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By Lonnie Brooks
A couple of things that seem to me to be important have now happened at the General Conference since my last report. First in a move that was predictable, given the polarized nature of this event, in keeping with the polarization of the whole Church, the Committee on Reference that is charged with overall management of the petition process declared on a hugely one sided vote that any petition that was submitted by an individual, local church, or annual conference that has subsequently left The United Methodist Church will be declared to be invalid and will not be processed.
While that point of view is defensible, it leaves some important questions on a theoretical basis that have practical implications. Sometimes petitions are submitted by an individual who dies before the General Conference convenes, and such a person is no longer a United Methodist. Moreover, many of the people who have recently withdrawn from the Church, some because their beloved local church of a lifetime's ministry or even multigenerational ministry to their family, withdrew, submitted petitions that became United Methodist law long ago. Are we now to go into our Book of Discipline to discover such law and expunge it from our law? Historically we know, for example, that two of the greatest of our early Christian theologians of the young church, Tertullian and Origen, both were declared to be heretics after most of the work for which they are celebrated had been done. And the church has never seen fit to declare their work tainted by what happened to them later in life.
This strongly seems to me to be following the fallacious path known in analysis of forms of argument as the "poison the wells" approach. People often resort to this method when they can't successfully refute the merit of the opponent's argument. So, in the alternative, they argue something like, "You know that my opponent is an untrustworthy person who associates regularly with people who are nefarious and wrong headed. So, that means you cannot trust anything that comes from that source." You might recall that Jesus's opponents used that argument against him claiming that he regularly associated with prostitutes, tax collectors, and other sinners and didn't even fast as the good people did.
In a move that was a bit of a surprise, one of the committees that processes legislation prior to its being sent to the full plenary for final decision had on its slate five of the many petitions dealing with regionalization of the Church. It approved all five of them by overwhelmingly one sided votes--a large enough margin to put them on what is called the "consent calendar." Being on the consent calendar means that it will be one of many petitions included in a block, and there will be no debate permitted in the plenary session on either the whole block or on any petition thereon. When the consent calendar is presented, the vote will be called, and all of the items on it will be accepted or rejected. A consent calendar is always approved.
This strongly suggests that regionalization will be passed by a large margin, probably including even those petitions that call for amending the Constitution. But all the regionalization petitions that call for amending the Constitution will have to face ratification votes in the annual conferences, and that's likely to be tougher sledding for this concept.
Lastly, today was when all the legislative committees elected their officers, and though not all of them have reported yet, the trend seems to be strong that the Progressive wing of the Church is running the table and capturing all the leadership positions. That's understandable, given that most of the disaffiliations and withdrawals from the Church have been Traditionalists and Conservatives.
