Reconciling Ministries Network

5 Ways to Make a Reconciling Resolution for 2012

As the new year approaches, many people make resolutions or set goals for 2012. I want to suggest 5 ways to make a resolution that moves The United Methodist Church closer toward full inclusion for all God's children.

1. Prayers

Pray for a fully inclusive church. Pray for General Conference 2012, for the delegates to General Conference, and for the volunteers and staff who are headed to Tampa. Pray for the local church of which you are a part, wherever it may be in the reconciling process (or not). Pray for people you know who need to hear that God's love includes them. Pray for the IRD, the Good News Movement, and others who have different understandings of what the Gospel means. Remember that prayer means listening, too, and responding to what God calls all of us to do.  

2. Presence

Be present at the local church of which you are part. If you can, be present for local or conference-wide Reconciling events, or even General Conference. Be present for the people you know and whomever God might put in your path who needs a Reconciling friend.

3. Gifts

Consider making a gift to RMN. What a great way to honor someone who has touched your life! Perhaps you feel called to make RMN a regular part of your spiritual practice of tithing.

4. Service

RMN has a whole webpage devoted to explaining how to get involved in service! There's also a range of possibilities in the local church to which you relate. And don't forget the many ways to be of service in the micro-politics of everyday conversation and interaction.

5. Witness

Tell your story! Why are you a Reconciling United Methodist? Why does the full humanity off all God's children matter to you, and why is it important within The United Methodist Church? Whether you seek opportunities to share your story or simply welcome those that come along, be open to the movement of the Spirit as chances to offer a word of witness present themselves. 

 

What is your Reconciling Resolution?

 

Relationships

by Kara Crawford

“God loves queers!” Wouldn't it be wonderful if this were a more commonly-heard message in the public sphere than its infamous converse, à la Fred Phelps and the Westboro Baptist Church? Believe it or not, it actually is a majority sentiment in Mainline Protestant Christianity. According to a Pew Forum Religion and Public Life survey conducted in 2007, 56% of Mainline Protestant Christians agreed that homosexuality should be accepted, and I am virtually positive the percentage has only increased since then.

So, not all Christians are anti-queer. In fact, many genuinely believe in, and a fair number act on, the sentiment that “God loves queers!” Some Christians are out queers; some queers are out Christians. Many signs point to positive changes in favor of queer acceptance by Christians.

However, this doesn't account for unsupportive Christians. Some of us know all too well who they are, have been repeatedly hurt by their hateful sentiments, some of us even left the churches of our childhood because of the hatred we felt from them. For some of us, they are former pastors and Sunday school teachers, even grandparents and parents. Can't we just ignore their hatred and pretend it doesn't exist, or better yet, only pay it attention when we're protesting and counterprotesting it and mocking their rhetoric?

I would argue no. In fact, I would argue that simply ignoring them is counterproductive to our looking for inclusion and acceptance. How's that, you may ask? Well, most simply, even unsupportive folks are part of the society in which we live. So if we, as queers and company, want to genuinely work to transform and challenge society's heterosexism, I believe it is critical that we work to build genuine relationships with unsupportive folks. Sure, it will be difficult. We will face challenging and even hurtful conversations, but I believe this is key to bringing about transformation.

The Not So Impossible Dream

by Violet Fenn

With the recent amazing developments from several Annual Conferences, including resolutions passed to eliminate the “incompatible with Christian teaching” section from the Book of Discipline, and the church trial of Rev. Amy DeLong, I have been pondering about my future in the United Methodist Church. I am a transgender woman and currently identify as a lesbian. Right now, the latter would automatically prevent me from ordination. Despite this, I am currently in seminary and plan on beginning the process to pursue ordination.

Why am I doing this? One of the reasons is that I’m a dreamer. I dream of the day that the United Methodist Church will be fully inclusive of everyone and anyone called to the ministry will be able to be ordained.

I’m a lover of Broadway musicals. One song that I’ve kept coming back to is “The Impossible Dream” from the musical Man of La Mancha. The lead character, Don Quixote is a dreamer. Unfortunately, his dreams are in some ways unrealistic and delusional. In fact, he believes his romantic interest, Aldonza, is a lady of nobility when in reality she’s a prostitute. Despite all of the evidence to the contrary, Don Quixote refuses to believe her. At one point in the musical, Aldonza asks him why he goes around doing good deeds and believes her to be something she isn’t. He replies by singing “The Impossible Dream.” His quest is to “fight the unbeatable foe,” “right the unrightable wrong,” and “run where the brave dare not go.” His optimism is admirable, but sadly it’s an unrealistic pursuit.

