Not Disaffiliating from Grace

 (Note: This post is United Methodist-centric. If United Methodism isn't your tribe, or if you have no interest in our current situation, feel free to disregard this one and enjoy a lovely winter day.)

As you’re aware, the UMC is in conversation about splitting over matters regarding sexual orientation, in particular marriage and ordination. General Conference 2020 was going to iron out the details, enabling churches to move ahead in their preferred direction. The working assumption is that the moderate/progressive UMs will retain custody of “The United Methodist Church” and all its workings, and the conservatives will move into a new denomination of their creation, “The Global Methodist Church.” A highly-negotiated plan, The Protocol, had been ironed out by key parties and was holding together by a thread coming into General Conference 2020.

And then COVID. General Conference 2020 was rescheduled to 2021 and now                    re-rescheduled to 2022, and it’s not looking good for the September 2022 date.

Why does COVID have power to stall the UMC? The only body that can make these decisions about separation is the General Conference, a gathering of delegates from around the world. In addition to the normal barriers to large gatherings that have been and still are in place, over 40% of our General Conference delegates come from outside the US, many from nations in Africa and elsewhere with scant access to the vaccine. Although great minds around the world have tried to come up with various solutions to allow us to actually hold General Conference, limitations imposed by a worldwide pandemic and our UM Book of Discipline continue to prevent us from holding General Conference.

We are hamstrung by our own rules. And we can’t change the rules that are keeping us from gathering until we are able to gather in person to change the rules.

So, what’s been happening in United Methodism while we’re all stuck in this interminable holding pattern? The answer is both that nothing is happening, and that a great deal is happening.

On the “nothing is happening” side of things, the restrictive, punitive rules of General Conference 2019 remain in place. There is no agreed-upon plan for separation.

On the “a great deal is happening” side of things, churches and clergy on both sides are increasingly tired of waiting. Some progressives, both clergy and churches, have been living as if we are already a renewed, progressive denomination. Some conservatives, both clergy and churches, have begun to break away. It is a messy, liminal time in which we are COVID-trapped together for the duration.

In short, we are like a couple that has decided to divorce but is stuck living in the same house. It is not easy, and it is often not pretty.

In Missouri, there have been some developments that have warranted a response from our bishop. There are a few sizeable traditionalist churches in Missouri that are choosing to break away, to “disaffiliate,” even before General Conference has been able to meet to hash out the separation. The UMC and the Missouri Annual Conference have established guidelines for this process for churches that want to leave now, intended to create equity on all sides. One particular issue, for instance, is to insure that departing churches pay their fair share towards the pension fund for retired pastors. Otherwise, if our pension funds become unstable, remaining churches would have to pay more because of churches that walked out on their pension obligation.

Unfortunately, there are churches that are choosing to act outside of this process and, in their leaving, are leaving our retirees in the lurch. Their actions necessitate a response from the Missouri Conference. If you’d like to know more, read the attachments to this email.

I’m grateful that Bishop Farr and the Conference are doing the hard work of accountability with these clergy and churches. Their strong response is helping to protect our retired clergy and all of the churches in the Missouri Conference. Because they are taking on this role so ably, I am freed from the burden of having to express outrage or indignation, although I confess to the occasional eye roll. My most righteous of indignations wouldn’t do anything to affect the reality of the situation, and it would only serve to steal a little light from my own soul on this already-gloomy winter day.

So, I am choosing to trust the system and to spend my time and energy working and praying for grace.

It’s not news that divorce is messy. After all, if things were good between the two sides, there wouldn’t be need for a divorce, would there? These deep divisions within the United Methodist part of Christ’s body seem to be leading inevitably to separation. We didn’t choose these circumstances, yet we can choose our response to the circumstances.

I hope you’ll join me in praying for one another, even folks who are choosing to leave our UM family. Pray for our bishop and Conference leadership as they navigate the legal complexities of this situation on our behalf. Pray for those of us who are staying within the UMC, that grace may be the defining characteristic of our renewed denomination.

As we work to re-create a denomination based upon grace, may the very same grace that we dream be lived out in our own grace-full actions in these moments.

(Okay, and maybe with an occasional eye-roll.)

Read Bishop Farr's letter here. Read FAQs on Disaffiliation in Missouri here

Observing January 6

 

Today’s the day we remember when a crazed ruler was willing to do anything to retain power. He knew his days in power were coming to an end, because a new ruler had been selected. His fear was contagious and spread to his followers. He co-opted the religious folks, so that he could bend Scriptural passages to his will. His willingness to do anything to retain his power led to loss of life. In spite of his best efforts, however, he was unable to block the new kid in town.

