Nov. 26, 2002
Listening posts show Holy Communion important to United Methodists
By United Methodist News Service

NASHVILLE, Tenn. —The sacrament of Holy Communion is important to United Methodists, though understandings and practice vary widely.

Nearly 100 clergy and laity from six annual conferences in the Southeast Jurisdiction made that determination as they provided reactions to a paper being developed by the denomination’s 19-member Holy Communion Study Committee. During the committee’s Nov. 13-16 meeting, participants engaged in a "listening post" to share their concerns about the sacrament and what each hoped would be the result of the study.

One of the consistent concerns voiced was the need to keep the communion table open to all. The study committee has struggled with how to uphold the "open table" as practiced by United Methodists, along with the classical order of the Christian sacraments — baptism leading to communion. Committee members have learned from earlier listening posts that United Methodists have passionate opinions about Holy Communion even though understandings and practices differ.

The committee is conducting listening posts in each of the five jurisdictions of the church and individual members are holding sessions in representative central conferences in Europe, Africa and the Philippines.

The 2000 General Conference mandated the United Methodist Board of Discipleship form a Holy Communion study committee to bring to the 2004 session a comprehensive paper on the theology and practice of Holy Communion. Committee members reflect the diversity of the church’s theological spectrum, racial and ethnic makeup, and also include representatives from the denomination’s Board of Higher Education and Ministry, Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns and Council of Bishops.

"The aim of the committee as it deliberates is to create a ‘centrist’ document that paints in clear strokes the fullest and best of our United Methodist Holy Communion tradition, both our theology and practice, " said the Rev. Dan Benedict, a committee member and Board of Discipleship executive.

In earlier meetings, the committee agreed that it was not charged with changing the ritual of the church as contained in the denomination’s hymnals and book of worship or with generating legislation. Benedict said that while the proposed paper may at points identify practices that "are not compatible with our understanding, the intent is to create a positive vision of what Holy Communion can be in United Methodist churches."

The Nov. 14 session indicated that participants clearly want pastors to be better trained and more effective as leaders and teachers who interpret the sacrament to congregations. United Methodists want a study document that church members can read and understand, Benedict said. They want the church to provide clear guidance in relationship to the Lord’s Supper and to provide print and electronic resources for learning their way into vital Eucharistic celebration.

Several deacons present asked that the paper be clear about their role in Communion. To the surprise of some, one GenXer who was selected by his table to be a panelist, made it clear that he was looking for tradition and mystery in celebrations of the Lord’s Supper.

In another session, the committee made significant progress on the question of the invitation to the table. Members agreed that a middle way had to be found that honored the "open table" as a welcome to all and "that upholds recognition of the nature of Christian discipleship inherent in sharing life in union with Christ’s sacrifice for us," Benedict said.

The key to dealing with the question seemed to revolve around the nature of the invitation as Christ’s welcome and call to all who "do truly and earnestly repent of your sins and are in love and charity with your neighbor, and intend to lead a new life, following the commandments of God…," he said, while quoting invitation found in the Word and Table IV service of the United Methodist Hymnal.

While the language is yet to be worked out, the committee was ready to affirm a necessary balance of an open welcome with a clear invitation to a disciplined life.

The committee’s work is currently represented in three documents: a comprehensive list of the contents to be covered and two drafts called "This Holy Mystery" that were developed out of questions dealt with at the second and third meetings of the committee. These papers can be found and responded to at www.umcworship.org, the Board’ of Discipleship’s worship Web site.

The Rev. Gayle C. Felton, a Discipleship consultant who was the lead writer for the denomination’s interpretive pieces on Baptism, is the principal writer for the Holy Communion Study Committee. She will compile several pieces into one document by early January.

The committee will next meet March 6-9 in Evanston, Ill., hosting a listening post there on March 8. The final meeting of the committee will be June 16-19 in Oklahoma City, Okla.

Information from this article was adapted from a committee report compiled by the Rev. Dan Benedict, a staff member of the United Methodist Board of Discipleship, Nashville, Tenn.

top


Dec. 3, 2002
Free newsletter enables churches to reach members easily
By United Methodist News Service

Local churches have a new way to reach the people in their congregations: a free newsletter developed by United Methodist Communications.

