriminatory kind of debate and results. We had a petition about membership that came as a result of Judicial Council 1032. This was the one where a Virginia pastor denied a gay man membership in the church. It was a very poorly written decision and had no real Disciplinary language behind it. So this petition 80088 would have fixed that. There was a minority report that was defeated 384-515, so things looked good. Then the main report which would have fixed things lost 436-448. 12 votes out of 884
But we weren't done yet. The next, and last for today was about paragraph 304.3, qualifications for ordination. Currently it says, "The practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in the UMC." The minority report was to replace that with, "The standard for candidates is to do good, to do no harm, and to continue to grow in love with God." (sound familiar?) The minority report lost 298-599, and then the main motion which was to reject a change to delete the offensive language lost 335-579.
The sermon this morning was, again, excellent. Bishop Violet Fisher on "The Necessity of the Call". She was at my table Monday evening at the higher education dinner - very nice lady, and a good preacher. At one point she really got into it, and said, "I'm not angry, I'm just passionate." She talked about Samaria, and then said that Jesus didn't need a meeting, and didn't need a 3-6 month new member class. It was good, but some obviously were not listening, or did not remember later in the day. She shared that we need radical hospitality - "Come into my Father's House."A couple of more people came up to me today and said that they voted for me on that first ballot. I think there are now almost 30 that voted for me to get 18 votes. Obviously there were some defective machines. Maybe I should push for a re-vote (like the Dems need to do in Florida and Michigan).
We are up to page 2372 in the DCA and adding more every day.Tomorrow Bishop Jung is preaching at the morning worship which is a Memorial Service for Bishops that have died since the last General Conference - there have been 14. Then in the afternoon we are hearing from Bill Gates. No, not that one, but close - his father.
Another long, tiring day. Only two to go. When I logged on to the PC tonight I had 33 emails, and about 1/2 of them were from some of you reading these. Thanks for all the supportive comments. There has been at least one comment on the blog site too.
Peace to all, Jack
NIC Delegation Making a Powerful Witness
(Photo to feft) Members of the NIC Delegation standing for an more inclusive church (in third row) are Dr. Irma Clark (cut in half at left edge of photo), Rev. Tracy Smith-Malone, Jack Ryder (light blue shirt) and behind man in dark jacket, Rev. Margaret Ann Crain.
(Photos below) Protestors make a common witness against the General Conference's continued failure to provide inclusion for LGBT persons. NIC alternative delegate David Braden is on the left of the photo.
Rev. Debbie Fisher speaks to a petition that discourages homophobia. The petition passsed by a 60% vote.
Jack Ryder observes, "We, from Northern Illinois are a small delegation - only 10 delegates, but we are making a powerful witness and they (the rest of the conference) knows that we are here."
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Day 7
My committee finally finished our work this afternoon. We all got lunch and brought it to the meeting room and worked from about 1 till 3 and finished all of the petitions. The plenary session started at 2:30, but we were close to finishing, so we just kept going. A real good group of people, and we got a lot done. Now we will see how our petitions do with the whole group.
Today was Ecumenical day and started with a sermon by Bishop Mark Hanson, ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church of America). The title was "Rooted" and he asked, "Are you rooted or rootless?" Jesus didn't say I am the vine, you may be the branches. He noted that the Root Command in a computer is the one that enables all other programs to run. Our root command should be "Love one another." He did note that the ELCA is 97% white.
Tie today - University of Chicago.
After we passed this morning's consent calendars we have dealt with 707 petitions.
By a vote of 776-102 we created a new mission statement for the UMC. It is now, "The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. Local churches provide the most significant arena through which disciple-making occurs."
We voted tonight to reduce the number of Bishops in the US in 2012 by 4 - one each in the North East, North Central, West, and South Central Jurisdictions. Vote was 457-401. This was very disappointing, but not unexpected. Actually the closeness of the vote was the surprising part. With declining enrolement, it was kind of inevitable, and was talked about 4 years ago. The only real question was when, now or in 4 years. All of the speakers for this are from the Southeast.
