This week, the Judicial Council of the United Methodist Church meets in Zürich. One of their cases is to consider arguments for and against the constitutionality of the various plans from the Commission On A Way Forward.
There’s a bit of hype and hyperbole so let’s get a few things clear.
They will not affirm a Plan
Of the three plans before them, the two from the Commission (1,2) and the one from a small group of bishops and clergy (3), the Judicial Council will not endorse a plan or say “this plan is better than the others.” That’s not the point.
The point is to avoid a situation that happened in 2012 where General Conference passed a plan (PlanUMC, which this blog was actively opposed to) which was then ruled unconstitutional by the Judicial Council on the last day of GC2012. Because it was a single piece of legislation, any elements that were unconstitutional nullified the whole effort. GC2012 then passed a variety of other reforms, but did not try to “fix” PlanUMC and it died a fiery death…for now.
So this effort is to avoid that and to have Judicial Council examine the legislation beforehand so any of their issues would be handled before GC2019.
They will weigh in on PARTS of the Plans
I predict there will be much social media kerfuffle if Judicial Council declares sections of any plan unconstitutional. I can already see the IRD saying “One Church Plan Unconstitutional” in a tweet, when that will not be the case.
What will happen is the JC will say that a section of a Plan is unconstitutional and needs to be reworked or stricken. There are multiple petitions for each plan, each handled separately, so an entire Plan won’t be nullified.
But there will be considerable concern if novel parts of the plane are stricken. If the One Church Plans’ allowance for annual conferences and local churches to choose their own level of inclusion, or if the Traditionalist Plan’s expulsion of churches to their own conferences–if those novel and essential parts are named, then those plans will need serious revisions before and at GC2019.
This is a new thing
As far as I know, the Judicial Council has not been asked to do this before: to weigh in and pre-evaluate the plans. In fact, they may choose to not do it and claim they don’t have jurisdiction over these questions because they are not in our polity yet. But I doubt they will take a pass because of the stakes involved in being wrong.
One Plan is already Constitutional
The Simple Plan is already Constitutional because it does not add anything new to the Discipline. It is simple in that it simply removes language from the Discipline. Removing particular phrases or lines does not add new constitutional questions. And the Simple Plan is undoubtedly being considered by GC2019 because it deals only with the paragraphs specifically charged to the Commission.
Therefore, we already have one plan which is Constitutional: the Simple Plan. Check it out here.
What happens next?
We await their decision which usually comes 2-21 days after the meeting. So come mid-November, we will have clarity for the next 3 months leading up to General Conference 2019 in St. Louis Missouri on February 23-26, 2019.
In the meantime, LGBTQ persons continue to be excluded form the life of the church, more and more people continue to ask why, and the Church continues to debate how much discrimination they can put into their polity and still call themselves a Christian denomination.
May we be in prayer for all involved.
Your Turn
No plans will be nullified or endorsed, and with all likelihood, only the rough edges will need to be amended or smoothed out in various proposals which will come in the coming months. I’m thankful for this process that makes sure we are not opining away in a vacuum but have a solid basis for debate in a few short months.
Thoughts?
Thanks for reading, commenting, and sharing on social media.
This is just a clarification. The Judicial Council has been asked to rule on a plan before General Conference. In 2015, the Council of Bishops referred Plan UMC Revised, again in hopes of avoiding what happened in 2012. At the Judicial Council’s fall meeting that year, the court announced it was deferring a review because such early action by the Judicial Council “could potentially place a constitutional seal of approval on one proposed legislative item,” the decision said. Other items of proposed legislation “might also deserve advance consideration as to their constitutionality.” The court did issue a ruling the following May before General Conference officially got underway. Here is that UMNS story https://www.umnews.org/en/news/plan-umc-revised-still-partly-unconstitutional
I was coming down to the comments section to say the same thing, but I didn’t have the UMNS article link handy like you did!
Deep gratitude for converting the Simple Plan.
Would you consider adding a note about the dockets with direct impact on the lives of 3 of our Queer Clergy siblings?