Today is, as I’ve described above, Epiphany. It is the traditional day that marks the coming of the three sages (wise men, kings, magi) to find the Christ child. Herod’s shadow hangs heavily over this story. When he hears that a new king has been born, Herod summons the faith leaders of the day to get more information. They give him a Bible verse or two, and, thus armed, Herod works to thwart this new king before he has begun. The sages are swept inadvertently into this plan, but God intervenes to send them home by another way, a way that will keep them far away from Herod. And yet. When Herod realizes his original plot isn’t going to work, he slaughters every male child under the age of two, just to make sure that there will be no boy king to survive and take away his power.

There’s another terribly painful event that is being commemorated today, on its one-year anniversary. That event also features a fearful ruler who sought to use everything within his power, including religious leaders, to retain his power. (And, to be clear, while I see parallels between the two rulers, I am NOT equating our current president with Jesus. There is no human, no church, no political party, nor anything of earthly nature that deserves that designation, although we seem to forget that fact with great regularity.)

God’s intervention in humanity through the coming of Christ was set against a backdrop of great political turmoil and fear. I take great comfort in that reality today. It turns out that God does some of the very greatest work during the toughest times. God doesn’t wait for human perfection to bring light, but God brings light exactly when things are so bleak that we can barely see the end of our nose.

Isaiah dared to declare God’s light and glory at a time of immense political upheaval and threat.

Arise, shine; for your light has come,
   and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

 For darkness shall cover the earth,
   and thick darkness the peoples;
but the Lord will arise upon you,
   and his glory will appear over you. Isaiah 60:1-2

These words from Isaiah had to have been echoing in John’s ears as he wrote about the meaning of the coming of Christ.

The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it. John 1:5.

Today, while I step away from the nonstop doom-cycling of news stories about the other commemoration of January 6, I choose to celebrate Epiphany. I’ve lit some candles as the dawn breaks this morning, and I’ll keep them burning. I’ll spend some time being grateful for the places where light has come in my life this last year, and I’ll ask God’s guidance and light in days to come. And, of course, I’ll make that request not only on behalf of myself and those whom I love, but for my nation and for our world.

Today, I choose to celebrate Epiphany.

The Front Seat of the Hearse

 

I got to know CL Holdren in the usual way that clergy and funeral home directors in a county seat town do, in the front seat of a hearse. For five years, I’d see him about once a month as some of Warrensburg’s finest United Methodists found their way to heaven. (My church members were so prolific in their heaven-going that CL had to stop running my honoraria through the funeral home, because I had hit the point where they would have to file taxes on me as an employee.)

Most of the time, our hearse rides would be brief, only going the five minutes to the Warrensburg Cemetery. Other times, we’d find ourselves on the longer trek to the Veteran’s Cemetery in Higginsville. In a formal funeral procession, the trip would take about 45 minutes. On the way home, however, unburdened by a casket in the hearse or a trail of cars following us, CL could make the trip in 15 minutes. I am certain that there were times when all four wheels were not in contact with the pavement on those roller-coaster hills. More than once, I considered the potential irony that I might meet my own end in the front seat of a hearse.

Those rides with CL were worth every minute of hair-raising hills. He knew where every body in Warrensburg was buried, both literally and figuratively. He would regale me with stories of locals, making sure that this new-to-the-community pastor knew what she needed to know. Over time, we developed an ease and a friendship that was genuine. It was a wonderful gift to be able to move from a particularly intense, emotional funeral service and slip into the front seat of the hearse, where we’d talk about a wide range of topics until it was time to re-enter the emotions of the graveside committal service.

The thing about CL that impressed me the most is that he treated every family and their grief with respect. He never spoke unkindly about even the most demanding families, and he never spoke ill of the dead. It’s a rare thing to be able to tell the stories of a community with both honesty and love, and CL was able to do that.

Eventually, the time came for me to move on from Warrensburg, as is the Methodist way. On my last day in the office, CL showed up at my door. It was the first time he had ever been in my office, and now he stood there to say goodbye. The eyes of this man, who had stood beside the grief of so many others with stoicism and grace, welled with tears in our farewell. My heart was touched, and my own tears flowed.

I saw CL’s obituary as I was reading Saturday’s Kansas City Star. I thought it was surprisingly modest for a man who was in the funeral business. As for me, I don’t need words in a newspaper to remind me of this gentle, dignified man. On Wednesday night, I’ll show up at his funeral home to share my respects with his family. It will be odd for me to be in CL’s funeral home without him standing nearby, making sure things are going smoothly. I do know that hearse rides have never been the same for me since, and they never will be again.