The newsletter is provided by e-mail as a template that can be filled with local church news and sent out electronically or by postal mail to congregation members. The template includes space for a pastor’s message, local church calendar, prayer concerns, feature stories and other content. It also offers denomination news from United Methodist News Service.

"We want to encourage local churches to tell their own stories and to find easy, economical ways to tell those stories," said Garlinda Burton, director of United Methodist News Service, which developed the newsletter template. "With this tool, a congregation doesn’t need a big budget or staff to have a quality newsletter."

Local churches can offer the newsletter to their members on a weekly or monthly basis. The eight-page monthly template is already available, and the four-page weekly edition will follow in January. Both will be e-mailed as Word documents, suitable for editing on PC or Macintosh.

The newsletter is designed for ease of use by churches of all sizes, small as well as large. Step-by-step guidelines enable a church staff member or volunteer to put the newsletter together regardless of level of experience. Frequent tip sheets will offer additional advice on designing a lively, sharp-looking publication.

The versatile template will allow the church to be as creative as it wants with the design. Each edition will include two locked-in features – the UMNS briefs and a box that promotes United Methodist Special Sundays, churchwide funds or other programs.

Congregations can subscribe to the newsletter by going to http://umns.umc.org/newsinpews/default.asp online. For more details, write to newsinpews@umcom.org.

top


Nov. 27, 2002
United Methodist dialogue addresses budget woes, opportunities

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) – Finances, a topic that often engenders misunderstandings, provided the basis for surprising discoveries of common ground when representatives of various groups gathered to talk about the United Methodist Church and funding.

The Nov. 21-22 dialogue was organized by the denomination’s General Council on Finance and Administration and served as a prelude to the agency’s regular annual meeting that continued through Nov. 23.

For the first time people who work within the church’s financial structure at conference (regional), churchwide and agency levels brought their different perspectives on a perceived "disconnect" between the churchwide budget voted by General Conference delegates every four years and the understanding of the rest of the church.

Together with members of the monetary agency-- also a cross section of denomination members -- the participants gathered in dialogue groups to brainstorm about financing the mission and ministry of the church and share their mutual concerns about this task from local to global budgets.

Representatives of almost every annual (regional) conference in the United States including conference treasurers, heads of conference councils on finance and administration, district superintendents, pastors and lay leaders, found financial similarities with the officials from the 16 churchwide agencies.

"We are more alike than different," said the reporter from one dialogue group.

All levels of the church are struggling with the rapid acceleration of insurance costs, noted another as the groups sought to identify what the agency termed "budget drivers." Health care is an issue that is not limited to the church, commented others. The dialogue participants urged the denomination to address the issue throughout society, where more people are finding themselves without health benefits, as well addressing the issue as a budget item related to church personnel and retirees.

Several groups said they wanted to see the church’s budgets reflect core values for ministry instead of being driven by fixed costs, such as increases in health and liability insurance. Many noted the need to prioritize and delete items that are low in priority rather than crippling every program with across-the-board cuts.

Concern about demographics and membership was partly an expression of a sense of mission and partly anxiety about the income side of budgets. The need for membership growth was noted, along with various possible strategies to reach the baby boomer generation and younger generations.

"Are we losing members because of confusion about who we are?" asked one group.

Tension between what appears to be an increasing desire to do mission locally and the church’s calling as a global church was highlighted. Several groups affirmed the importance of having a churchwide structure to do the things individual congregations or even individual annual conferences could not do effectively, such as creating curriculum, establishing Africa University or launching "Igniting Ministries."

The need for better communication was a frequently heard plea. In many ways, people said that the church and its agencies need to speak the "language of the pew" and reiterated their confidence in the support that comes from church members when reliable, clear information is shared.

The dialogue groups expressed a desire for more stewardship education for clergy and laity, more leadership training in the theological basis of stewardship, and fresh ways to retell the good news to new generations and to share traditions with new members from non-Methodist backgrounds.

"Every agency and ministry is important," said Bishop Alfred L. Norris, Houston, in opening the day and a half of dialogue.

As president of the finance agency, Norris lamented the anti-institution attitude abroad in the land; but he declared, anything that has two or more people involved is an institution. He cited marriage as an example. The question is how to best serve Christ, he said.