I wouldn’t go so far as to call the naysayers foes, but of course there are Methodists against full inclusion and I would venture to say that many view our work as impossible as Don Quixote’s quest. It’s not an impossible task. Evidence of this comes from the resolutions passed by several Annual Conferences as well as statements from clergy pledging to perform same-sex unions. We are closer than ever before and we can’t stop now.

This is why I am attending Sing A New Song in August. I can sense change in the air and it’s given me another boost to keep pursuing the dream we all have. The dream is fantastic and closer to coming true. To quote from another musical, The Sound of Music, we should “climb ev’ry mountain, ford ev’ry stream, follow every rainbow ‘til you find your dream.” Keep on singing, keep on climbing. Keep the dream alive.

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Violet Fenn is currently a United Methodist in exile due to a lack of reconciling congregations in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she lives and is attending a UCC church. She began her gender transition in 2008 and has been active working against bigotry and intolerance for many years. She is active in MOSAIC and the leader of its TransJustice working group. This fall, she is beginning the next chapter of her journey by attending Phillips Theological Seminary in Tulsa for a Master's in Divinity. Despite the bigotry and transphobia she has experienced at the hands of a UMC congregation, she believes that the Methodist Church will become open and affirming of everyone in the LGBTQ community.

I Will Not Go Quietly

Recently, I learned that Chad Holtz, a recent graduate of Duke Divinity School who was serving as a United Methodist local pastor in North Carolina was fired for questioning the existence of hell. Here is a link to his blog post about it. This disturbing incident prompted me to think about the risks that we Reconciling Methodists take every time we work towards inclusion of LGBTQ people in the UMC.

     Currently, I am a student at Phillips Theological Seminary in Tulsa, Oklahoma. As far as I know, I am the first transgender student the seminary has had. Back in 2009, the UMC church I attended in Tulsa was no longer welcoming to me and I became a member of a congregation of the United Church of Christ.Despite not being a member of the UMC, I was still active in RMN and MOSAIC. This fall, I am transferring to Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Chicago and coming back to the United Methodist Church, the church that I love. God has called me to be what a friend has termed a "holy rabble rouser." I am not the only one.

     Despite the very real risks that we face, we continue to fight for full-inclusion of LGBTQ persons in the UMC. Despite being told that we are of sacred worth, we are denied even the possibility of ordination because homosexuality is "incompatible with Christian teaching." Despite the attempts to silence us, we scream with indignation and make our voice heard, even if it's one small voice in the crowd. If your voice is small, keep using it. Many small voices will eventually be heard. The battle for inclusion has been a long, hard, and painful one. We mustn't give up. In spite of the attempts to silence us, we cannot go quietly. We are fighting a good fight. To quote John Wesley: "Do all the good you can, ...By all the means you can, In all the ways you can, In all the places you can, At all the times you can To all the people you can As long as ever you can!"

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Violet Fenn is currently a United Methodist in exile due to a lack of reconciling congregations in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she lives and is attending a UCC church. She began her gender transition in 2008 and has been active working against bigotry and intolerance for many years. She is active in MOSAIC and the leader of its TransJustice working group. This fall, she is beginning the next chapter of her journey by attending Phillips Theological Seminary in Tulsa for a Master's in Divinity. Despite the bigotry and transphobia she has experienced at the hands of a UMC congregation, she believes that the Methodist Church will become open and affirming of everyone in the LGBTQ community.

Remembering Peter John Gomes

by Rev. Gilbert Caldwell

Peter John Gomes

Minister to the Memorial Church and member of the faculty of Harvard Divinity School Dead at the age  of 68

I had not heard until recently that Peter John Gomes experienced a stroke in December and then today I received the news that he had died last night (February 28th) from complications related to the stroke.

His book THE GOOD BOOK: Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart impacted me in ways few books have. The 8th chapter in the book is titled "The Bible and Homosexuality: The Last Prejudice". It was his "last prejudice" idea that prompted me to write my RMN blog post "The Last United Methodist Church Trial".

Peter Gomes announced he was gay in November of 1991 after a student magazine published an issue condemning homosexuality. Gomes spoke to the Harvard community and said, "I am a Christian who happens as well to be gay...These realities are unreconcilable to some, yet are reconciled in me by a loving God."

