This year, delegates might do better to pack hymnals, work gloves and sneakers.

Delegates to the Kansas East Annual Conference in 2012 voted on a resolution by holding up their voting cards. During sessions last year, the Kansas East, Kansas West and Nebraska conferences approved a measure to merge into one conference by the start of 2014. PHOTO COURTESY KANSAS EAST CONFERENCE

With the seven-week annual conference season under way (having begun with the May 16-18 Eastern Pennsylvania Conference at the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center) many such gatherings will spend less time on business and more worshipping, learning, performing mission work and even fostering healthy habits.

“You will hear fewer reports, shorter reports and less emphasis on institutional concerns,” Bishop Gary Mueller promised delegates in a preview of the Arkansas Conference, which meets June 9-12 in Little Rock.

Bishop Mueller’s vow reflects a broader evolution in the way United Methodists do annual conferences, according to Russell Richey, a historian of Methodism and former dean of Candler School of Theology.

“[Conference leaders] are limiting the time devoted to legislative concerns, and increasing the time for special events that are motivational in character,” he said, reflecting a broader effort among church leaders “to make the church more effective, more goal-oriented, more missional and more spiritual.”

Annual conferences date to the 18th century. The first in North America took place in 1773.

“This is the way Methodists have come together to do business, to care for one another, and to increase the spiritual depth and range of the movement,” Dr. Richey said.

The 59 annual conferences in the U.S. are a key link to the church’s connectional structure. Active clergy are required to attend, along with elected lay delegates and other lay leaders. The meetings are tasked with approving programming and budgets, examining and recommending candidates for ministry, and, once every four years, electing delegates to general and jurisdictional conferences.

“It’s partly a revival, partly a family reunion, partly an educational and learning time, and partly a business meeting,” said Great Plains Area Bishop Scott Jones.

The Miracle Offering at the 2012 West Ohio Conference session was given to Wings of the Morning, a United Methodist ministry in the Democratic Republic of Congo. UNITED METHODIST NEWS SERVICE PHOTO COURTESY OF WEST OHIO CONFERENCE

The Great Plains Area conferences—Kansas West, Kansas East and Nebraska—will, like the Arkansas Conference, spend less time on reports and legislative business this year.

Taking cues from evaluations by lay and clergy members from past years, Bishop Jones said, “We will devote more time to the things that were more meaningful, and less time to the things that were less meaningful.”

Similarly, the Missouri Conference is paring non-essential reports and greetings from dignitaries in favor of workshops and seminars that give delegates practical tools.

Annual conferences, some say, are getting smarter about the way they handle the many reports that must be delivered to delegates. Many are moving toward presenting reports as short (usually 4-5 minute) edited videos, said the Rev. David Wood, executive director of Good News TV, a United Methodist ministry in Macon, Ga., that provides audio-visual services to many annual conferences. He said that spurs presenters to distill the most important information and helps keep delegates more engaged.

The tone and focus of reports has changed in some annual conferences.

“More and more of our reports end up being stories of lives changed,” said Danette Clifton, director of communications in the North Alabama Conference. “The details of the ministry, you can put in the written report. That’s a more effective way to use that stage time.”

Required voting

All of the annual conferences do face some required business this year. They’ll be voting on four proposed amendments to the United Methodist Church’s Constitution. The 2012 General Conference approved all four amendments, which relate to lay speaker ministries, episcopal boundaries, Christian unity and the scheduling of General Conference.

Delegates to the 2012 session of the Missouri Annual Conference in Springfield, Mo. PHOTO COURTESY MISSOURI CONFERENCE

Issues relating to homosexuality, including same-sex marriage, typically get floor time at many annual conferences. Also on the agenda of several conferences are health insurance and pension changes, restructuring plans, and debates over gun control, immigration and military spending.

But Bishop Jones says many annual conferences are spending less time debating social issues.

“There’s less arguing over social issues, more inspiration and more teaching,” he said. “I believe that people have realized that the resolutions we pass don’t make any difference, and they are tired of the polarizations that causes.”

Shorter gatherings

Most conferences in the U.S. meet for three to four days. This year, at least six conferences—Tennessee, Iowa, Detroit, Kansas East, Kansas West and Nebraska—have shortened their gatherings by a day or half day. Some did so for logistical reasons; but leaders in Iowa and Detroit say their shorter meetings will mean better stewardship of time and resources.

“This makes attendance easier for laypersons and reduces the costs of the session for both the annual conference and attendees,” said the Rev. Bob Burkhart, Iowa’s assistant to the bishop for administration.

For example, lay delegates with jobs will need to take off only one weekday, instead of two, in order to attend.

Another conference, Northern Illinois, is preparing to trim its schedule back by a day and a half in 2014. South Georgia trimmed its schedule from four to three days in 2012, and will keep the shorter format his year when it meets in Macon, Ga., June 2-4.

“If you’re trying to get a younger demographic to attend, you’ve got to be sensitive to the work schedule,” said Brad Brady, assistant to the bishop for connectional ministries.

Bishop Will Willimon (retired) echoed that sentiment in his memoir Bishop, and sharply criticized protracted annual conference sessions. Under his leadership, the North Alabama Conference meeting shrunk. In Bishop, he writes that his team “transformed our annual conference from a four-day somnambulant conclave to a lively two-day teaching/mission fest.”

That led some delegates—but only clergy, according to Bishop WIllimon—to complain that the shorter meeting shortchanged fellowship. This year, the North Alabama Conference will add back half a day, in part to allow more fellowship.

Bishop Willimon does admit to a bias against long meetings.

“Annual conferences can be depressing,” he said. “I’m not allowed to be left alone with scissors.”

Bumping up worship

Several annual conference leaders say they’ve made an effort to shift more focus to spiritual renewal. This year’s schedule for the Arkansas Conference, for example, includes no less than 10 worship services.

“The more worship, the more holy conferencing, the richer the experience is,” said Bishop Mueller. He thinks more annual conferences are moving in that direction because “people are wanting annual conference to be a time of growth in spirituality.”

Some annual conferences will get the spiritual focus rolling even before the first gavel. In advance of the Memphis and Tennessee conferences, Bishop Bill McAlilly called on church members to join a “40-Day Walk with God,” following a daily prayer guide. Arkansas delegates were invited to commit to prayer and fasting for three weeks before Annual Conference.

Mission work

Many annual conferences have added some kind of mission project to their agendas in recent years, and will continue to do so in 2013.

The South Georgia Conference and the South Carolina Conference will each devote time to packing meals for Stop Hunger Now. Delegates to the Northern Illinois Conference will assemble hygiene kits or volunteer at a food pantry. When the Alabama-West Florida Conference meets June 2-5 in Mobile, Ala., delegates will fan out to food banks, ministries and community centers to spend an afternoon helping out.

“We wanted to be the eyes, ears and hands of the church and leave Mobile a better place after our four-day session,” said Susan Hunt, director of mission and advocacy for the conference.

Healthy breaks

Following another trend that’s been underway for a few years, many annual conferences are offering fitness events, a nod to concerns about clergy health as well as a break that gets delegates up and moving, bright and early.

This year, the Memphis Conference added a new, one-mile “Witness Walk” at 6:30 a.m. on Monday, June 3, when the conference meets in Collierville, Tenn.

At the Iowa Conference, delegates may opt to join the Bishop’s Fitness Walk at 6:15 on Sunday morning. Health screenings—including blood tests and blood pressure monitoring—will be also offered throughout the conference.