The Rev. Bruce C. Birch, dean of Wesley Theological Seminary, Washington, asserted that all the people participating in the dialogue share concern for being the best stewards of the church’s resources.

"The role of steward begins with a vision," he said. Because this is a broken world, "the vision always needs renewal." When Moses was told to go bring his people out of Egypt, he was inclined to count the cost rather than serve the vision, Birch observed.

"Deliverance is not straight into the Promised Land; it’s into the wilderness," he pointed out. That wilderness was a place of hardship and struggle, but it was also a place of renewal, Birch added. The story of God’s manna teaches that "abundant life is not the life marked by excess but by enough," he said while emphasizing that institutional structures are not an end but exist to serve the mission.

As the small groups began looking at the church’s budgetary problems, similarities were recognized --whether in a small local church or in a church agency-- and some statements of appreciation were sounded. At one point a group of churchwide agency representatives said they wanted local churches to know their contributions were appreciated and that the agencies do not take budget issues lightly. Another group noted that many budgets are more than 50 percent personnel costs, and that it is important to recognize and value the church’s workers.

When one dialogue group made its final report, its spokesperson praised the respectful tone of the conversations, and added the hope that it carries over to the 2004 General Conference.

Sandra Lackore, the denomination’s treasurer and the finance’s agency’s top executive, said the agency is working with several annual conferences to help them assess their financial health.

In dealing with traditional business, voting members authorized the staff to implement a program of electronic fund transfer across the five U.S. jurisdictions. The plan, which has been tested in a pilot program since June, will offer individual church members a method of giving contributions to their local churches by checkless bank transfers just as many households use this method to pay bills.

The finance agency also took the following actions:

• Approved financial plans for the fourth Global Gathering, the fifth Historical Convocation, a national adult ministries event and JUSTPEACE conflict transformation team training and gave contingent approval for another JUSTPEACE gathering;
  
• Granted approval of spending plans for 2003 for the churchwide agencies and programs with a few stipulations;
  
• Approved sets of loan guidelines including those to assist annual conferences with legal expenses, central conference bishops and general church agencies; and
  
• Agreed to a special offering for the World Methodist Council on May 18, 2003, and referred the matter to the executive committee of the Council of Bishops for their approval.
  

Voting members approved several personnel matters affecting employees of the churchwide agencies. One proposal would have added to the ethics statement that all church agency employees sign requiring agreeing to adhere to the ethical standards of the Social Principles. It was defeated after some floor discussion. Objections included a lack of clarity about how the principles relate to the work of employees, whether this would preclude employment of non-Christians in support or custodial positions and if it might lead to witch hunts.

top


Nov. 26, 2002
U.S. must intervene in Middle East conflict, returning pastor says
By United Methodist News Service

The United Methodist pastor held in an Israeli prison after being involved in a confrontation between Palestinian villagers and Israeli soldiers believes it is imperative that the United States intervene in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"I firmly believe that unless intervention occurs, Israelis will continue to be victimized by suicide bombs and Palestinians will continue to be threatened and jeopardized by Israelis," the Rev. Gordon "Gordy" Hutchins of Tieton, Wash., told United Methodist News Service in a Nov. 25 interview. "Nobody wins."

The 46-year-old pastor was one of 10 non-Palestinians arrested Nov. 15 when residents of Jayyous, in the West Bank, tried to stop Israeli bulldozers from clearing land for a security wall. He was held at Massyahu Prison in Ramle before being abruptly released the evening of Nov. 19.

Hutchins said Israeli authorities never returned his passport or gave him an account of the charges against him. But with the help of the U.S. consulate, he was able to fly to Seattle on Nov. 21, where he spent the night before returning home to the Yakima Valley the next day.

Hutchins is a member of the denomination’s Pacific Northwest Annual (Regional) Conference, which is led by Bishop Elias Galvan. The bishop himself had traveled to Israel-Palestine last February with three other bishops and two of the church’s top staff executives as part of a fact-finding mission to the Middle East and Pakistan.

At that time, Galvan and Bishop Clifton Ives of West Virginia issued a statement stressing the importance of the Christian community in the United States and elsewhere to support Christians in the Middle East and to encourage the United States to protect the rights of both the Israeli and Palestinian peoples.

