Opinions welcome

Since being elected as a General Conference delegate last May, a full 11 months before General Conference, I have been waiting for the work to start. Which it is beginning to but the past four months have been pretty quiet. I realize that people all over the denomination are working very hard to get ready for the party in Tampa but since I am a 1st time delegate they haven't really invited me to the pre-party.

Not that I'm feeling ignored. Far from it. In the first days after being elected I found my name on a GC delegate Twitter list and also added to a Facebook group for Young Adult delegates (in this case defined as under age 40, which is really stretching the definition of young adult. I guess no one wants to tell the 37 year olds they are no longer young.) Being added to those groups is about as far as the social media interaction has gone but it was a signal to me that some people really want to know who is going to General Conference. Why? So they can lobby.

There are currently 11.4 million members in the United Methodist Church world wide. Only 1000 of us will be able to vote on any given piece of legislation in Tampa next spring. You can imagine that some of those 11,399,000 other members of the UMC have ideas, even passionate ideas, about how we 1000 should vote.

So far I have received (I think) six communications that I would call "lobbying" related to GC. All six have been about...can you guess?...homosexuality. More specifically 4 or 5 out of the six have been requests to repeal or replace any discriminatory language in the Discipline related to gay and lesbian persons. I have received several letters (one hand written) an email, a phone call and a book. I take this to mean that the Reconciling Ministry Network is winning the communication race at the moment.

It's not really a surprise that this is the issue that has people energized the most and the earliest. We have been struggling with language related to sexuality in the Discipline since 1972. That was 4 years before I was born. And, I am sure, United Methodists were struggling with how to interpret scripture and live with gay people who love God long before that. No matter what happens, I don't anticipate that GC 2012 will be the final chapter in the debate.

I do find it interesting that none of the communications have asked me to support a specific piece of legislation or referred to a specific paragraph number in the Book of Discipline. They have been general instead, asking me to vote for "justice" or to "uphold biblical standards." I assume someone has submitted petitions on all sides of the issue but I guess the lobbyists felt they couldn't wait until the legislation is published.

I also find myself wondering what effect such lobbying has. Are there delegates elected last spring who are saying, "I don't really know how I feel about the ordination of gay and lesbian people." Or "I have been thinking I need to decide if UMC clergy should perform same-sex unions." These seem pretty entrenched opinions to me. I would guess the chance of an outcome different from the past lies more with who got elected to GC from around the world and less on changing the minds of already elected delegates. I could be wrong on this, some of those letters may have a deep effect.

I am sure there will be more letters/phone calls/emails to come on this issue. I wonder, will I be lobbied about anything else? Or do we only have this kind of political energy for issues of sexuality? We've got seven months to find out.

Tampa Bound

Four years ago I started this blog because I wanted to share about a big project, my first time cycling 100 miles in one day. I have ridden over 7000 miles since then and let this blog go very, very dormant.

Now in the fall of 2011, as I embark on another "big ride," I find myself wanting a place to share the experience. If you care to read about my reflections as a 1st time delegate to the United Methodist General Conference in April of 2012, read here. (subscribe, do the RSS thing or check back as you wish).

How these things start: An election



The "five finger" ballot moving us toward "Kanaska"

I went to Annual Conference last May with a lot of things on my mind. I was concerned about the test vote regarding possible conference realignment (Kansas East + Kansas West + Nebraska). I was nervous and excited about selling DVD's of the small group curriculum I have been working on for two years http://www.acrosscreation.org/ And I was curious to see how the elections for General and Jurisdictional Conference would turn out.

I was interested in serving on the delegation and had hope that I would be elected as an alternate to Jurisdictional Conference. I had never been a delegate before that that seemed like the place people start. I was almost elected as an alternate in 2008 but considering our delegation was half the size for 2012 (two GC clergy delegates, two JC clergy delegates, three alternates, same 7 slots for laity) I didn't know what would happen. 



KS West Delegation 2012



Long story short, I was elected as the second clergy delegate, meaning I am a voting member of General Conference 2012.  Who knew? If someone (or several someones) worked hard for me behind the scenes, they didn't bother to tell me about it. Which is a very Kansas-like way to operate but also perhaps a little odd. I'm not complaining, mind you. I'm thrilled. Not for the "honor" of it (though it is certainly an honor) I'm thrilled because I get to spend the next several months digging into our church polity and structure and then I get to be a part of the conversation that shapes that structure for the years ahead.