The Arkansas Conference will feature a “Skeeter Beater Run/Walk” at 6 a.m. on June 12. For a $10 donation to Imagine No Malaria, participants can enjoy a trek along the River Trail.

Over-managed?

Organizers’ instincts toward keeping annual conferences mission-focused and “on message” are understandable, according to Thomas Frank, University Professor at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., and a historian of Methodism.

“Historically, nobody’s been in charge of annual conference,” he said. “Traditionally, the group that actually organizes it has really had to struggle to get everyone to coordinate and cooperate. It can easily get out of control.”

Dr. Frank likens annual conferences to state fairs, with a wide array of music, speeches and entertainment under one big tent. But he cautions that the pendulum could swing too far in the other direction. Too carefully orchestrated conferences could leave little room for debate, conversation and even a few surprises.

“I’ve seen the spirit sweep through a conference and blow the agenda right off the table,” he said, recalling an annual conference where delegates, one by one, spontaneously volunteered to donate 400 generators needed by a guest speaker from Africa.

“I actually think it’s important to retain the state fair quality,” he said. “There is an unbridled openness that I think should not be entirely reined in.”

mjacobs@umr.org

UnLeader: Reimagining Leadership . . . and Why We Must
Lance Ford
Paperback, 192 pages
Beacon Hill Press, 2012

Our church leadership culture has failed. It is past time that we set aside the idolatry of corporate leadership structures and rediscover the vastly different way of leading modeled by Jesus.

If such language sounds harsh, that is because author and pastor Lance Ford intends for it to be. In UnLeader, Mr. Ford challenges virtually every assumption of contemporary church leadership, then builds a new vision for leading based on the patterns set forth in the New Testament.

Mr. Ford draws his key ideas from Matthew 20:25-28, in which Jesus contrasts the hierarchy of Gentile power structures with the servant leadership that is to mark his disciples. In the first half of the book, he particularly emphasizes verse 26: “It shall not be so among you.”

Even though most church staffs are structured with a single leader (usually the senior pastor) at the top, Mr. Ford argues for a flattened way of relating in which all paid and volunteer staff treat one another with love and respect. Any practice of leadership that emphasizes power, rank and chain of command belongs, in Mr. Ford’s mind, to the military or corporate world, and has no place among disciples of Jesus.

So how did American church culture become so unquestioningly hierarchical? Perhaps, Mr. Ford posits, because of a natural human tendency to crave the clarity that comes with following a single leader. Just as Israel cried for Samuel to appoint a king over them, so do modern churches hand power over to individuals for the sake of certainty.

What we fail to fully embrace, however, is Jesus’ insistence that his heavenly Father is already our king and leader. Jesus lives in submission to the will of the Father, and releases his rightful authority as the Son in order to live among his disciples as brothers and sisters. If Jesus himself eschewed the authority of his position, then his disciples must resist the temptation to wield power over others, no matter how benign that hierarchy may seem or what circumstances bring it into being.

In the second half of the book, Mr. Ford makes a case for replacing modern concepts of leadership with what he calls “servantship.” The New Testament ideal is one of diffused power held in common among those who recognize Jesus as the only chief shepherd. Humility among co-laborers brings about a way of living in which every member of the community is not just allowed to participate with his or her gifts, but expected to do so.

Is a shift to Jesus’ call to servantship possible for the American church? Yes, Mr. Ford writes, but not without significant changes and potential costs. We will have to forego the superstar culture that surrounds our most visible pastors. We will have to recognize the limitations of preaching or programming in really making disciples. We will have to learn to share life together in humility—and probably in smaller groups—if the disciple apprenticeships that Mr. Ford suggests are to become a focus for us.

Mr. Ford comes across as a gentle radical, a passionate advocate for servantship who expresses his arguments in a clear way. Although UnLeader is at times repetitive and includes many examples from the author’s own experience that don’t correlate directly with United Methodist polity, it challenges our leadership addiction in refreshing and insightful ways. It is a worthwhile read for thoughtful Christians ready to question how we conceive of power and whom we entrust with it.

The Rev. Van Meter serves as director of the Wesley Foundation campus ministry at Arkansas State University. Reprinted by permission from the Arkansas United Methodist.

Bishop Earl Bledsoe, now leading Northwest Texas and New Mexico Conferences, speaks at a clergy retreat earlier this year.

What’s beyond dispute is that the episode came at a cost, including financial.

The South Central Jurisdiction recently paid nearly $100,000 to cover legal fees and other expenses of Bishop Bledsoe, as ordered by the UMC’s Judicial Council, which reinstated him last November.

That money comes from apportionment payments—in other words, from people in the pews across the South Central Jurisdiction.

Highland Park UMC in Dallas contributed another $75,000 for Bishop Bledsoe’s legal defense, from a benevolence fund.

The South Central Jurisdiction episcopacy committee, which sought to retire Bishop Bledsoe for ineffectiveness, went about $14,000 over budget due to extra meetings over his status.

“It is what it is,” Bishop Bledsoe said by phone recently. “Obviously that money could have been used for other things. I’m not so sure, given the realities of the situation, it could have been any different.”

The UMC encourages amicable resolutions of church conflicts, but this one went the opposite direction, even including, at one point, a private investigator.

That may represent another first for the UMC in an episode all agree was unprecedented, one that continues to reverberate with accusations of conflict of interest and warnings of dangerous precedents established by how things played out.

***

The Bishop Bledsoe saga is painfully familiar to many, but here’s a refresher.

Delegates to the 2008 South Central Jurisdictional Conference elected him to the episcopacy, and he was assigned to lead the North Texas Conference, at the request of delegates from there. He was the third consecutive African American to lead the conference.

Bishop Bledsoe would earn admirers, including pastors at Highland Park UMC, one of the denomination’s largest churches. They saw him as a change agent, willing to take flak for instituting long-overdue organizational reforms, and willing to support creative approaches to ministry—including their own.

But deep tensions developed between Bishop Bledsoe and other North Texas clergy over his reorganization of the conference, choice of district superintendents and handling of clergy evaluations and appointments. It didn’t help that he was in Liberia on a mission trip when a scandal broke at St. Luke “Community” UMC in Dallas, and went days before releasing a statement.

Don House

The South Central Jurisdiction episcopacy committee was led—still is—by Don House, a Ph.D. economist in Bryan, Texas. His oft-stated argument is that the long steady decline of the UMC in the United States means ineffective clergy, including bishops, can no longer be indulged.

Under Dr. House, the committee last spring used a three-part system for evaluating bishops of the jurisdiction. Bishop Bledsoe got the lowest scores, and went into a May 24, 2012 meeting with the committee knowing that, Dr. House said.

That meeting, according to Dr. House, did not go well.

“We wanted from him an acknowledgement that there were weaknesses, and we wanted to know what his plans were for improving,” Dr. House said. “His answers were way below par.”

After meeting with Bishop Bledsoe, no committee members wanted him to lead their conference, Dr. House said. He added that the committee decided it would be willing to hold a hearing on involuntary retirement, if it came to that.

Next, Dr. House and another committee member met with Bishop Bledsoe, giving him the option of retiring voluntarily or facing an involuntary retirement hearing.

The process had been private to this point, and Dr. House said the committee hoped to spare Bishop Bledsoe the embarrassment of a public airing of the poor evaluation. The committee also wanted to find him another church position, possibly as a bishop-in-residence, that would better use his talents and keep him at the same pay level.

On May 31, 2012, Bishop Bledsoe told the North Texas Conference by video that he would be taking voluntary retirement. He smiled as he said it, but gave no reason.

