A WORD ON INCLUSION IN THE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH, AND A FEW MORE ON THE NATURE OF CHURCH...

As I sit down to write this,  email inbox, Facebook, and the internet are all abuzz with news that the United Methodist Church has “defrocked”  a pastor for performing a wedding for a gay couple.   More poignantly, this pastor performed the wedding ceremony of his son, who happened to be marrying someone else’s son.

            This is the latest in a growing number of incidents of disobedience  (or “biblical obedience,” as some call it) to the United Methodist Book of Discipline, which forbids our clergy to perform weddings of this nature, and also forbids having them take place on church property.  Moreover, in language that only a church committee could conjure, our Discipline lifts up the sacred worth of all people while simultaneously condemning homosexuality.

            In my new role as a Superintendent I am receiving a growing volume of queries about where I stand on this issue.    With each email I have burrowed a little deeper in prayer and wondering.    For me, this is a storm of clarity and conscience.   Anyone who knows me even a little knows full well my position and my work on this issue over thirty years of ministry.   But, for those who wonder if Superintendency changes someone’s heart let me be clear.

            The Church is wrong on this issue.   Cloaking homophobia in poor biblical scholarship and even worse concoctions of church law is simply wrong.   Moreover, demanding subservience to Church law above dictates of conscience and biblical understanding smacks of idolatry.   

            The preponderance of our Christian understanding of grace, which speaks to the unearned, abundant love of God for every person reveals the Church’s error in this.   Our understanding that all the walls between people have come down in the love of God in Jesus Christ reveal the Church’s error in this.    The call of our own Lord and Savior to liberate the oppressed reveals the Church’s error in this.   And, the simple practice of agape love reveals the Church’s error in this.   Even our local Church membership vows which have every United Methodist promising to struggle against evil and injustice in any form, reveal the Church’s error in this.

             Now that I have made my stance clear,  I need to add that this is not the only place where the United Methodist Church is wrong.   The Church is wrong on it’s mushy language about war.   The Church is wrong when it invests pension funds in military contractors and other corporate entities that ravish our environment and practice human slavery.     Indeed, the Church has been wrong often throughout it’s history.   On slavery, on the inclusion of women in ordination, on so many things the Church has stumbled and fallen.     And, friends, the hard truth is that when we get this issue sorted out we will continue to be wrong on a host of things.    

            When I served the local Church I would frequently invite people to participate in a rhythmic chant.  It went like this.   Feel the beat if you can. 

  

“The Church is a broken and sinful institution!

The Church is a broken and sinful institution!

The Church is a broken and sinful institution!”

I know.  It’s a strange thing to ask people to do.    But I led this seemingly silly chant because as a people we frequently get caught in the trap of thinking the church should be perfect.   And then we are surprised and upset when learn that it’s not.  The Church is not perfect.    It never will be close to perfect.  It will always be forming, reforming and reviving.  It will always be picking itself up from the dust of its errors and reaching to be a more faithful expression of God’s love in Jesus Christ.   Moreover, we are not perfect.   We, the Body of Christ, the people of God are an imperfect people in search of the perfect wonder of God. 

Of course, one cannot list the frailties and failings of our United Methodist Church without lifting up the wonder and power that emerge from our great Connection.   Divided though we may be, we continue to heal the sick and lift up the broken hearted.   Disgruntled and disagreeable we may be, but because of us the scourge of malaria will very likely be halted in it’s tracks.   While we argue over important issues, we continue to sponsor the most effective relief agency on the planet.   Our common work is spread around the world through the schools and colleges, hospitals and clinics we have built.   We also share the saving Word of God as we train pastors and lay people across the globe.   Friends, even in the heat of our present disagreement we are nothing short of amazing.

  My hope and my fervent prayer is that we will journey together with our eyes on the prize, knowing that we are not there yet, believing that the journey is worth it, and trusting that God is calling us forward to justice, hope, revival and renewal in Jesus’ name.

So there it is.   I believe the Church is wrong here.   I stand firm in my commitment to the United Methodist Church, and I will follow it’s rules as far and as long as conscience and biblical understanding allow.

Finally, I call all my sisters and brothers throughout our connection to get busy where you are and do your passionate best to be the Church of Jesus Christ in this time and this place.    Let us join hands and hearts as we build a faithful, powerful, healing place for all people in the name of Christ Jesus our Lord.

sr

Becoming a Movement Again? Really?

BECOMING A MOVEMENT AGAIN….Really?

I hear these words a lot  in relationship to our life as a United Methodist Church these days.   We want to  shed the skin of institutionalism and take on the character of a “movement.” 

That’s good.

We should do that.

But we should be clear about what it is that we are doing as we shift from an institutional life to a movement reality.