I became the first African American pastor of the Bryantville and West Duxbury, Massachusetts Methodist Churches in the summer of 1958. The mother of Peter Gomes, who lived in nearby Plymouth, Massachusetts, was a close friend of one of the white members of one of those churches. They spoke frequently and my member shared with Mrs.Gomes that although a few members were upset with having a Black Pastor, most members were pleased with me, their new Pastor. The first time I spoke to Peter Gomes, he told me that the conversations between his mother and my member concerning my ministry, encouraged him to believe that a black minister in a predominantly white Church could be successful.

For some people, the idea of a black minister in a predominantly white Church or a gay minister in a predominantly straight church is unreconcilable. But Peter Gomes and I knew that despite the biases and bigotry of some, reconciliation within and beyond takes place through a loving God.

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The Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is a retired United Methodist Minister who lives in Asbury Park, N.J. He was active in the Massachusetts unit of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and participated in the civil-rights movement throughout the nation. In 2000, he, with others, organized the RMN Extension ministry United Methodists of Color for a Fully Inclusive Church (UMOC), an organization committed to the full inclusion of LGBT people in every aspect of church and society. His recent book, Something Within: Works by Rev. Gilbert H. Caldwell is available from Church Within A Church.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell

by Chett Pritchett

On Wednesday, President Barack Obama will sign into law the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." This momentous occasion is the culmination of years of hard work by activists, policies makers, former military members, and voters. The idea that members of the United States armed forces could be dishonorably discharged for the simple fact of who they love is a notion whose time is extinct.

Had you asked me my feelings on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" two years ago, I would have been ambivalent. In many ways, the current structures for safeguarding our nation perpetuate the military-industrial complex. I believe our nation has wandered down a slippery slope in the "war" on terror, while slashing funding on education, health care, and the environment. For LGBT persons who wanted to serve in the military, I could only ask, "Why would you want to do that?"

"Why would you want to do that?" It's basically the same question I had heard for years about my ordination process in the United Methodist Church. Why would I, an openly gay man, seek ordination in a denomination that claims that "homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching"?

I could have easily closeted myself and lived in fear that my Bishop or members of the ordination committee would discover the truth. I could have lied had I ever been directly asked about my sexual orientation. I could have become celibate in order to conform with the "self-avowed, practicing homosexual" clause in our Book of Discipline. I could have operated (and did for four years) under an all too familiar form of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" within the United Methodist Church.

I know many candidates for ministry within the United Methodist Church who have wrestled with these options. Some have been ordained and still live within the fear of the closet. Some manage to live within the tension of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell".  Some have left the United Methodist Church and found a home in another denomination that affirms their call to ministry and their sexuality and/or gender identity. Sadly, many have left the Church altogether, hurt by the people of God and unable to trust structures that say “God loves you…but not that much.”

All of these are valid, understandable decisions. I have chosen another way – as an active, involved, out layperson who sees deep connection between the harmful policies of our denomination and decline in vitality of our local congregations. When pastors cannot be their authentic selves, we cannot expect parishioners to be their authentic selves in order to engage in radical hospitality, passionate worship, intentional faith development, risk-taking mission, or extravagant generosity.[1]

The repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” in the United States Armed Forces did not happen over night. It took many long years of grassroots organizing, policy work, relationship building, phone calls, emails, protests, prayer, meetings, educational trainings, and for people of good conscience, regardless of their political persuasion, to stand up and let their voices be heard. The same must happen in the United Methodist Church. We must tell our stories; we must work across denominational lines/political lines/secular-sacred lines; we must call, email, write, and have conversations with our Annual Conference and General Conference delegates; we must pray; we must sing and worship and protest; we must tell the stories of those who have left the United Methodist Church.

Will you join me in this work and repeal a long too accepted “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”?

[1] These marks of the Church are developed by Bishop Robert Schnase in his book, Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations (Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press), 2007.

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Chett Pritchett is Lay Leader at Dumbarton United Methodist Church in Georgetown. 

Just Too Much

Yesterday, I said to a colleague, "Every time I open an Internet browser, it seems that I hear about another gay suicide." I know from my training as a student and scholar of communication that the number of news stories about something, whether shark attacks at the beach, plane crashes, or gay teenagers killing themselves is not necessarily indicative of a trend or pattern, but rather of newsworthiness.

I am not sure whether suicide rates of LGBTQ teenagers are increasing, but the recent number of stories about it has caused me to pause for thought. In a widely circulated video, Ellen addresses this series of recent stories poignantly:

As Ellen says, "we have an obligation to change this. There are messages everywhere that validate this, [...] and we have to make it stop. We can't let intolerance and ignorance take another kid's life."