Some black clergy (as well as others) began to question what was happening, and at the North Texas Conference’s annual gathering they formally asked Bishop Bledsoe to reconsider.

In closing remarks of that meeting, on June 5, 2012, Bishop Bledsoe dramatically reversed course, saying he’d been evaluated unfairly and promising to “fight like the devil” to keep his job. He noted the North Texas Conference had begun to see improvement in worship attendance and other key statistics. He also reported his pain at hearing that someone in the conference had said, “When are we going to get a white bishop?”

Later, Bishop Bledsoe would write that he did not consider the effort to retire him to be racially motivated.

The episcopacy committee followed through, holding a marathon closed-door hearing in Oklahoma City on July 16-17, just before the South Central Jurisdictional Conference. Bishop Bledsoe was accompanied by clergy advocates.

Outside the hearing room, he had working on his behalf a Dallas lawyer, Jonathan Wilson, who specializes in employment disputes. Mr. Wilson provided the committee videotape depositions of North Texas Conference clergy speaking for Bishop Bledsoe, and submitted documents attacking the fairness of the committee’s evaluation and questioning whether the committee had followed church law.

Bishop Bledsoe would lose in Oklahoma City. The committee voted to retire him involuntarily (24 in favor, four against and two abstaining), and delegates to the full Jurisdictional Conference affirmed the decision by an 82 percent margin.

Dr. House had appeared before the larger group, choking back tears as he described how hard the process had been, but also reiterating the committee’s conclusion that Bishop Bledsoe was an ineffective administrator. He added that the committee had, through its dealings with him, come to question Bishop Bledsoe’s trustworthiness.

Bishop Bledsoe also took the microphone, again raising the fairness question and angrily defending his integrity against what he described as Dr. House’s “zingers.”

***

In retiring Bishop Bledsoe, the committee had used paragraph 408.3(a) of the Book of Discipline, the UMC’s law book. The paragraph says an episcopacy committee can retire a bishop “for performance,” if it’s in the interest of the church. But it doesn’t define an unacceptable standard of performance or give many details for how a committee should proceed in doing an involuntary retirement.

Jon Gray

While Bishop Bledsoe wasn’t the first bishop quietly encouraged to retire, he was the first to be subject to a 408.3(a) forced retirement. In Oklahoma City, Dr. House said an appeal of the committee’s action would at least provide clarity from the Judicial Council on how episcopacy committees can use the provision.

Bishop Bledsoe obliged by promptly appealing. Jon Gray—a Kansas City, Mo., attorney, former state court judge and former member of the Judicial Council—took over as counsel, filing a brief challenging the committee’s action generally, and specifically arguing that 408.3(a) violated other parts of the church constitution.By late summer, Bishop Bledsoe and his wife, Leslie, had moved out of their episcopal residency into temporary housing in Dallas, and awaited his day in court.

***

The first key Judicial Council action came in October. The Council had been asked by South Central Jurisdiction bishops to decide the constitutionality of 408.3(a). The Council ruled tersely that “the requisite number of votes needed for establishing unconstitutionality of 408.3(a) was not obtained.”

The paragraph remained constitutional. But the absence of affirmative language did not bode well for the South Central Jurisdiction episcopacy committee.

The Judicial Council heard Bishop Bledsoe’s appeal in November, in Phoenix, with Mr. Gray arguing for him and Dr. House defending the episcopacy committee. Within a couple of days, the Judicial Council ruled that the committee had committed “numerous violations” of fair process against Bishop Bledsoe, and had failed to follow specific requirements of 408.3(a). The Council ordered him reinstated as an active bishop, given an area to oversee and “made whole” financially.At the same Oklahoma City gathering where Bishop Bledsoe had been voted out, delegates had elected new bishops, and the episcopacy committee had made bishop assignments for all conferences. But one spot was left open—the episcopal area encompassing the Northwest Texas and New Mexico Conferences.

Early this year, Bishop Bledsoe and his wife moved to Albuquerque, headquarters for that episcopal area, and he began his new assignment.

***

Once reinstated, Bishop Bledsoe got back pay and benefits through the General Council for Finance and Administration, which handles bishops’ pay. The amount was reduced by donations Bishop Bledsoe received for living expenses while awaiting his Judicial Council hearing.

But the South Central Jurisdiction also recently wrote checks totaling $98,930.68, to cover Bishop Bledsoe’s legal fees and other expenses, said the Rev. David Severe, executive director of the jurisdiction.

They include $58,542.53 to Shook, Hardy & Bacon, Mr. Gray’s law firm; and $15,895 to the law firm Haynes and Boone, for the part of the defense overseen by Mr. Wilson. (He has since moved to another firm.)

A check for $12,596.25 went to GCFA. That’s to cover Bishop Bledsoe’s move from the North Texas episcopal residency to temporary housing as he awaited appeal. GCFA picked that up, but insisted on reimbursement from the South Central Jurisdiction once the Judicial Council had ruled against the episcopacy committee, Mr. Severe said.

The South Central Jurisdiction also paid Bishop Bledsoe $9,625.92 directly, for other expenses incurred, and paid travel expenses for the Rev. Zan Holmes ($847.73) who accompanied Bishop Bledsoe in the Oklahoma City hearing and the Rev. Larry Pickens ($1,423.25) who joined in strategy development and arguments for the  Judicial Council hearing in October on 408.3a.

That totals $98,930.68, and represents about a third of the reserves the South Central Jurisdiction keeps in case it has to have an emergency meeting, Dr. Severe said.

He noted that the controversy’s costs include the episcopacy committee going $14,000 over its budget.

Dr. Severe and the Rev. Jim Welch, who heads the Mission Council of the South Central Jurisdiction—the group responsible for decision-making between quadrennial jurisdictional conferences—agreed to the Reporter’s request to see billing records for the $98.930.68. They said that since apportionment dollars were involved, the records should be open.

The records show Mr. Gray charged $400 an hour for some work. Other services were not broken down by hour.

Mr. Gray said by phone that confidentiality requirements would keep him from sharing how much he charged.

“I think I’m OK to say that a significant reduction from my standard rate was offered,” he said.

***

Mr. Wilson is a member of Highland Park UMC, and met Bishop Bledsoe through the Rev. Paul Rasmussen, associate pastor at the church. With last summer’s drama unfolding, Mr. Rasmussen said he got a call from Bishop Bledsoe, asking for help in finding a lawyer with expertise in employment disputes.

Mr. Rasmussen would give a videotape deposition for Bishop Bledsoe, strongly defending the bishop’s work in North Texas. So did the Rev. Mark Craig, senior pastor, who complained that the episcopacy committee had not sought his input as leader of one of the denomination’s largest churches.

Mr. Craig and Mr. Rasmussen said in a recent interview that they did not commit early on to helping underwrite Bishop Bledsoe’s defense. But by August, they had learned from Mr. Wilson of mounting expenses. On Aug. 21, Highland Park UMC sent a $75,000 check to Haynes and Boone.

“I said, ‘You know, he’s going to need a defense fund,’” Mr. Craig recalled. “The bishop didn’t ask us. . . . It was just a good faith gesture to a person we thought was abused.”

Mr. Craig said the money came from a fund for the needy that he controlled as senior pastor.

“We felt the bishop was needy,” he said.

Mr. Craig emphasized that the fund comes from a single donor.

“That did not touch our budget,” he said of the $75,000. “It did not cost our congregation a dime.”