"I have encouraged people to visit Palestine," Galvan told United Methodist News Service. "I encouraged Gordy to do that. I believe that we, as Christians, need to stand with our sisters and brothers in Palestine. They need to know we are concerned for their safety and their future."

Galvan said he was distressed that the situation in the region had continued to deteriorate since his visit and added that he believes the current policies of the Israeli government will not lead to peace

top



Dec. 10, 2002
Church’s silence on HIV/AIDS spells death, leaders warn
By Melissa Lauber

WASHINGTON (UMNS) – More than 200 people from black United Methodist churches gathered in the nation’s capital to discuss how the church’s silence around HIV/AIDS is killing people.

"If we stay silent, we’re killing people. Silence with HIV/AIDS means death," said Noemi Fuentes, a staff executive with the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries. The board, along with the Baltimore-Washington Conference, sponsored the open discussion on AIDS and the Black Church at the Washington Plaza Hotel Dec. 6-7.

Keynote speaker Dr. Joycelyn Elders, a former U.S. surgeon general, described the crisis that the disease has created during the past three decades.

African Americans make up 12 percent of the population in the United States, but 59 percent of women with AIDS are African American and 65 percent of teens with AIDS are African American. By 2005, Elders said, 60 percent of all AIDS cases will be African American.

"And in the church, we’re still deciding whether we want to talk about it or not," said Elders. "The day you see the truth and cease to speak is the day you begin to die."

Fuentes acknowledged that the Baltimore-Washington Conference is one of the more outspoken, active annual conferences in the AIDS arena. However, Bishop Felton Edwin May cautioned against complacency and simple good intentions.

"In the church, we identify, process, debate, codify, print and believe it’s done. We have spoken," Bishop May said. "By the time the ink is dry, we are exhausted."

He expressed concern that the church is in denial about AIDS and noted that actions speak louder than words.

"The Word has not value until it is wrapped in flesh and blood," said the bishop. He encouraged the participants to become "living prayers" in the battle against AIDS.

Elders also urged the church to act with "mountain-moving faith." She shared the story of how the United Methodist Church changed her life by giving her a scholarship that took her from the cotton fields of Arkansas to a college campus.

She served as the nation’s surgeon general in the Clinton administration but had never seen a doctor before she went to college.

"You can’t be what you can’t see," Elders said. "You’re the visionaries of our society. You’ve got to be voicing a vision for the poor and powerless."

Elders also took the church to task for allowing the AIDS virus, a medical condition, to become a sin. She questioned people’s uneasiness about discussing sex in church settings and their unwillingness to advocate the use of condoms to prevent the spread of AIDS.

"I agree condoms will break, but vows of abstinence break far more easily," she said.

At a Bible study during the conversation on AIDS, Randy Bailey, a professor at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, stressed the importance of allowing honest discussions about sexuality within the church, especially from the pulpit.

In a lively discussion, Bailey, a Hebrew scholar, showed participants his interpretation of how the first part of the biblical book of Esther is a homoerotic story.

"The ways in which we read a text can limit us or free us to become involved in ministry," said Bailey. By denying or distorting human sexuality, the church stigmatizes the very people with whom it seeks to be in ministry, he added.

He shared how he spent time trying to convince his brother, who had AIDS, that God still loved him when the church indicated otherwise. He also pointed out God’s absence in the book of Esther. "Where is God in all this?" Bailey asked. "How do we live through situations where it seems God is not speaking?"

Christians practice an incarnational faith, he said. "We have to demonstrate God’s presence," and find God in the "unacceptable one."

Following the Bible study, a panel discussion on AIDS and a series of workshops were held, which included opportunities to explore ministering to the deaf community.

"That was intentional," Fuentes said, noting that AIDS infections rates in the deaf community are four times higher than those of the hearing community.

Miscommunication about AIDS is a huge problem, said Harry Woosley, a deaf activist from Christ United Methodist Church of the Deaf in Baltimore. Within the deaf community, misunderstanding the signs for positive and negative has spelled the difference between life and death, Woosley said.

People have died and others have delayed medical treatment because they believed themselves healthy when they saw the sign for positive conveyed to them in American Sign Language as they were being diagnosed for HIV/AIDS.