My dear friends, if ever we become complacent in our work of reconciliation, let this be a reminder of what we're about. Our beloved United Methodist Church is one of the places that produces the sorts of messages Ellen refers to so powerfully here. I need not rehearse the hurtful terms in our polity or the even more hurtful things that faithful--but I believe misguided--United Methodists say in their attempts to interpret and live out that polity.

I know some of our readers would not consider themselves Reconciling UMs. Some are here with questions. Some are here to keep tabs and see what we're doing. So, I want to close with a question for those who disagree with me on the question of inclusion/reconciliation: Do you believe, as I do, that God's heart breaks for these young people and their families? And if so, how does the current language of our official position work to do anything but exacerbate their pain and God's pain? When will we understand the impact and the consequences of our language and the attitudes of our hearts?

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Leland G. Spencer IV, a lifelong United Methodist, is a PhD student in the department of speech communication at the University of Georgia, where he researches religious rhetoric as it intersects with gender and sexuality. Leland holds an M.A. in Communication from the University of Cincinnati (2009). While in Cincinnati, Leland served as the worship intern at the Wesley Foundation. Leland served as a part-time local pastor at Mapleton United Methodist Church in the East Ohio Conference from 2005 until 2007 when Leland withdrew from the candidacy process because of the United Methodist Church's exclusive position about the ordination of LGBT persons.

Lay Folks Laying the Foundations for Marriage Equality

by Peter L. DeGroote

After the DC Council approved marriage equality as a civil right in Washington the members of Foundry UMC began discussions that culminated in what was called a Summer of Great Discernment to determine the congregation’s views. While clergy in the UM Church decide on religious services, this wasn’t about clergy decision-making. This was a lay process, what, in hindsight, might be called a lay movement.

A resolution was prepared and discussed over the summer. On September 26 the Congregational Council set the resolution before a Church Conference held under the rules of the Book of Discipline and chaired by our District Superintendent. 377 lay members attended. The vote was 367 yes, 8 no, with 2 invalid votes.

The resolution began with the proclamation that as a community of faith we recognize God’s profound blessing of committed life partnerships, including same-gender couples.  Further, that celebrating those relationships is not only an important part of our church’s ministry but is also a witness to the joy of God’s love.

The resolution also makes a claim on the Church Constitution (Disciplinary para 341.6). The Constitution prohibits the structuring of any organizational unit so as to exclude any member or constituent body because of race, color, national origin, status or economic condition. Noting the incorporation of anti-lgbt provisions into the discipline over the recent past, the resolution asserts that the Constitutional prohibitions against exclusion based on status have been violated.

The resolution closes with two commitments. First: to work within the denomination to change the Book of Discipline so that it “may be consistent with the teachings of Jesus.” This commitment includes working for the respect and honor of same-gender marriages in the same way that all marriages are respected and honored.

The second commitment is to equally support and honor marriages licensed in the District of Columbia without regard to the couple’s gender. Accordingly, it offers and approves use of the church sanctuary for all marriages. Finally, while acknowledging clergy discretion over the conduct of services, the congregation pledged to support those clergy who conduct same gender services.

Word travels, of course. We've heard that some conference leaders were "blown away" by the numbers. How many DSs have ever conducted a church business meeting with 377 people voting and even more people in attendance? We've heard that some conference leaders are wondering how to stop or control a lay movement.

The Bishop did send a letter to all Pastors and lay members of the Annual Conference. On one hand he described the underlying conflict in the church; on the other he urged holy conversation.

What will this lay movement do next? My guess is that they will take the Bishop up on holy conversation—in a big way.

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To read the Marriage Equality Proposal, click here

To read the Special Edition of the Foundry Forge regarding the Vote and the Summer of Great Discernment, click here

To read the Congregational Council's response to Bishop John Schol's letter to the Conference, click here

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Peter is a second career pastor who has served in several churches in the Baltimore-Washington Conference. Prior to his ordination, he was a secondary-school teacher, a university lecturer in Government, an Associate in a government related professional association, CEO of a national financial institution. Peter was involved in Mid-Atlantic Affirmation, served on the National Council of Affirmation, and sat on the Board of the Reconciling Congregations Program, the predecessor name for RMN and has worked with BWARM (Baltimore-Washington Reconciling United Methodists).