***

In describing his efforts for Bishop Bledsoe, Mr. Wilson shared with the Reporter that he had used a private investigator. He would not name the investigator, and said the cost was under $5,000.

The investigator looked into Dr. House’s professional background and found he had collaborated on church-related research projects with the Rev. Lovett Weems, director of the Lewis Center for Church Leadership at Wesley Theological Seminary, in Washington, D.C.

That interested Mr. Wilson, because Dr. House had enlisted Dr. Weems to help the episcopacy committee. At Dr. House’s request, Dr. Weems studied a questionnaire the committee used in getting input on bishops’ performance from clergy and laity in their conferences. Dr. Weems ranked the questions he thought were most important in episcopal leadership.

The episcopacy committee report detailing Bishop Bledsoe’s poor evaluation included his scores as calculated under Dr. Weems’ ranking.

On June 29, Mr. Wilson wrote the UMC’s Judicial Council, arguing that by bringing his associate Dr. Weems into the process, Dr. House had created “an inherent conflict of interest,” and tainted the evaluation of Bishop Bledsoe.

Dr. Weems, reached for this article, said he was only asked to help with the questionnaire, which was used with all bishops. He said he did not look at Bishop Bledsoe’s scores or advise the committee on Bishop Bledsoe.

“All that Don and I have done is public,” he added when told about the private investigator. “All they had to do is ask.”

Mr. Wilson said the cost of the private investigator was ultimately covered by the donation from Highland Park UMC. He said he made the decision to hire the investigator, and didn’t tell the Highland Park pastors or Bishop Bledsoe about it.

Bishop Bledsoe confirmed that he had not known an investigator was part of his defense team. He said he might not have taken all the steps Mr. Wilson did, but praised his work generally. 

“I think Jonathan was trying his best to find the truth and defend me in terms of that,” he said. “He’s a great attorney, and he was concerned about justice.”

When asked recently about Highland Park UMC having paid, unwittingly, for a private investigator, Mr. Craig said he was not upset, given that the investigation focused on possible conflicts of interest and not personal matters.

Mr. Craig continues to feel deeply that the episcopacy committee stacked the decks against Bishop Bledsoe. And if Bishop Bledsoe has backed away from race as a factor, Mr. Craig has not.

“This never would have happened to a white bishop,” he said.

***

Meanwhile, from the episcopacy committee side, there have been allegations of a conflict of interest involving Mr. Gray.

Dr. House and Jay Brim, another committee member, raised the question in a recent, unsuccessful petition for reconsideration of the Judicial Council decision reinstating Bishop Bledsoe. (They weren’t seeking to re-retire him, but rather to challenge other parts of the ruling.)

In their petition, they said that Mr. Gray had, with another former Judicial Council member, been paid to help lead a training session for the newly elected Judicial Council late last July. This was just after Mr. Gray had filed an appeal to the Judicial Council for Bishop Bledsoe.

Letting Mr. Gray do that training while he had a case before the Judicial Council “constitutes a clear and obvious conflict of interest, by implying an unmistakable bias toward that attorney and the party represented by him,” Dr. House and Mr. Brim wrote.

The Rev. William Lawrence, dean of Perkins School of Theology and president of the Judicial Council, confirmed that he arranged for Mr. Gray to help with the training and did not ask him to withdraw after the Bishop Bledsoe appeal was filed. He said Mr. Gray volunteered his time, though his expenses were covered. He noted that the training was all theoretical, not grounded in real cases.

Otherwise, Dr. Lawrence declined to comment on the conflict of interest charge.

Mr. Gray disputed it. He said Judicial Council members have an obligation to recuse if they feel themselves to be biased for whatever reason. And he noted that it’s not uncommon for Judicial Council members and parties who come before them to know each other.

“It doesn’t honor our process to suggest that members of the Judicial Council would fudge, based on who they knew,” he said.

***

Dr. House would not elaborate on his and Mr. Brim’s allegation of conflict of interest. But he was eager to talk about what he sees as the dangerous implication of the Judicial Council’s awarding of legal fees to Bishop Bledsoe.

That move encourages bringing lawyers into the church legal process, he said, and will create a chilling effect on episcopacy committees, causing them to avoid trying to retire ineffective bishops for fear of incurring large legal fees.

“The episcopacy committees are paralyzed,” he said.

Mr. Brim, a lawyer himself, foresees a legal “arms race,” and other committee members, such as the Rev. Don Underwood, worry aloud that lawyers will take Judicial Council cases on a contingency basis.

Part of the buzz about legal fees owes to a letter Mr. Gray wrote to U.S. bishops on May 14, 2012, offering his legal services on a “cost effective” basis. In the letter (a copy of which the Reporter obtained) he notes his Judicial Council background. He says he can help bishops “survive Judicial Council review” in answering questions of church law and can help them meet Book of Discipline requirements in processing complaints against clergy.

Mr. Gray confirmed by phone that he did write the letter seeking for-pay work from bishops, and considers the effort a ministry to the church.

“We would have far fewer problems if more bishops took advantage of sound legal advice,” he said.

Mr. Gray emphasized that when he wrote the letter, he did not anticipate he would get hired by Bishop Bledsoe. And in fact, he wrote it before Bishop Bledsoe’s fateful May 24, 2012 meeting with the episcopacy committee.

As for the Bledsoe case, Mr. Gray argues that the episcopacy committee bears the blame for a deeply flawed effort. It’s inconsistent with United Methodist polity and values, he said, for the same group to investigate, evaluate and decide the fate of a bishop.

“If he had robbed GCFA at gunpoint, he would have had more rights,” Mr. Gray said.

Nearly a year out, strong feelings and rhetoric are still the rule in the Bishop Bledsoe matter.

The calmest voice may be his.

“We’re just ready to put that behind us and do ministry,” Bishop Bledsoe said. “Sorry it happened.”

 shodges@umr.org

He had struggled with migraines that started around the sixth grade. When the migraines got worse in high school, his mother took him to a neurologist and he started receiving treatment that made them manageable.

Ministry to people who suffer from mental illnesses is often challenging. But those who lead the effort say it’s essential for Christians to be educated about mental health, and to then reach out. 2013 DESIGN PICS PHOTO

He was also diagnosed with depression and bipolar disorder but was seeing therapists and specialists that “he just clicked with,” said his mother, the Rev. Dr. Cheryl Magrini, a United Methodist deacon in the Chicago area. She also suffers from migraines and bipolar disorder.

In his sophomore year, Dan told his parents he needed a semester off from the University of Iowa—a mental health break—and moved home. He started seeing two doctors he trusted, Dr. Corey Goldstein and Dr. Chad Owens at Rush Presbyterian Hospital in Chicago, and began medication that seemed to change his life. He was also part of an outpatient program for young adults with mood disorders that met daily.

His suicide on June 6, 2011, was a shock to his family, friends and his doctors.

“He was starting to turn around; he made new friends and was planning to return to college. We saw none of this coming,” his mother said. “The next weekend [we were going] . . . to look for apartments in Iowa.

“My husband says that just shows the insidiousness . . . it is horrific. That deep depression is always there. That is what is so difficult for people to understand. There is no cure. Even when a person is feeling better, when life is on track, it’s still there.”

New ministry

Since her son’s death, Dr. Magrini is working to educate people on the causes of depression and bipolar disorder and to fight the stigma, fear and misunderstanding often associated with a diagnosis of a mental illness.