Movements are unpredictable.

Movements are matters of the heart.

Movements are…..dangerous.

A movement takes flight on the wings of passion.   Often the passion is ignited by injustice or some egregious wrong.  Sometimes the movement emerges out of inspiration.   In our case as a Church, the Wesleyan Movement  set ablaze by the power of the Holy Spirit, calling people to a consuming faith in God that was to be lived out in the healing of the sick, feeding of the hungry and the liberation of the oppressed (read Luke 4:14 – 19).    People were on fire in those days, giving all to “make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.”    In that outpouring of “scriptural holiness,”  faith communities, schools, hospitals and more were planted around the globe.   People poured out their whole lives, and some gave their lives to this movement.   Yes.   Movements are things to which people commit their whole lives, willing to risk it all for the sake of the movement.

Think of the movements in our recent history.

The Womens’ Movement.

The Civil Rights Movement.

The Peace Movement.

The Labor Morvement.

In all of these struggles people not only gave their lives but lost their lives.

People gave all to the movement to claim equal rights for women, and some died.   Tens of thousands gave all to the movement for racial justice.   Some died.

In the Peace Movement, people spent years in prison, some were exiled and yes, some died.   And in the struggle for child labor laws and an eight hour day people suffered under the clubs of anti-union goons….and some died.

If we United Methodists are serious about becoming a “movement” again then we need to think of this with clarity and focus.   Are we willing to give all to the call of Jesus Christ to go forth and heal the world?   Are we willing to pour our lives out in building communities of hope and justice?   Are we spiritually pulled, drawn into creating spaces of inclusion and new life where everyone is welcome?     At the end of the day, are we willing to give our lives….not to an institution but to a movement committed to this “way of life,” which we are called in The Great Commission (Matthew 28

So, I’m all for this movement thing.

But let’s not play.

Indeed, let’s just stop playing altogether and actually pour ourselves into being Church together.     It’s going to be dicey.  It’s going to be unpredictable.   It’s going to be….dangerous.   People will die.

But then we’re a people of the Resurrection, yes?

We’re a people who trust in God’s power for new life, yes?

We’re a people who follow Jesus wherever he bids us go, yes?

So let’s reclaim our power as a movement. 

Let’s go forth and spend our lives and sharing the love, grace

and healing that we know in Christ Jesus.

Claiming Hope In Spite of All the Evidence

".....and hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.....(Romans 5:5)"

      A question.   When was the last time you heard someone go on about the notion that the Church is dying?  I'm willing to bet that if you're involved in a church somewhere, it hasn't been that long.  It's out there, isn't it?    The truth is that I hear it all the time.   It's whispered in pews, pronounced by pundits and dwelt upon by all manner of "believers."  
      Well, I want to say that I'm weary of hearing it all.  I know.   There's truth in it, and denial isn't going to get us anywhere.  But maybe truth is broader than what is merely true.  Perhaps there are more possibilities hidden in the folds of tomorrow than we can imagine.   Maybe the landscape we are walking on isn't what we think it it is after all.   It makes me wish I could have Mary's eyes when I gaze into the tomb.      
       So it is that I'd like to call a moratorium on doomsday language in the Church.   I would like to lovingly invite those people who are fond of pronouncing the church's obituary to take a nap for a bit.   For a period of one year I would like to issue a call, a dare, a double dog dare to everyone....yes including me... to stop the woeful shaking of the head and whining about the church's decline.   Is that possible?
      I wonder.
      I throw down this gauntlet because I believe there is a large degree to which all this gloom and doom becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.   Think about it.  Who wants to knowingly get on board the Titanic?  Who would choose to become part of a community who has no passion or sense of a possible future?   Why would someone invest time, resources, heart in an enterprise whose demise has already been scheduled?   The answer's obvious, yes? 
      I do think that what is needed is a new kind of truth telling.   Not the unvarnished member counting kind of truth, but the kind of truth that reminds us of what it is to hope.   By hope I'm not talking about a hollow wish that accompanies things like, "I hope it doesn't rain,"  or  "I hope the Giants take the Series again this year."    No.   I am talking about actual hope.   The willingness to individually ad collectively seize upon an unreasonable enthusiasm for a future we cannot necessarily see.    This is the kind of hope lived out in the life of Nelson Mandela, who spent decades in prison refusing to abandon the hope of liberation for his people.    This is the kind of hope that stares death in the face and shouts, "Resurrection!"  
     I have a deep hope for the United Methodist Church, though perhaps the evidence might be hard to see right now.   But then if there were evidence, it wouldn't be hope, would it?    My hope is that this Wesleyan people will claim anew the Resurrection power that propelled our spread across the world.   My hope is that, rather than chewing each other up over absurd culture war silliness, we will claim our common cause in a Risen Christ and go forward to heal a broken world.   My abiding hope is for a radical rebirth of our sense of mission and hospitality, our commitment to "social holiness," and simple joy rooted in our communities and in our faith.    These are some of my hopes.
     Beyond the cynicism that gets flung at us daily, what are some of yours?    Perhaps we can step into them together.