On Asking & Telling

by Leland Spencer

I have to confess that I'm conflicted about the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Of course, as a feminist and a reconciling United Methodist, I support the right of any person to have any job without regard to her or his sexual orientation (or, for that matter, sex, gender, gender identity, or gender expression); however, something about supporting any effort that increases the number of people in the military doesn't sit right with me. If DADT is repealed, queer folks will have the same rights to get shot or have their bodies blown to bits as anyone else. Is that really the kind of equality we're working for in this movement? I'm not trying to be flippant; my concern is serious. If an underlying theme of this movement's work is human dignity and the sacred worth of each person, is that compatible with increased militarism?

Not having sorted entirely through this paradox, its very existence brings me to another: The UMC also has a DADT policy, but we describe it with bigger words and no contractions. And, clearly, I support the repeal of the church's version of DADT. Therefore, a fair question based on my concern in the first paragraph is whether adding out, practicing queer people into the current structure of the church actually does anything for human dignity. My initial answer is yes, and that the church and the military are different. I am privileged to have had moments in my life where I've seen the church at its best, so I know the church can be a source of hope in connecting people with the resource of faith, and indeed, in resisting evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.

So, I conclude that I support the repeal of both DADT policies, though I am substantially more ambivalent about the first than the second.

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Leland G. Spencer IV, a lifelong United Methodist, is a PhD student in the department of speech communication at the University of Georgia, where he researches religious rhetoric as it intersects with gender and sexuality. Leland holds an M.A. in Communication from the University of Cincinnati (2009). While in Cincinnati, Leland served as the worship intern at the Wesley Foundation. Leland served as a part-time local pastor at Mapleton United Methodist Church in the East Ohio Conference from 2005 until 2007 when Leland withdrew from the candidacy process because of the United Methodist Church's exclusive position about the ordination of LGBT persons.

Street Theatre Challenges Pastoral Leadership

by Peter L. DeGroote

Self-appointed “messengers” of God recently tried to get arrested by demonstrating in front of the Justice Department in Washington. Their goal was to use their arrest to challenge the protection of glbt from hate crimes by way of the 1st Amendment guarantee of free speech. (They see the law as a threat to their hate mongering.)

First, a summary: I am relying on the reporting of Dana Milbank writing in the Washington Post on Tuesday, November 17, 2009 under the title The Messengers of God can’t get arrested in this town. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/16/AR2009111603248.html)

Act 1: The “messengers” proclaimed such things as:

• Rev. Paul Blair: Anything other than sex "between a male and his wedded wife, is a perversion, and the Bible says that homosexuality is in fact an abomination."

• “Rev. Rick Scarborough, quoting Scripture, listed ‘homosexual offenders’ along with thieves, drunkards, swindlers and idolaters as those unwelcome in the kingdom of God. To fail to call homosexuals to repent of their sin and come to Jesus is the highest form of cowardice and sin."

• Rev. Jim Garlow: "Had people listened to our plea, there would be tens of thousands of people who had not died of a dreaded disease. This breaks our heart to see people die of AIDS."

Act 2: Milbank then notes that their “prayers were not answered. Nobody was arrested, which wasn't surprising: To run afoul of the new law, you need to ‘plan or prepare for an act of physical violence’ or ‘incite an imminent act of physical violence.’"

Act 3: Then the street theatre got interesting (again quoting from Milbank’s article):

• Instead of getting arrested, the ministers got something else: “A couple of dozen gay activists, surrounding them with rainbow flags and signs announcing ‘Gaga for Gay Rights’ and ‘I Am a Love Warrior.’ By the end, the gay rights activists had taken over the lectern and the sound system and were holding their own news conference denouncing the ministers.”

• Chuck Fazio, from DC Podiums “was hired by the religious conservatives to provide the sound system for the event, but upon learning of their cause, he decided to donate his proceeds to the gay rights activists and to give them a chance at the microphone before shutting down the amplifiers.”

Postscript: It seems like fun all around but I am troubled: 

• A reader gets the impression that these self-proclaimed “messengers” represent Christianity and the Church.

• I don’t know what reporter Dana Milbank knows about the deep divisions in the church over glbt issues but I do know that if we do not show up at these kinds of events we have only ourselves to blame if our views are not reported.

• The failure of any clergy to demonstrate a different perspective reinforces the views of those young people who claim that the church is a source of oppression.

• I didn’t know about it in advance. I’m retired but still closely connected to the reconciling activities of Foundry UMC. We know a lot of what’s going on. Still, we never heard about this. Had I known, I would have donned a collar, made a sign, called a few others, and gone. Our information systems need work.

While this event occurred in Washington, similar events take place in many communities. To one degree or another, my troubled thoughts apply to those events as well. However, not to be lost are the underlying challenges to pastoral leadership that need to be thought out.