Her family, husband Pete and son John, started a chapter of Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance which meets at First UMC at Chicago Temple. In 2011, Bishop Hee-Soo Jung affirmed her appointment as president of the DBSA Chicago Loop chapter. She is also a peer-to-peer certified specialist of the national DBSA organization and her doctorate degree is in Christian education and congregational development from United Methodist-affiliated Garrett-Evangelical Seminary.

Cheryl Magrini

The 2012 United Methodist General Conference, the denomination’s top lawmaking body, approved a resolution stating God’s love for people with mental disabilities.

“A large part of the ministry of our Lord focused on persons with mental disabilities,” the UMC’s 2012 Book of Resolutions (Paragraph 3301) states. “Such persons are children of God and, therefore, our brothers and sisters within God’s family. The full and equal rights of persons with mental disabilities are enshrined in the Social Principles of The United Methodist Church.”

Seed planting

On May 3-4, Dr. Magrini led a pilot program offering two days of intensive training in mental health ministries for the Northern Illinois Conference. The workshop offered training for Mental Health First Aid USA and the Caring Congregations Ministry.

The Caring Congregations Ministry was developed by the founder of Mental Health Ministries (MHM), the Rev. Susan Gregg-Schroeder of San Diego. She developed Caring Congregations in consultation with the Rev. Cynthia Abrams, director of Alcohol, Other Addictions & Health Care at the United Methodist General Board of Church and Society.

Mental Health First Aid USA is managed, operated and disseminated by three organizations: the National Council for Community Behavioral Health Care, the Maryland Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, and the Missouri Department of Mental Health.

Dr. Magrini hopes this pilot program will be “seed planting” for other United Methodist conferences and churches.

The denomination’s Boards of Church and Society and Global Ministries have created a new resource for local congregations to observe Mental Health Awareness Month in May. The bulletin insert, “Faith & Mental Health—Creating Caring & Sharing Communities,” is available free as a download (http://alturl.com/ci5at/).

Watch for signs

The Magrini family has taken on a mission of education and awareness around mood disorders, particularly bipolar disorder, with young adults.

Dr. Magrini wants young people and their parents to know “there is no shame in going to see a psychologist.” Parents play such an important role, she said.

It is often hard to detect signs of bipolar disorder in teens because they are naturally going through so many changes.

She said her son Dan had many friends, was always smiling and was a straight-A student. Some of the troubling signs she detected in him were reluctance to go to school and sudden failing grades. But through it all, he was always willing and wanted to get help, she said.

Dr. Magrini said her faith is helping her cope and learn to be happy again.

“Parents, don’t feel like you failed because you are doing the best a parent can do. But you need to be on top of this, do everything you can to get your [child] to cooperate.”

The Magrini family was featured in three broadcasts by the Greater Chicago Broadcast Ministries’ Different Drummers television program. To view the segments online, go to http://alturl.com/rnufc/, http://alturl.com/dt2tb/ and http://alturl.com/etizb/.

“Living Spirit, Holy Fire”
Ruth C. Duck
Worship & Song, No. 3109

Living Spirit, holy fire,
burning bright to light our way
blaze among us and inspire
lives that praise you day by day. *

“Daddy, Daddy! Sing me that song—you know, the one about my story!”

As a 6-year-old child, I had no idea about the theological depth of Fanny Crosby’s “Blessed Assurance.” What I did have was a fascination with this idea of singing a story, my story. As the modern-day church seeks to navigate the murky waters of a culture in transition and changing understandings of ministry and discipleship, a sense of story provides an anchor on which to hold fast.

Stories pervade the United Methodist Hymnal—from the background story of each hymn writer, to scriptural stories put to music, to the story set to rhyme of the Christian identity of those who have gone before. Yet, for all the gems held in the great repository of historical hymnody, what about the story of the church in the 21st century? Who’s writing our story into song?

One present-day hymnist who has taken up this cause is Ruth Carolyn Duck (b. 1947), who is retiring this year as professor of worship at United Methodist-affiliated Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Ill.

Born in Washington, D.C., Dr. Duck spent most of her childhood in Annapolis, Md., before moving with her family at the age of 16 to Memphis, Tenn. While attending Southwestern-at-Memphis College (now Rhodes College) in the 1960s, she witnessed the events of the civil rights movement and was deeply affected by the ministry and death of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. In this social crucible, Dr. Duck forged the belief that justice is at the heart of Christian faith and practice, a theme that imbues the majority of her hymns.

In 1972, as she finished coursework at Chicago Theological Seminary and began preparing for ordination in the United Church of Christ, Dr. Duck discovered the many injustices still faced by women seeking ordination in the church. In an effort to make a difference, she volunteered for a committee putting together a collection of hymns using inclusive language. Out of this experience, Dr. Duck wrote her first two hymns, “Arise, Your Light Has Come” and “Lead On, O Cloud of Presence.”

Inspiration for composing a hymn comes to Dr. Duck through a variety of avenues. While some hymns are born out of personal experiences, others are commissioned by individuals, congregations or hymnal committees. “Living Spirit, Holy Fire,” included in the United Methodist collection Worship & Song (2011), stems from her interaction with Pilgrim Congregational Church, UCC, in Oak Park, Ill.

In an attempt to reorient the narrative fabric of the congregation, the church sought to be multicultural in life and spirit by going beyond singing on

Ruth Duck

th all its heart to love and honor all people, something only possible through the holy fire of the living Spirit.”

In “Living Spirit, Holy Fire,” Dr. Duck describes the work of the Holy Spirit through the metaphor of fire. The Holy Spirit illumines the path ahead, warms the fearful soul, and “melt[s] away the masks we wear” that hinder the church’s greatest ministry, enacted love. Though the use of fire to illustrate the Holy Spirit is not new in the Christian tradition, the naming of fire’s various functions serves to nuance the story of the Holy Spirit’s indwelling in this particular congregation and the greater Body of Christ. In blazing, the Spirit grabs the imagination. In warming, the Comforter gently prods. In melting, God’s fire exposes vulnerable places.

Yet, the story does not end with the revelation of sharing “love in action, love that’s real.” Rather, the end is not an ending at all, but a new beginning. In unity, the many parts do not burn out, but grow stronger and brighter, affirmed in the journey.

Though there may be milestones and rest stops along the way, the work of the Holy Spirit, and thus the work of the church, is an ever-continuing action of hope in God’s redemptive purpose. This is the church’s tale told in many tongues for over 2,000 years, told now by Ruth Duck in simple and powerful images that voice the concerns, the dreams and the challenges of new generations discovering a place in God’s story.

* © 2005 GIA Publications, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Ms. Hancock, a Master of Sacred Music student at Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, studies hymnology with Dr. C. Michael Hawn.

In this month of May, we in the United Methodist Church pay special attention to our heritage by observing Heritage Sunday. According to the Book of Discipline, the observance takes place “on Aldersgate Day (May 24), or the Sunday preceding that date.”

Bishop Woodie W. White

This year the observance will be on Sunday, May 19. It is a day to remember our roots as Methodists, and to reflect on how the movement has not only changed individual lives but also transformed our societies and the world.

The United Methodist Church has a rich, historical legacy. And it is not about only a single history but a collection of histories, a metaphorical quilt of remarkable vision and service in ministry—which has resulted in a still more remarkable institution. This history must not be forgotten in the midst of current stresses and the demands of the future.

It is good that we pause as a denomination for this annual occasion, but the risks, sacrifice and, indeed, the faith of our forebears should be remembered the whole year round. Since 1738, hearts have been “strangely warmed” and lives forever changed far beyond the locality of Aldersgate Street in London!