SR


     

Claiming Common Ground - Galatians3:28

I am such a newby!  Still (and always I hope) learning about this new ministry, traveling around, listening and sharing.   It is a new landscape on which I am walking, and it is beautiful.    In these early days I am enjoying first hand the beauty of the diversity of our District and our Annual Conference.   It is amazing.  Breath-taking.   We are diverse in location, in culture, in race, and in ethnicity.   We are even diverse in our theology, in the way we experience God's love in Christ.  

Everywhere I look, everyone has their own "thing,"  their own experience, their own perspective and agenda.   Everyone holds a piece of God's good work in their hands.

So, someone asked me the other day, with all this diversity and difference, what is it that pulls us together?  What is it that "connects" us in this great United Methodist Connection?    Across our geography and our experience there is much that can, and sometimes does separate us.     So, what then, draws us into the folds of community together?

Paul asserts that "there is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus."

Well, I don't want to disrespect the Apostle or anything, but I'm pretty clear that in Christ I am still a male and a pretty white Euro-American one at that!    Furthermore, I am fairly certain that anyone reading this would also claim their race, ethnicity, culture, gender and sexuality as core to their identity, even as they seek faithfully to follow the Master.

Here's what comes to me as I ponder and pray about all this.

Our cultures and our ethnicity, our gender and our sexuality are all gifts from God.   They are precious gifts that we are called to unwrap together in the context of Christian community.   Because we are "in Christ," do we surrender those pieces of our lives?  No.

In Christ, however, we have claimed a new common ground.    In Christ, enriched by our diversity, we have claimed the powerful truth of Christianity.   And that is, that when we pour ourselves out for others.   Redemption happens.

When God gave God's self for us on the Cross, we were redeemed, yes?   That's our story.   But it doesn't end there.   We are called to go and do likewise, pouring ourselves out for others in love as we spread redemption across the land.    God in Christ has given us the Resurrection story to live out using the powerful gifts of culture, ethnicity, race and gender.

Our call is to claim this common ground of self-giving love in Christ while we celebrate and learn from one another.   Our call is to go out into the world and share this redemptive, self-givng love until the whole world is transformed.

So let us treasure these precious and holy gifts of culture, ethnicity, race, gender and sexuality.
Let us claim this common ground of self-giving love and pour our whole selves out for the healing of the world!

Let's step into a new day of a unity, not based on making everyone the same in some bland template of religion.   Let's step instead  into the powerful giftedness of who we are together in the self-giving love of Jesus Christ!

I look forward to the joys and challenges, the laughter and the wonder of being with you as we travel this path together!   SR

Reflecting on Christian Community

Reflecting a lot lately on Christian community.  As I have stepped away from one community and am entering something totally different, the prayers and the thoughts reverberate and push.  And so I sit down and try to articulate.

Christian Community.

If it's real, it is always incarnational.    And I believe that a journey toward "real," or authenticity is one to which we are called in this time.   You see, I think we are not merely Church.  Or at least we should not be so.    I believe that when we travel toward "real,"  toward authenticity, we truly become the Body of Christ, returned and let loose in the world to foment justice and healing;  hope and salvation.   Folks who resonate with thoughts of the Second Coming might want to consider that this reality depends literally upon our current faithfulness.

When we are authentic Christian Community, the Body of Christ rises up in power.

We refer often to ourselves as the Body of Christ, but seldom connect the dots, but there it is.   

In this Resurrection Body, there is precious little room for our own narrow desires and agendas.  This Body has purged petty quarrels and silly arguments.  It has moved beyond the tyranny of what we want.   This Body is focused upon pouring out its life for others in the same way Christ poured his life out for us. In this Body, we are concerned with the transformation of the world as we spread God's love by example,  witness, through service and through an abundant amount of joyful laughter.   

I close this tempered rant with words from Romans 12 as offered by Eugene Petersen in "The Message."

".....The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what God does for us, not by what we are and what we do for God.     In this way we are like various parts of the human body.   Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around.  The body we're talking about is Christ's body of chosen people.  Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body.   But as a chopped of finger or cut off toe we wouldn't amount to much, would we?  So since we find ourselves fashioned into all these excellently formed and marvelously functioning parts in Christ's body, let's just go ahead and be what we were made to be....."