In 1989, Woosley discovered he was HIV-positive. "There was no counseling, no discussion. The doctor told me I was HIV-positive and left the room, left me alone in the room."

Conditions for deaf people with HIV/AIDS have changed, but not nearly enough, said Woosley, who is a caseworker for deaf people with the Family Services Foundation.

Woosley has an act he takes on the road. It’s very graphic and includes teaching deaf participants safe-sex practices.

Everything with deaf people must be visual, he stressed. Deaf people don’t hear about AIDS in movies, on television or radio. Most read at only a third-grade level, so they tend not to read newspapers, magazines or closed-captioning on their televisions. "It’s person-to-person. That’s how the message about AIDS is spread," Woosley said.

"I don’t have time to be embarrassed. I’m not polite," he said. "That’s a waste of time. There’s no time for games."

The Rev. Joseph Daniels of Emory United Methodist Church in Washington, agreed. Local churches can no longer afford to be silent or inactive about AIDS. "We just need to do it," he said. "We need to open our doors and get to it."

Lauber is associate editor of the UMConnection newspaper in the Baltimore-Washington Conference.

top



Dec. 11, 2002
United Methodists join war protest near U.N.

NEW YORK (UMNS) – About a dozen United Methodists were among the 100-odd demonstrators arrested Dec. 10 near the United Nations while protesting a possible U.S. war with Iraq.

Following an interfaith rally that drew more than 200 people, some of the demonstrators engaged in an act of nonviolent civil disobedience by blocking the front entrance of the U.S. Mission to the United Nations. About 12 to 15 United Methodists, mostly clergy from the denomination’s New York Conference, were among those arrested by New York police and charged with disorderly conduct. Others arrested included Ben Cohen, a co-founder of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, and Daniel Ellsberg, the peace activist involved in the Pentagon Papers scandal of the Vietnam War era.

The Rev. Bryan Hooper, pastor of Washington Square United Methodist Church and one of those arrested, said police were cordial as they placed plastic handcuffs on demonstrators, who spent several hours in holding cells before being processed and released.

The Rev. James Fitzgerald, a United Methodist currently serving as minister for mission and social justice at the interdenominational Riverside Church, declared that religious people should not be silent about the fact that a war with Iraq makes no sense.

"I think the rush to war is poisoning the soul of America," he told United Methodist News Service just before the interfaith rally began. "Instead of having a war on terror, we should have a war on the root causes of terrorism."

The Rev. Richard Parker, a retired United Methodist clergyman, seconded the need "for us to have a strong United Methodist witness against a pre-emptive strike at this time."

It is precisely because the U.S. government seems focused on going to war that "we need to stand up and say no," added the Rev. Sarah Lamar-Sterling, pastor of Nicholas United Methodist Church in Trumbull, Conn.

All three were among those arrested after the rally.

The demonstration in New York was one of many being sponsored across the nation on International Human Rights Day by United for Peace, a coalition of 70 peace and religious groups. Endorsers of the civil disobedience action in New York included the Methodist Federation for Social Action, National Council of Churches and Church World Service. The Rev. James Lawson, a retired United Methodist pastor and well-known civil rights leader, led the training for that action.

"We’ve seen in New York what violence does to people," said the Rev. Carol Cox, New York District superintendent, who attended the rally but was not involved in the police action. "As a Christian and a Methodist, I can’t see perpetuating violence as a way of solving problems."

A full-page ad in the Dec. 4 edition of The New York Times, bought by a new coalition called "Religious Leaders for Sensible Priorities," urged President Bush to "turn back from the brink of war on Iraq" and noted that such a war "would violate the tenets, prayers and entreaties of your own United Methodist Church bishops."

Although it mentioned him only by title and not by name, the ad also quoted Jim Winkler, chief executive of the United Methodist Board of Church and Society, who said, "It is inconceivable that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior and the Prince of Peace, would support this proposed attack."

The Rev. Richard Deats, a United Methodist pastor who serves as communications coordinator for the Fellowship of Reconciliation, pointed out that the threat of U.S. unilateral action against Iraq bypasses a tradition of negotiation on such issues, working through the United Nations and world community.

"Saddam Hussein has been demonized to the point of obsession," he said of Iraq’s leader. "We don’t see the human face of the Iraqi people."

_{Back to the Top}