We were debating a petition about the General Board of Church & Society and the building that it is in in Washington DC. Apparently the building was donated many years ago and has some restrictions about the proceeds of the building being used (A building endowment trust fund) for temperance and other things. I don't know how specific it is, but some object to the proceeds being used for other than temperance. The Board went to DC Court a while ago to find out if it had been operating within the rules of the trust, and I believe there is a trial in a couple of weeks. The petition would have required a new committee to look into their finances - and all other General Boards. It was not well written and looked like a whitch hunt. Lots of debate for a while, then someone moved to table it indefinitely so the court case could play out. That passed overwhelmingly, and we were done for the night - and it was only about 10:30 pm. That was the right thing to do.
The highlight of the day was an address by Her Excellency, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of the Republic of Liberia. She is a United Methodist who went to the College of West Africa - a United Methodist College founded in 1839 by Methodists. She also went to the JFK School of Government at Harvard. She noted the widening gap betwen the rich and poor - as the search for energy continues. She noted that the GDP of 41 nations with 567,000 people is less than the combined wealth of the world's 7 richest people. One billion people entered the 21st century without being able to sign their name or read a book. But all is not bleak - the bad news of Africa is beginning to change. The focus is on, and must be on, the young people of our land. We had to vacate the arena during lunch while they searched the room, and then sealed off certain areas. A few minutes before she started her speech the doors were closed and no one was allowed in till after she was out of the building.
The codifying petition was not on the consent calendar this morning - should be tomorrow, we will see. I am not worried though. It will be on a consent calendar, and the people that understand it will not remove it, and no one else knows enough to lift it.
Peace to all, Jack
Today was Ecumenical day and started with a sermon by Bishop Mark Hanson, ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church of America). The title was "Rooted" and he asked, "Are you rooted or rootless?" Jesus didn't say I am the vine, you may be the branches. He noted that the Root Command in a computer is the one that enables all other programs to run. Our root command should be "Love one another." He did note that the ELCA is 97% white.
Tie today - University of Chicago.
After we passed this morning's consent calendars we have dealt with 707 petitions.
By a vote of 776-102 we created a new mission statement for the UMC. It is now, "The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. Local churches provide the most significant arena through which disciple-making occurs."
We voted tonight to reduce the number of Bishops in the US in 2012 by 4 - one each in the North East, North Central, West, and South Central Jurisdictions. Vote was 457-401. This was very disappointing, but not unexpected. Actually the closeness of the vote was the surprising part. With declining enrolement, it was kind of inevitable, and was talked about 4 years ago. The only real question was when, now or in 4 years. All of the speakers for this are from the Southeast.
We were debating a petition about the General Board of Church & Society and the building that it is in in Washington DC. Apparently the building was donated many years ago and has some restrictions about the proceeds of the building being used (A building endowment trust fund) for temperance and other things. I don't know how specific it is, but some object to the proceeds being used for other than temperance. The Board went to DC Court a while ago to find out if it had been operating within the rules of the trust, and I believe there is a trial in a couple of weeks. The petition would have required a new committee to look into their finances - and all other General Boards. It was not well written and looked like a whitch hunt. Lots of debate for a while, then someone moved to table it indefinitely so the court case could play out. That passed overwhelmingly, and we were done for the night - and it was only about 10:30 pm. That was the right thing to do.
The highlight of the day was an address by Her Excellency, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of the Republic of Liberia. She is a United Methodist who went to the College of West Africa - a United Methodist College founded in 1839 by Methodists. She also went to the JFK School of Government at Harvard. She noted the widening gap betwen the rich and poor - as the search for energy continues. She noted that the GDP of 41 nations with 567,000 people is less than the combined wealth of the world's 7 richest people. One billion people entered the 21st century without being able to sign their name or read a book. But all is not bleak - the bad news of Africa is beginning to change. The focus is on, and must be on, the young people of our land. We had to vacate the arena during lunch while they searched the room, and then sealed off certain areas. A few minutes before she started her speech the doors were closed and no one was allowed in till after she was out of the building.