FYI: I anticipate actually talking about all that legislative stuff here. So if your eyes rolled at the last part of that previous paragraph, you might want to unsubscribe.

At the end of Annual Conference the elected delegates gathered to choose legislative committees. Thankfully Mark Conard, our 1st elected clergy person, 3 time delegate and revered elder statesmen, had given me a heads up so I could consider my choice. I selected "Ministry and Higher Education" because I also serve on the conference Board of Ordained Ministry and I care a great deal about our ordination process, creating a hospitable climate for young clergy, and clergy effectiveness. I'm sure I will have more to say about that in posts to come.

Since the end of May there has been only a little bit to do regarding GC. Until yesterday, that is, when we held our first delegation meeting. I could have stayed busy by reading some of the 31 Books of Discipline I have in my office, dating back to 1854. They were a gift several years ago from a relative who is a retired UM elder. I took them from him to be polite, but now that I will get to vote on what's in the 2012 version, I'm kind of glad to have them.

Up to my eyeballs in stuff for Annual Conference... +...trying to get ready to be gone to said AC and then to the ATL for memorial day...+...80 year old men testing the fire alarm system with matches without telling anyone at church...=...No time for the bloggy. I am sure you have been wondering.

Just one question that I have no where else to ask...

The space shuttle Atlantis took off Monday to go fix The Hubble telescope. News outlets made a big deal of the fact that Shuttle Endeavour was also on the launch pad ready to go up and rescue the Atlantis crew if their craft was damaged during liftoff (like a small piece of foam screwing up the heat shield panels or whatever it was that happened to Colombia.)

But what if Endeavour was damaged during lift off? What then?

Huh?

Huh?

Who would rescue them?

We only have so many shuttles and so many astronauts, or so I understand. (not counting the secret military shuttles, of course) Are you going volunteer to go up if the third or fourth shuttle is too damaged to return? Or do we say.."sorry no more shuttles. Take your chances and come home. Cross your fingers!"

Not a very good "fix" if you ask me.

Not that you did.

Or anyone would.

retinkin

Last Saturday I went to a training event regarding our new denominational media campaign "Rethink Church." As much as I dislike Saturday training events (though I was able to take my coffee into the Sanctuary, thanks to a gracious colleague) there were some stimulating moments in the day.

A new important part of the campaign is the idea that in the 8 year old slogan "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors" the word "open" is no longer considered an adjective, instead we need to think of it as a verb. So we are "opening" hearts, minds and doors. Or you can think of it like a command: our task is to open hearts, minds and doors. While this revision is more exciting than the old concept for those inside the church, (and some of the videos to communicate this idea are actually GOOD) I do wonder how it sounds to those outside the church. Would it come off as patronizing? "hey! We want to open your heart and mind and front door!"


Oh wait. It might be our hearts and minds and doors that need to be opened. I guess that is closer to the truth. "Hey world! We are trying desperately to pry open our small hearts and tiny minds and locked doors so there is room for you!" Yes, that might be closer to the truth.


The other key revision of the campaign is the concept that churches have "ten thousand doors." Seems we have focused rather exclusively on worship being the one "door" for newcomers. It might be more effective, campaign creators say, for the first "door" into the church to be a small group or a service project or a special class or a Vacation Bible School or a block party. In those other settings relationships are formed that then become a bridge to participation in the worship life of the chruch.

I like this, because it helps us think fully about the entry points of our church, nothing is for "members-only," everything we do is a chance for hospitality.

The problem is (you knew there was going to be a problem, didn't you?) in how the "trainers" expressed this idea on Saturday. They asked, "Who has vital and passionate worship?" And they asked it in a way that showed they expected few hands to go up. They went on to say basically, "We know worship stinks at your church. So don't invite people to worship. That's boring. Invite them to something fun, like a bar-b-que or a work project. " The implication is that when they know you a little more they will be able to tolerate the boring worship like you do.

Anyone else think this is a little backwards? If worship isn't vital and passionate...FIX WORSHIP! And realize that while not everyone is going to feel comfortable stepping into the Sanctuary as their first contact with a church, most people are still going to use that as the primary entry point. Hence the need to FIX WORSHIP!