As United Methodists, we all know people in the church who have touched our lives personally. Also, the saints we never knew can make an impact because their stories of service in ministry are told to succeeding generations. So many names, events, circumstances and places come together in a colorful tapestry of Methodist heritage.

I am on the board of the African American Methodist Heritage Center (AAMHC), an organization just a little more than 10 years old. Its mission is to “to collect, preserve, protect, and make accessible artifacts, documents, printed materials, and manuscripts about African American people in Methodism.”

The AAMHC materials and, in fact, all the archives of the United Methodist Church are stored in a secure and professional manner at the United Methodist Archives and History Center on the campus of Drew University in Madison, N.J. Recently, as the AAMHC board’s new president, I visited at Drew and received a brief tour of the center from the top executive of the denomination’s General Commission on Archives and History. I saw original documents written by Methodist leaders and U.S. presidents, copies of early hymnals and, oh, so much more. What a treasure, and how reassuring it is to know this history will not be lost because others have made it their ministry to preserve it! Generations of Methodists to come will be able to glimpse the past through archives that are so well cared for and organized.

This month let us examine the vibrant history of Methodists from every region, and of every racial and ethnic background. Let us be inspired by the contributions of clergy, laity, congregations, conferences and agencies of the church.

As a United Methodist I take great pride in this legacy. Early in life, my own heart was strangely warmed and my path made clearer—and I hope my witness is more effective because of it.

When those who are yet unborn look back at the ministry and witness of 21st-century United Methodism, I pray that they will be equally proud!

Retired Bishop White is bishop-in-residence at Candler School of Theology, in Atlanta.

It’s true for all of us. Without realizing it, we spin our wheels, repeating the same behavior, until we’ve created ruts so deep that the only thing we can see around us is mud.

Missy Buchanan

Too much routine is certainly a temptation of aging, but it’s important to also remember that older adults have already experienced enormous change in their lifetime. In fact, has any generation experienced as much change over the span of their years as our oldest old? From transportation and communication to culture and social issues, the changes that have occurred in this older generation have been far-reaching and swift, historically-speaking.

However, so much change, even positive change, can leave a person feeling unsettled, off-balance and perhaps more resistant to even more change.

You may have hoped that as you age, you would somehow outgrow temptations like getting stuck in a rut, but it’s just not true. In fact, the older you become, the more on guard you must be against the temptations of aging if you expect younger generations to ask for and learn from the wisdom you have garnered over the years.

Aging will likely escalate your battle with a critical spirit. The increasing pain of arthritis, chronic health issues and feelings of loss may begin to drain your reservoir of patience. You are tempted to gripe about the way things are done now, referring constantly to the past. Or perhaps you are threatened that others are minimizing your past contributions. Before long you have turned into the bitter old man or woman you never intended to be.

There’s also a temptation to step away from ministry opportunities and church commitments. It seems that you have put in your time and now it’s someone else’s turn to step up to the plate. You begin to think that you have earned the right to sit back and watch from the sidelines. The problem is the Bible doesn’t mention spiritual retirement. Though physical changes may prompt you to find new ways to serve, don’t give in to the temptation to withdraw to your favorite recliner.

Now that you are standing on the more distant side of life’s timeline, you are also tempted to think that your value has eroded with each birthday. It’s hard not to be affected by the world’s noise constantly ringing in your ear, telling you that being old is being useless. That young is better than old. That aging is something to deny for as long as possible. It is little wonder that you are tempted to feel as though your worth doesn’t measure up to younger, active people who seemingly contribute more to the world.

Perhaps one of the greatest temptations of aging is worry. It’s understandable since there are so many things to worry about. Finances. Physical limitations. Chronic health issues. Insurance coverage. Increased dependence on others. Dementia. Loss of loved ones. Transitioning to a new home. Selling a longtime home. Dealing with a lifetime of stuff. Transportation. Children and grandchildren. Living alone and more.

Unless you are peering through a pair of rose-colored glasses, the litany of worries seems unavoidable and very real. But it is letting worry consume you that is the great temptation.

Aging brings a plethora of other temptations, too, from selfishness to regret. How easily you give into the temptations of aging depends on your willingness to first acknowledge them. So take a close look in the mirror. Are you modeling the Christ-like behavior you intend?

In the journey through aging, one thing is certain. The more closely you walk with Christ, the less likely you are to stumble into the pit of temptation.

Ms. Buchanan, a member of FUMC Rockwall, Texas, is the author of several books, including the new Joy Boosters: 120 Ways to Encourage Older Adults. Reach her at: missy@missybuchanan.com.

BATESVILLE, Ark.—This year’s Ozark Foothills FilmFest, held April 3-7, featured 34 films, one of which holds special connections for United Methodists in Arkansas.

Black Marks on White Paper, an hour-long documentary, made its world premiere April 5, with both the filmmaker—retired clergyman the Rev. Bob Hager—and the film’s subject—retired Bishop Bennie Warner—in attendance.

The film’s title refers to an observation made by young Bennie Warner the first time he saw someone reading and writing in his village in Liberia. He told his father he wanted to learn how to make “black marks on white paper,” and his father explained that people who could read and write had gone to school.

Before the world premiere screening, Bishop Warner poses next to a movie poster for the hour-long documentary that focuses on his life and work. ARKANSAS UNITED METHODIST PHOTO BY AMY FORBUS

Thus began Bishop Warner’s dream to attend school—which, when fulfilled, turned out to be at a Methodist mission. His education set him on a path to his work as a teacher, his call to ministry, election to the vice-presidency of Liberia and more.

While serving as both a bishop of his church and vice-president of his country, Bishop Warner had come to the U.S. for the 1980 United Methodist General Conference. During that time, a military coup overthrew the Liberian government, all government officials were executed and Bishop Warner was cautioned not to return lest he join them. He and his family made a new home in the U.S., serving in Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas.

The Rev. Hager, the filmmaker, first met Bishop Warner when the exiled leader became superintendent of the Camden District in Arkansas. At a clergy retreat, he and his fellow pastors learned Bishop Warner’s story.

After Mr. Hager retired, he studied documentary filmmaking at Arkansas State University. While talking with a fellow student who was working on a project about a man from Nigeria, Mr. Hager realized Bishop Warner’s life would make a great documentary: “I’ve got a story that’s in my lap!” he told his classmate. He called the bishop, and the project began to take shape.

Premiere night

Bishop Warner and his wife, Anna, who now live in Oklahoma, spent the moments before the premiere visiting with Arkansas friends, including a busload of parishioners from St. Paul United Methodist Church in Maumelle, where they served before Bishop Warner became a district superintendent.

He took some time to reflect on the experience of having his life become the subject of a documentary.

“I had to stop to look back, to learn about myself,” Bishop Warner said. “I began to look at myself in retrospect. When you are busy doing something, you don’t look back, take a back-track and see what things are going to look like.

“I’m going to have to pinch myself: ‘Is that me, really?’ It’s amazing.”

Bishop Warner had not received an advance screening of the documentary, and looked forward to seeing it along with the rest of the audience.

“I saw Blake [Lasater, pastor of Living Waters at Centerton UMC] in one interview, a clip on one of the ads, and he’s talking about me. I said, ‘Really? Did we do that? Did we really do that?’ It’s exciting, and you’re grateful to God for letting your life be a record that has meaning to other people,” he said. “You don’t start off with that in mind, but you just do what God wants you to do, and that’s the outcome.”

Mr. Hager noted that the United Methodist Foundation of Arkansas, which provided grant funding for the documentary, will provide a copy of the DVD to each charge at the Arkansas Annual Conference session, June 9-12 in Little Rock.