The codifying petition was not on the consent calendar this morning - should be tomorrow, we will see. I am not worried though. It will be on a consent calendar, and the people that understand it will not remove it, and no one else knows enough to lift it.
Peace to all, Jack
NIC Delegation Thanks Jack Ryder for Judicial Council candidacy
The delegation of the Northern Illinois Conference gathers every morning at 7:45 am for a brief prayer meeting in a quiet hallway outside the floor of the convocation center before official proceedings of the General Conference get underway for the day. At this morning's meeting, chair of the delegation Roger Curless took a moment to express appreciation to Jack Ryder for being part of the nominated slate for for the UM Judicial Council. "We need to celebrate and thank Jack for his efforts to become part of the Judicial Council," said Curless. It takes a lot of courage to put yourself out there. And even though Jack was not voted onto the council, his candidacy sent a strong message that there are good progressive candidates who can serve. This was an important statement." The delegation unanimously applauded and affirmed Jack for his Judicial Council candidacy. -- Susan Dal Porto
Monday, April 28, 2008
Day 6
WOW - What a day. I don't know where to start, but I better start since it is 12:30 and I am just starting. We recessed tonight at 11:20 after working from 2:30 on with legislation that added money to what had been previously agreed to by the budget and program groups of the church. (GCFA & Connectional Table) Well, I am not a judge.
The Judicial Council elections went better than I could have hoped - except by getting elected. I had been in discussions with the Common Witness folks since last week about the nominees by the Council of Bishops and that I was probably not on it. I told them that if we could elect progressive candidates I would step aside either before voting or early on so as to not be in the way and steal votes. I was not on the list from the Bishops, the endorsed list came out and I supported it. They had suggested that if I did not get 60 votes on the first ballot, should I withdraw. I said I would. Well, I got 18 votes. So I got the Bishop's attention and went to a mike and asked if I could withdraw from the election for JC, but be back on the ballot for alternate (there would be 6 of them). The Bishop consulted the staff up there and said that I could not, but that from my speech I had informed those voting me of my intent. I said something about thanking my 17 friends (big laugh from the conference) and sat down. On the second ballot, I still got 6 votes - I was not one of them. We then elected 2 lay and then 3 clergy that were all on the Bishop's list and on the CW list. We were stunned. A huge win, and we got rid of several of the people that voted for decision 1032 (I can explain that one sometime later), and elected some really good people.We then voted for the 6 alternates and I did not win that either, but I got 279 votes!
A BIGGER WIN TODAY ! ! ! The petition for codifying the Discipline was passed unanimously in committee, which means it will be on a consent calendar for final voting Wednesday morning. They amended it in committee, from being a study to "WE SHALL CODIFY THE 2012 BOOK OF DISCIPLINE". The people form the publishing house came to the committee and said, that it could be done so that helped too. I will try to call Rod once the vote is taken Wednesday morning. It is possible for someone to lift it off the consent calendar, but I have not heard anyone against it.The sermon this morning was excellent. Bishop Ernest Lyght - "Someone's knocking at the Door." He talked about a neighbor that knocked on his door years ago looking for help since his house was burning. He had knocked on another door and no one answered. He talked about the prodigal son and Moses - providing enough bread for each day's meals. The Bread of Faith, the Bread of Hope and the Bread of Love. He said, "Wake up Church - people are knocking at the door." "The church can't afford to offer stale bread to feed the soul. I want to go to an alive church where they are serving fresh bread. Evangelism is just one beggar telling another where the fresh bread is."My tie today - golfer.
At one point today a speaker said: "God loved the world so much that he didn't send a committee.
