General conferencing on the horizon

And so it begins.

For most of you, this will have little meaning. But for us United Methodists, this might be the most meaningful 10 days since John Wesley got on a horse and rode around talking about prevenient grace.

In Oregon, beginning tomorrow, United Methodists from around the globe will meet in what is called General Conference, and all heck might result.

This might well be the most involved, most meaningful, most divisive conference ever. General Conference is the top policy-making body of the UMC. It's here that church law, as well as the adoption of resolutions on current moral, social, public policy and economic issues happen.

It is here that schism, the separation of the denomination might begin.

This conference will be, in ways never before seen, about change.

Debate will be held on how the church ministers with lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals. The UMC's book of discipline governs has since 1972 proclaimed that all people are of sacred worth but the practice of homosexuality is "incompatible with Christian teaching." The denomination, my denomination, bans the performance of same-gender unions and the ordination of "self-avowed practicing" gay clergy.

Those sentences will be debated and perhaps changed. The question that looms heavily over the conference, it seems to me, is what will happen to the denomination if indeed those sentences are changed or done away with.

As a little pastor in a little town, I don't know how it will go, and I don't even know how the persons we in Louisiana voted to be our representatives will vote. I do know this topic will be a hot one.

Just last Thursday, the Pacific Northwest board of ordained ministry voted to affirm that all "people of all sexual orientations and gender identities" can meet the standards for "fitness, readiness, and effectiveness in ministry." This board joined with the Baltimore-Washington and New York boards as saying they will no longer inquire about the sexual orientation of their ministry candidates. Fifteen clergy and clergy candidates in the New York Conference came out as gay on May 2.

I know this: the tipping point of this near. Maybe at this conference, maybe the next in four years. But it is coming. How United Methodists deal with this is the key.

I also know this: How one feels about this subject can change when one puts faces on those seeking change. How one feels about this can change when one looks at how long it took the denomination to allow women clergy persons in. How one feels about this can change when one looks at how long it took the denomination to become "united" with African American conferences.

Change is coming. I asked our congregations to simply pray, "God's will be done on earth as it is in heaven" about this conference. I still feel we're better together than we are apart. 

Perhaps we're about to find out whether that is true.