Unity on the table

Today at what we United Methodists call Annual Conference, which is a meeting of duly appointed delegates and clergy, which by my count could come to somewhere around 1,000 folks crawling up and down the hills of Shreveport in the name of holy conferences, we will debate a proposal for unity.

The proposal, set on garish yellow-orange paper as if we could not possibly remember the seriousness of it unless it was in striking colors, says simply that we will make every effort to maintain unity in the bond of peace for the sake of our mission.

It further says we commit ourselves to the faithful practice of the means of grace so that our devotion to Jesus Christ and our love for one another may increase, and further we commit ourselves to this for the love of god and our neighbor and our common mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

Yesterday I went to a lunch for a meeting on what is called for the Traditional Wesleyan Fellowship, and I heard five options for the denomination I love and most of them were not good, including that above mentioned lack of unity.

And I went to bed last night with swirls of disunity on the brain.

How could we have come to this? Forty years of fussing and fighting over one issue, and in my mind it’s not even the right issue to splinter over.

How could we risk our mission over this? How could we risk everything that the church has built?

Wait. Wait. Wait. I’m asking the wrong question, it seems to me. I think the question, if we believe what we say we believe, is more akin to how could we not risk everything?

Because what I felt when I was listening to the chair person of Good News, which is the conservative wing of the denomination as it were, is that if there are persons who believe that the scriptures still say what they seem to say about this topic that is causing the disintergration of the denomination I hold dear then how could they not risk everything? And if those persons who believe there are extenuating circumstances about this subject that means God’s Word must be interpreted through the prism of culture in which we live, then they too must risk everything.

And suddenly the unity of the church seems not so certain, does it not?

The true question is unity at what cost, schism at what cost and who is willing to walk over what they believe?

Is there are third way forward? I’ve signed a petition saying I pray there is. Do I believe this will work? Probably not. Every church voting for itself, and every conference doing likewise, seems like a fine idea until you break it down to this: What happens when a church votes to allow gay persons to be married in its building and the pastor says no? What happens when a pastor is willing to marry gay persons in its building, and the church votes no? What happens when a church votes no, and then gets upset about abortion or about whatever the next schism topic is?

The answer is no one knows. No one. So, in a world of questions, we wind up without any answers.

When all we want to do is leave it all behind and come to the well, come to meet Jesus, come to do the next right thing.

I am torn. I see the need on both sides. I see the hurt on both sides. I see the tender hopes of those who want to belong and can’t figure out how. I see the hardness on one side that has always belonged and yet can’t seem to find peace about sexuality. Other’s sexuality.

Where are we?

We are here, in holy conference, having to have a petition about unity. The United Methodists, like so many other denominations, is having a petition about being unified.

This is the world in which we live.

Come, Lord Jesus, come.