"We passed the new hymnal committee that will bring a new hymnal to us in 2012 by a 450 - 336 vote. Closer than we thought it would be.It is now 1:00 am and I have a 6:00 am wake up call at the front desk.
Tuesday is Barrett's birthday - he will be 3 and is having a party in his school in Lagos, Nigeria. He is VERY excited. Then later Tuesday Deb starts to fly home to LaGrange Park - keep her in your prayers for a safe journey.
We only have 4 more days and probably about 1300 petitions to go. Our committee is not done yet. We got lunches and took them to our committee room and worked through lunch. We finished 3 petitions in 2 hours. Remember me telling you how impressive and smart the whole group of (mostly) lawyers was. Well, they are, but crossing T s and dotting I s is their business and we are moving along, but slowly.
Peace to all, Jack
The Judicial Council elections went better than I could have hoped - except by getting elected. I had been in discussions with the Common Witness folks since last week about the nominees by the Council of Bishops and that I was probably not on it. I told them that if we could elect progressive candidates I would step aside either before voting or early on so as to not be in the way and steal votes. I was not on the list from the Bishops, the endorsed list came out and I supported it. They had suggested that if I did not get 60 votes on the first ballot, should I withdraw. I said I would. Well, I got 18 votes. So I got the Bishop's attention and went to a mike and asked if I could withdraw from the election for JC, but be back on the ballot for alternate (there would be 6 of them). The Bishop consulted the staff up there and said that I could not, but that from my speech I had informed those voting me of my intent. I said something about thanking my 17 friends (big laugh from the conference) and sat down. On the second ballot, I still got 6 votes - I was not one of them. We then elected 2 lay and then 3 clergy that were all on the Bishop's list and on the CW list. We were stunned. A huge win, and we got rid of several of the people that voted for decision 1032 (I can explain that one sometime later), and elected some really good people.We then voted for the 6 alternates and I did not win that either, but I got 279 votes!
A BIGGER WIN TODAY ! ! ! The petition for codifying the Discipline was passed unanimously in committee, which means it will be on a consent calendar for final voting Wednesday morning. They amended it in committee, from being a study to "WE SHALL CODIFY THE 2012 BOOK OF DISCIPLINE". The people form the publishing house came to the committee and said, that it could be done so that helped too. I will try to call Rod once the vote is taken Wednesday morning. It is possible for someone to lift it off the consent calendar, but I have not heard anyone against it.The sermon this morning was excellent. Bishop Ernest Lyght - "Someone's knocking at the Door." He talked about a neighbor that knocked on his door years ago looking for help since his house was burning. He had knocked on another door and no one answered. He talked about the prodigal son and Moses - providing enough bread for each day's meals. The Bread of Faith, the Bread of Hope and the Bread of Love. He said, "Wake up Church - people are knocking at the door." "The church can't afford to offer stale bread to feed the soul. I want to go to an alive church where they are serving fresh bread. Evangelism is just one beggar telling another where the fresh bread is."My tie today - golfer.
At one point today a speaker said: "God loved the world so much that he didn't send a committee.
"We passed the new hymnal committee that will bring a new hymnal to us in 2012 by a 450 - 336 vote. Closer than we thought it would be.It is now 1:00 am and I have a 6:00 am wake up call at the front desk.
Tuesday is Barrett's birthday - he will be 3 and is having a party in his school in Lagos, Nigeria. He is VERY excited. Then later Tuesday Deb starts to fly home to LaGrange Park - keep her in your prayers for a safe journey.
We only have 4 more days and probably about 1300 petitions to go. Our committee is not done yet. We got lunches and took them to our committee room and worked through lunch. We finished 3 petitions in 2 hours. Remember me telling you how impressive and smart the whole group of (mostly) lawyers was. Well, they are, but crossing T s and dotting I s is their business and we are moving along, but slowly.
Peace to all, Jack
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