Realizing I have ten thousands doors to my church does not mean I should ignore or shut the biggest and most obvious door I have (namely 10:30 worship on Sunday morning.) It just means I need to make sure all available doors are unlocked, open and ready to welcome whomever wishes to walk through them. (Metaphorically speaking of course. This is the big city).

Enough rant. Best learning point of the day came from a line in the campaign's signature video:
"the smallest step through one of our doors is an act of courage."

That seems like truth to me.

reading the obituaries

I, like you who listen to the news, have been hearing continual updates about the health of American car companies, or ill-health, as it were. Chrysler might go into bankruptcy this afternoon. GM's deadline is a month away. Although I have, in my life, owned a GM ('77 Chevy Malibu), a Chrysler ('94 Jeep Cherokee) and a GM ('04 Pontiac Vibe). I think overall this intense pressue to change or die is a good thing. These companies have had a flawed business model for a long time and, it seems to me as a very uneducated outsider, have been ignoring it. They can ignore no longer. They will emerge, or not, from this crisis ready for business today and in the future. Necessary growing pains, that's what this looks like to me.

I really have little stake in the car companies, someone will keep making cars for me to buy. But the thought keeps occurring to me that the United Methodist Church is GM. We are a bloated and inflexible institution with too many stakeholders and too many reasons to keep the status quo instead of doing the hard work of change. I'm not saying anything new here. I, like you, can read the same analysis the denomination over. My question is...what will be our bankruptcy filing? What will be our recession? What will be the cataclysmic event that forces the change we cannot manage to create on our own? I don't know. Perhaps I should pray for that. For the United Methodist Church's bankruptcy filing. Would that be a heretical prayer?

Or maybe we are better understood as the newspaper industry. United Methodists are print newspapers who are struggling so mightily to figure out how to package our important content (the news) in a world of new media. People are not subscribing like they used to. Nor will they ever again to the same old delivery system. Our revenue model (print ads) is headed down a dead end road. Other people are innovating around us, but we are staring institutional death in the face. What will be our digital revolution?

This morning I was reading Paul Nixon's "I Refuse to Lead a Dying Church" which includes this paragraph about choosing to be a bold church over a mild church...

The milder the vision expressed [by a church], the more [their] energy is
diverted to fellowship, childcare, and building renovation, to entertainment
activities, parties and trips. The mild church is a religious Elk's Lodge except
for about an hour a week, when we sit quietly in a room decorated to my
grandmother's tastes and try to think (and even sing) nice thoughts about Jesus
and loving others, as our leaders run around down front in sixteenth century
costumes. Indeed there is a place in the world (and a market) for fraternal
organizations such as the Elks. But the Elks total membership is headed in the
same direction as the Episcopalians.

Or the United Methodists. He could have said, as the United Methodists. That paragraph stings, because it fairly accurately describes my work life.

This seems like a problem to me.

I do not want to be GM.

I do not want to be a print newspaper. (no offense to my many friends in the newspaper business).

I don't need to be the new "hotness" full of all things cutting edge either.

I just don't want to lead a dying church.

Overheard in the church office:

“Jim, what was that place down on south Washington...
that you took me to that one time…
when we was looking for…
something or another?”

The best part is the question got answered.

It’s a wonder we get anything done around here.

small and holy

Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you must do big things to be important.

Tuesday: pre-martial counseling: We are working on getting to know one another because, like most young couples, these two don’t come to church.

“When did your parents get divorced?” I ask, and two minutes later the tears have started.

“I don’t even know why I’m crying,” she says. Because it still hurts, I think, but I only say, “The kleenexs are right in front of you, and crying is always okay in here.”

“It might be important to think some more about your parents' divorce as you prepare for your own marriage,” I say, “and if you can, find a way to talk about it with them because you experience the grief differently as an adult than when you were 14.”

She nods. And the quiet that follows shows we both know she has shared something deep.

Wednesday: evening prayer: I give my 5 minute, off-the-cuff meditation on the passage in Acts 4 where the church shared everything in common and people sold their private possessions so that there was no one in need.

After we feast at the table, a favorite 80-something approaches me and says, eyes pleadingly serious…”You don’t know how I’ve struggled with that scripture and others like it.”

I am surprised to her say she struggles with scripture at all. She is a doer. She wastes little time on theology talk or overt spirituality. She does, and does, and does. Her compassion and generosity are rarely equaled inside or outside the church but, she reveals to me, her spirit is never quite settled. Her eyes can always see more in need, her heart questions if she had taken too much for herself.