“You saw the long list of people in the credits,” he told those who stayed after the premiere. “Documentaries don’t get made by one person, and I’m humbled by those who have donated their time and their effort and their love.”

New Hope Academy

While Black Marks on White Paper does share one man’s life story, it also looks to the future, and the legacy that he intends to establish.

In the question-and-answer session that followed the premiere, Bishop Warner said he considers “the investment I’ve made in people” as his biggest legacy. “The way I will thank you is to keep doing the good things that you witness in this film,” he told those gathered.

One of those good things has taken center stage in Bishop Warner’s life: his work to establish New Hope Academy, which will be the first school built to serve his home village in Liberia.

“I left that village at around 15, thereabouts, going to look for a school. And now, my determination is to bring the school to them,” Bishop Warner said. “We are talking about 14, 15 different villages that the school will serve. So, who knows? Thousands of students will go through there.”

The school’s foundation and cinder block walls already are in place, and a roof is the next step toward finishing the facility. It will have classroom space for pre-kindergarten to ninth grade students, a library, a technology center and a soccer field. There also will be a health clinic, Bishop Warner said, “because sick children can’t go to school.”

New Hope Academy will be United Methodist-affiliated, like the school Bishop Warner attended. Attendees of the post-screening talk peppered him with questions about the school, and many gave donations.

He emphasized that small gifts from individuals have driven the project. After the Living Waters at Centerton United Methodist Women held a fundraiser, Bishop Warner was on his way to his car and the pastor’s young daughter, Grace Lasater, chased after him to give him 25 cents.

“You don’t know how much that means,” he said. Small gifts made possible his own church-funded education.

When Bishop Warner went to school in 1950, the tuition was $3 U.S. He didn’t have money, let alone know that he needed it. But when the missionary in charge saw that he was determined to learn, she put him on a work scholarship. She later told them that the Woman’s Society of Christian Service—one of the predecessors of today’s United Methodist Women—had given money to that mission station for needy boys and girls.

“So I say to the United Methodist Women, look at the return on your three-dollar investment,” he said. “The return on your three-dollar investment is a bishop!”

In the aftermath of a 14-year civil war, Liberians need ways to teach their children.

Bishop Warner sees education as the solution to war and global violence “because much of the unrest is due to ignorance, illiteracy and misunderstanding. If we have education, things will be better for the world. And we can do it one school at a time,” he said.

“I hope that people can be inspired that every life is worth something, and has value in it—and that people’s lives can be transformed and changed for the better,” Bishop Warner said. “And that no life is useless; it’s what you make of it.”

For more information on the documentary, visit www.blackmarksfilm.com.

Ms. Forbus is editor of the Arkansas United Methodist, where this article first appeared.

SEVIERVILLE, Tenn.—Three years ago, Susana Lopez was a translator in a furniture factory. Wilmer Lopez made a living out of laying tile and carpet.

Today, the couple is co-pastoring what might be the largest Hispanic congregation in East Tennessee, and one of the fastest-growing Hispanic churches in the United Methodist denomination.

Pastors Wilmer and Susana Lopez serve Holy Communion to all who come to the table at El Ministerio del Espiritu Santo. ALL PHOTOS BY ANNETTE SPENCE

El Ministerio del Espiritu Santo, or “Ministry of the Holy Spirit,” is located in Sevier County, a congregation of First United Methodist Church of Sevierville. The Spanish-speaking congregation worships every Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday night with an average attendance of 100 or more each night. Few of the worshippers attend all three services; most attend the night that fits their work schedules.

“It’s a noisy, wonderful time,” says the Rev. Charles Maynard, superintendent of the Holston Conference’s Maryville District. He’s describing the standing-room-only services held in the chapel across the street from First UMC’s main building, yards away from the Great Smoky Mountain tourist traffic that streams through Sevierville each day.

When El Ministerio had its first United Methodist service in August 2010, just 18 people attended.

“Within eight months, we started to grow fast,” says the Rev. Susana Lopez, age 33. It wasn’t long before church leaders yearned for more space to accommodate their enthusiastic crowd, chock-full of children.

With three children of their own, Ms. Lopez and her 36-year-old husband are pastoring a church for the first time. They’re also introducing United Methodism to a community more familiar with Catholicism. A recent Gallup poll showed that while the majority of U.S. Hispanics are Catholic, younger Hispanics are increasingly shifting toward Protestant churches.

“At first, the people were afraid of what it means to be United Methodist,” Ms. Lopez says of her congregation. They believed worship services would have to be subdued, that music would have to come from a hymn book.

“We tried to show them that we could worship in our own way, while teaching what it means to be Methodist in the Wesleyan tradition,” Ms. Lopez said.

Answering the call

Since she was 18 years old, Ms. Lopez knew that God wanted her to be a pastor. “But like Jonah in the Bible, I tried to run from it.”

Children sit at their own table during a post-worship meal and birthday celebration at Primera Iglesia Metodista Unida de Gatlinburg.

She was pressed to answer the call in 2010 when her brother, the Rev. Arturo Reyna, called about a Sevierville congregation needing leadership.

Mr. Reyna is a United Methodist pastor who helped start several Hispanic congregations in Southwest Virginia and East Tennessee, territories of the Holston Conference. He saw another opportunity after learning of a Pentecostal congregation that had been renting space from First UMC in Sevierville.

“The Hispanic pastor who started it was moving to Arkansas. He wanted to leave the church to someone who would take good care of it,” said Mr. Reyna, Hispanic coordinator for the Holston Conference, which includes 897 total churches.

Mr. Reyna knew both his little sister and her husband were gifted to become preachers. When First UMC decided to adopt the Pentecostal congregation, Mr. Reyna summoned the Lopezes from their home in Galax, Va.

“I’m ready,” Wilmer Lopez said to his wife. “Are you ready?”

Within a month’s time, the Lopez family had moved in with the Reyna family in Morristown to begin training as pastors and transforming El Ministerio into a United Methodist church.

Women and children

The new pastors quickly settled their congregation’s concerns about worship. The Pentecostal congregation had dwindled from a high of 65 to fewer than 20. The people who remained preferred to keep their loud, casual, contemporary worship with electronic instruments and several praise singers, Susana Lopez said.

At El Ministerio del Espiritu Santo, children are included and free to join in worship as they please.

The style is typical of other Hispanic worship services in the Holston Conference, including the tendency to surpass the standard one-hour time frame by an hour or two.

Children freely whirl around the sanctuary during music, preaching, and communion, joining in as they please. Inviting children to participate in communion was a United Methodist tenet the congregation accepted “quite well,” Ms. Lopez said.

However, placing a woman in a pastoral role was more of a challenge for congregants with conservative cultural and religious backgrounds. In all the churches he works with, Mr. Reyna sets up regular Bible studies to educate church members about why United Methodists ordain women, baptize babies, and so on.

“The church is growing, so there will always be newcomers,” Mr. Reyna said. “But if we train our people in Scripture, they will speak up about what we believe. Susana doesn’t have to defend herself. The others will.”

Aiding the success of the Lopezes’ leadership is the fact that they are a husband-and-wife team with a different heritage, Mr. Maynard said. Susana was born in Dallas, Texas, to a Mexican family. Wilmer was born in Atlantida, Honduras. El Ministerio is a congregation comprised almost equally of people from Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala, with a few from Puerto Rico and Venezuela.

“Not only is the congregation able to see their pastors are different in gender and culture,” Mr. Maynard said, “but Susana and Wilmer are able to relate to people differently.”