Docket No. 1018-3
IN RE: Appeal of the Rev. David Wayne Meredith from the decision of the North Central Jurisdictional Committee on Appeals. Read More
Docket No. 1018-4
IN RE: Appeal of the Counsel for the Church of the West Ohio Annual Conference from the decision of the North Central Jurisdictional Committee on Appeals. Read More
Docket No. 1018-8
IN RE: Review of a Bishop’s Decision of Law in the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference concerning if the clergy session must (a) exclude a portion of the report of the Board of Ordained Ministry based on a policy that is not compliant with The Book of Discipline 2016 and (b) exclude from consideration two candidates who acknowledged in writing that they are married to persons of the same gender. Read More
The role of the Judicial Council to comment on proposed legislation before it has been enacted has always seemed a usurpation of legislative authority. What happened in 2012 was nothing short of an ambush by certain elements of what had been a carefully debated change in our structure. Many very solid Methodist leaders voiced dismay at this precipitous action. After all, delegates do have the authority to change the constitution subject to annual conference concurrence. In short, it seems to me that after 2 years of careful, prayerful, thoughtful deliberation among the UMC’s best and brighest, we are throwing their work to the discretion of a group that may have its own agenda.
Jeremy,
I just want to clarify one thing. There isn’t an opportunity prior to General Conference to make any revisions resulting from the JC ruling. We will all certainly do the work that needs to be done but any changes resulting from that work will have to be brought to the General Conference floor.
Your last paragraph concerning the people from the LGBTQ being excluded from the church is disturbing to say the least. People from all walks of life are welcome to come in the doors of a church any church. And since when is a sinful life condoned in a church or when a pastor ignores a sin. Sin needs to be addressed whether it is an Abomination or if they lie or it is stealing or it’s murder it needs to be addressed.
Yes Jesus welcomed everyone all sinners but he admonished and directed that they go and sin no more.
The hardest part about all of this from The Way Forward Commission is that the local rural churches that I serve are in such fear that they will have to accept these folks in their churches. And if they do not accept them or accept their way of life they would have to leave their churches. And I tend to agree with them especially since if you walk through a tar pit you will not come out clean on the other side. A sin is a sin. And why should we have to leave our beloved denomination? If those people who do the desire to live in that manner want a church so bad they should go and form their own denomination and leave ours alone.
The One Church Plan doesn’t force Churches to accept LGBT persons, certainly does not any Church to perform Gay Marriages. But what is good is that a Pastor who DOES perform them with the permission of their Congregation is not subject to trial.
“does not *require* any Church to perform Gay Marriages.”
“The hardest part about all of this from The Way Forward Commission is that the local rural churches that I serve are in such fear that they will have to accept these folks in their churches. And if they do not accept them or accept their way of life they would have to leave their churches.”
So, I’m guessing “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” has little place in the rural churches you are talking about, Frank. Your letter is all about fear, sin and judgement, but short on loving your neighbor. Could it be that you and the folks in those rural churches you mentioned somehow missed that most important part of the gospel, the law that Jesus said was second in importance only to loving God with all your being?
In the gospel of Luke Jesus asked his listeners who was the neighbor in the parable of the Good Samaritan. His listeners had to reluctantly acknowledge that the neighbor was in fact the ‘good’ Samaritan, two words that constituted an oxymoron in the understanding of first century Jews. Samaritans were the reviled religious, political and ethnic enemies of good Jews in Jesus’ time. It was a radical thing for Jesus to tell a parable where a Samaritan was the hero of the story. In effect Jesus was saying it is the people we most love to hate who are the very neighbors he called us to love. Could it not be that LGBTQ+ people, whom so many good Christians love to revile, are exactly the very neighbors you and your rural church folks are called to love, to show them the radical hospitality and unconditional love and acceptance of their Creator God despite your misgivings? If you and your fellow rural church folks feel you must leave your churches rather than follow the second most important law Jesus taught, then who exactly is it you are following as Christians?
I heartily endorse Frank’s concerns regarding the smaller churches–these people should not be forced to choose between their beliefs or their churches!
The picture at the top of the page that shows two one way signs going in completely opposite directions is a very accurate portrayal at where the united Methodist Church is at this moment in time: trying to go completely opposite directions at the same time. And there is an answer for that problem. It is in the fact that we live in America which guarantees freedom of religion for all; and inherent in that freedom is that my freedom ends where yours begins and your freedom ends where mine begins. In short, you cannot force me into believing what you believe and I cannot force you into believing what I believe. So quit expending all your energy in trying to convert a group of people who do not want to be converted and expend your energy in forming a church in which you are free to teach what you believe. And yes there are traditional extremists and fundamentalists who will take great exception to what you believe and react very badly and try to force you into their way of thinking. But the vast majority of us will give a sigh of relief that you are doing as you see best and we are now finally free to do as we see best and we will gladly defend your right to freedom of religion. Please, go teach what you want to teach and stop trying to force us into submission. No matter how this plays out, you are not going to silence nor stop classic Christianity of the Methodist persuasion.
Classic Christianity?
Jesus had words to say about classic Judaism, and it wasn’t kind.