“Those are good questions,” I say, “they keep us from holding too tightly to our things.”

She nods. And the quiet that follows shows we both know she has shared something deep.

Don’t ever let anyone tell you that you must do big things to be important.

Sandwich Artist Philosophers

Overheard in line at Subway:

Vegetable Specialist: You should read this new Danielle Steele book.

Cashier: I don't like Danielle Steele

VS: You'll like this one, I can't put it down.

C: No thanks.

VS: No, really. You should read it.

C: Isn't Danielle Steele one of those romance books? I don't read romances.

VS: But it's soooooo good.

C: No, because life isn't like that. Those give you false hope.

VS: You should read it.

C: Cause it makes you think...Oh, maybe I'll meet someone just like that...or my life will maybe be like that. It give false hope.

VS: You should really read it, you'd like this one.

Thinking the Subway cashier was a wise and sensible young woman, I sat down to eat my lunch and pulled out my current reading, Thomas A Kempis' "The Imitation of Christ." I flipped the page and read:

Love often knows no limits; its impetuous fire leaps across every boundary. Love feels no burden, makes light of toil, strives for things beyond its strength. Love never tries to make out that anything is impossible; everything, in the eyes of love, is both possible and lawful. Love, then can do everything; many a task there is that love can fulfil and many a wish it can make effective, where the man who does not love is powerless and fails.

Love is ever on the watch; it rests, but does not slumber, is wearied but not spent, alarmed but not dismayed; like a living flame, a blazing torch, it shoots upward, fearlessly passing through aught that bars its path...'My God, my love, you are all mine and I all yours."

Hum. Devotional literature as Romance: false hope? Or spiritual insight?

Physical Therapy

Second of two posts previously posted on 7 villages website

Tuesday was tense. A reminder of how messy it is to be a part of people’s lives. Leaving church at 7:00pm I was stunned to see the sun had emerged from a week of clouds while I was ensconced in the office. And it was calm…barely a breeze…in Kansas…in March.

Slowly the realization dawned: there was still light left for a bike ride. Home. Quick. Grab the cycling clothes, helmet, shoes. On the bike…the wheels turn…and the day shifts.
Within minutes I know that what I need is speed.

I hammer the pedals.
Legs burn.
Heart thumps.
Breath is short.
Jars of Clay pounds on the radio in my mind:

Sometimes I cannot forgive
These days mercy cuts so deep
If the world was how it should be
Maybe I could get some sleep…

Sometimes when I lose my grip
I wonder what to make of heaven
All the times I thought to reach up
All the times I had to give…

All the cries of thirsty children
This is our inheritance
All the rage of watching mothers
This is our greatest offense

Oh my God
Oh my God
Oh my God


I slide home at dusk,
Knowing the day has been left on the path behind me.
And ministry calls me back, tomorrow.

Open Doors

The following post originally appeared on a site called 7villages, a mostly failed social networking expereince fostered by the United Methodist Church. I have shut down my 7V profile but wanted to save two pieces I had written there by posting them here.


She got stuck in the elevator yesterday.

Thankfully the custodian was still in the church building and knew where to find the door key. I waited outside the elevator until the doors were open, as helpless there as she was inside, watching for something to happen.

With a turn of the key the door opened to reveal her, 84 years old, standing in her cabled cardigan and knitted beret, as calm as could be. She looked as if the elevator had been stopped for 10 seconds, not ten minutes.

As she launched into a conversation with the custodian about how the key worked, I left and went back to my meeting. It wasn’t until hours later that I realized I had offered no pastoral care. Not a single word of encouragement or consolation, no, “I’m glad you’re out” or “thanks for your patience.” I guess it was the look on her face that showed me she didn’t need it.

She’s unflappable. Not completely, already in four months at this appointment I’ve seen pain and grief on her face. But really, she’s unflappable. And she’s not the only one. This place is full of bedrock members, with faith as deep as the ocean, with commitments to the church longer and stronger than I can imagine.

Today I am thankful for them. For their quiet, consistent, presence. For their witness to life as shaped by the rhythms of church. For the stories they hold in sacred memory, stories I want to hear.

Okay, that sounds like a lot from one moment outside the elevator. But sometimes you get a glimpse of who you want to be in 50 years. And that makes for a good day.