“I am the right hand, he is the left,” Susana says of her partnership with Wilmer.

Spinning forward

El Ministerio del Espiritu Santo has a busy schedule and a busy future, aided by a cast of lay members. Six days a week, the church has a 6 a.m. prayer service, attended by three to 12 people.

“We have no days off, and every sermon has to be different,” Susana Lopez says.

In April, the church had its first wedding. In May, Ms. Lopez will graduate from UMC-affiliated Hiwassee College and consider her next step in higher education.

Congregants give generously during the offering at El Ministerio del Espiritu Santo.

Last year, El Ministerio helped spin off a second congregation at First United Methodist Church in Gatlinburg, about 13 miles away. Leading the congregation are Susana’s niece and Wilmer’s brother, Edna and Marvin Lopez, another Mexican-Honduran couple. They preach to about 40 regular worshippers on Thursday and Sunday nights, largely Guatemalan and working in the tourist industry. A recent revival service drew 100 from the community to the church known as Iglesia Metodista Unida de Gatlinburg.

Soon, church leaders will have to address the problem of needing more space for the Sevierville congregation. It’s a good problem to have, says Mr. Reyna, since the Holston Conference hasn’t chartered a Hispanic congregation since 2001.

In fact, Mr. Reyna was the first pastor of the only Hispanic church officially chartered by the conference: Iglesia Puerta del Cieolo Metodista Unida, or Door of Heaven United Methodist Church, located in Galax, Va.

Since then, Mr. Reyna has helped start most of the nine other Hispanic congregations in the conference. The Spanish-speaking church in Sevierville “could be the next chartered congregation,” says Mr. Reyna, to help the United Methodists serve a growing population.

Ms. Spence is editor of the Holston Conference newspaper, The Call, where this article first appeared.

Rev. Thomas Ogletree

By Thomas Ogletree, Special Contributor…

As a lifelong United Methodist, an ordained elder in the New York Conference, and a scholar specializing in theological and social ethics, I am profoundly grateful for the efforts of Reconciling Ministries Network (RMN), their affiliate Methodists in New Directions (MIND), and similar organizations, to foster marriage equality for LGBT persons within United Methodist practices. Such equality is fully congruent with the inclusive vision of the “Mission and Ministry” of the United Methodist Church (cf. Part III, Sec. VI of the Book of Discipline), though same-sex civil unions and marriages are currently prohibited by Disciplinary rules.

Throughout most of my career I have served as a professor in theological schools and university-based divinity schools, which included terms as dean at Drew Theological Seminary and Yale University Divinity School. In these various roles I was a strong advocate for inclusive visions of the Christian mission, embracing issues of race, gender, class, national origin and sexual orientation. Given the academic focus of my ministry, I was rarely asked to conduct marriage ceremonies, so I gave little attention to Disciplinary rules that prohibited pastors from celebrating same-sex civil unions or from presiding over same-sex marriage ceremonies in states where they were legal.

However, when my son Thomas Rimbey Ogletree asked me to preside over his wedding to Nicholas William Haddad, I was deeply honored. There was no way that I could with integrity have declined his request, even though my action was designated as a “chargeable offense” by the United Methodist Discipline (cf. ¶2702). Tom and Nick are men of maturity, wisdom and integrity, and their exceptional bonds with each other have enhanced their commitments to foster a more just and inclusive society that serves the well-being of all people. Performing their wedding was one of the most significant ritual acts of my life as a pastor!

I fully embrace the basic theological commitments that undergird the mission of the United Methodist Church. Indeed, I had the honor to play a role in drafting the section on “Our Theological Task” (¶104, Part II of the Discipline, “Doctrinal Standards and Our Theological Task”). Drawing upon John Wesley’s teachings, this section emphasizes the priority of biblical authority, and it underscores the indispensable roles of tradition, reason and experience in informing our efforts to comprehend and appropriate the biblical witness. These principles are clearly incompatible with attempts to settle complex theological and ethical issues by “proof texting,” i.e., the citation of carefully selected biblical texts that allegedly provide definitive resolutions of particular issues. The self-conscious inclusion of tradition, reason and experience in our critical engagements with biblical resources actually deepens our discernment of the profound, life-transforming promises of the gospel message.

I am deeply grateful, moreover, for the opening section of the Book of Discipline, which reminds us of serious flaws and shortcomings manifest in the larger history of Methodism. Shortcomings specifically listed include our previous accommodation of racial segregation by establishing a race-based Central Jurisdiction, and our extended denial of ordination rights and prominent leadership roles for women. These unjust practices were by no means easily addressed or overcome. Indeed, the struggles to eliminate them generated serious conflicts within the church, conflicts that were only resolved by persistent efforts to press for more just and inclusive church practices.

Equally important is the Disciplinary discussion of human rights as central to the “Social Principles” of the United Methodist Church (Part IV). This text strongly endorses the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with emphasis on respect for the inherent dignity of all persons. Explicitly cited are the full rights of racial, ethnic and religious minorities; and the rights of children, young people, the aging, women, men, immigrants and persons with disabilities. The list concludes by declaring the full human rights of all persons without regard to their sexual orientations, a reference that suggests rational and experiential grounds for endorsing the rights of same-sex couples to marry.

It is in the context of these traditions that we must address current shortcomings in United Methodist polity, in particular, 41 years of prejudicial language portraying the life practices of gay and lesbian persons as “incompatible with Christian teaching,” a standard that has excluded them from ordination, from marriage and in some cases even from church membership (Judicial Council Ruling 1032). These exclusionary principles are prominent components of the “chargeable offenses” assigned to the “Judicial Administration” (Chapter 7, ¶2702). Such unjust rules, combined with the prosecution of clergy who refuse to uphold them, are themselves incompatible with United Methodist visions of inclusiveness, which call for “Open Hearts, Open Minds and Open Doors.”

To move past the crisis caused by the blemish of bigotry in our denomination, we need to give far more weight to reason and experience in our conscientious reflections on the import of the biblical message. We also need to uphold with integrity the inclusive vision that undergirds the United Methodist mission. Reason dictates that we take account of the evolution of scientific and legal understandings, which now recognize that variations in sexual orientation are a natural feature of human life. The denial of civil rights, including marriage rights, to gays and lesbians is, therefore, a violation of the U.S. Constitution. While we await the Supreme Court’s ruling on these rights, we should acknowledge as United Methodists that unprecedented numbers of leaders from other religious communities, along with significant portions of our major political parties, and virtually all of the nation’s largest corporations now embrace marriage equality. Experience teaches us, moreover, that people with gay and lesbian orientations are as fully capable of living mature and socially responsible human lives as heterosexuals. Given these realities the United Methodist vision obligates us to foster more inclusive communities, both within the church itself and the larger society as well. Such inclusiveness requires a full recognition of same-sex marriages, including an appreciation for the role such marriages can play both in fostering larger and more inclusive family networks and in undergirding a stable, just and well-ordered society.

Thus, I contend that same-sex unions and marriages are fully compatible with Christian teachings, and that we have an obligation to incorporate these understandings into United Methodist practices, even though such efforts are in conflict with the church’s existing judicial standards. For the sake of justice, therefore, I was obliged to commit an act of ecclesial disobedience, even though I now face judicial charges for acting in faithful devotion to our church’s inclusive vision.

The Rev. Ogletree is a retired UM pastor and Yale Divinity School dean. An essay answering his, by the Rev. Thomas Lambrecht, is elsewhere on our webpage.