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Letters to the Editor

Serving the Lord
The overview of General Conference 2008 in the May/June issue was great. It provides a concise way to share the results of General Conference actions to laity and clergy alike who are asking about what happened. I even spoke to one brother who was ready to leave the United Methodist Church, but after going over the summary, he decided to stay and serve the Lord through United Methodism. I have ordered 50 copies of the magazine for our annual conference display table because it is such an important issue.

Dale Shunk
Western Pennsylvania Annual Conference

 

Making new disciples
I have never felt the desire to voice my opinion about issues involving the United Methodist Church until this year, after reading the May/June 2008 issue Good News. I am the wife of a semi-retired (never to retire) UM pastor in the Virginia Conference. Perhaps my professional life as a risk analyst and commercial loan officer for a major Virginia bank has prepared me for desiring structure in all aspects of my life. As a Sunday school teacher, Christian Education Director, etc., in our local church I feel the same need to have structure with grace and love.

I am finding it more and more difficult to see how we as United Methodists are having a positive influence on making new disciples for Christ. As long as our central issue is the issue of homosexuality, we will never have a positive focus. In his article “God is beyond lobbying,” Riley Case stated “…the church has moved beyond General Conferences in the past and will hopefully move beyond Fort Worth 2008.” I do not believe that we can. We must settle this issue once and for all before we can focus on directing people to Christ.

For ten years we have battled this and it becomes more divisive every year. We cannot rewrite Scripture. Whether we like what God has to say or not, it is our Book of Instruction. Fortunately, General Conference renewed the statement that homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching. However, the practice of the church goes on in support of homosexuality without any regard to this statement. What kind of message is this sending to our local churches when we have pastors in the pulpit who are openly homosexual? What kind of message are we sending when we have bishops who support this movement and when we are permitting the homosexual movement to ridicule and desecrate all that is holy within the church?

We did not make the rules—God did. We have only to abide by them; and that is the way we make disciples. We show the world that we are different people because we have the Spirit of the Living God within us changing us into his perfect will. Thank you for your work in this endeavor. May God bless each effort!

Mary Wright
Via e-mail

 

2012 delegates
Both my wife (who was at General Conference as an observer) and myself as a delegate enjoyed your excellent review of what happened in Fort Worth.

Your last point on Page 5 (May/June)isn’t totally correct. While we voted down the petition to set the size of General Conference to between 500 and 600, we left in place the current language that allows a General Conference of only 600. I will be surprised if there are more than 800 delegates in 2012 and that’s being optimistic. Any downsizing shifts influence to the smaller conferences as they still get two delegates, regardless of the total size.

Kevin Goodwin
Delegation Chair
Peninsula/Delaware Annual Conference

 

Appearance of evil
I must respectfully, but strenuously, disagree that the cell phone gifts were appropriate. When a group that does lobby for specific actions gives a substantive gift to voting delegates, there is a strong message that the delegates should support the group's agenda. This message does not have to be explicitly stated or intended for it to be very real. It does not make much difference whether you abused the position of power the gift put your group in. It does not even make much difference whether the message of coercion was intended by the gift givers; intentions are not ultimate adjudicators of right and wrong. Scripture tells us to avoid even the appearance of wrong, and to a reasonable outsider your actions did not even attempt to avoid the appearance of evil.

A gift of cell phones to central conference delegates was appropriate, but not from your group. It should have been made by a group that does not lobby at general conference.

Richard Fitzgerald
Wellsville UM Church
Wellsville, Kansas

 

Local pastors
Many thanks to John Montgomery for his article “No Room at the Table: A Case for Local Pastor Rights,” March/April Good News. This is a subject which cries out for wider discussion. Having been on the faculty for Licensing School for Local Pastors for well over a decade, I have had the privilege of meeting and teaching many local pastors in the Western Jurisdiction, and mentoring some of them. I see local pastors as a source of hope for the UM Church, destined to play a greater role if the church is to be revived.

Montgomery is correct to assert that formal education (i.e. the Mdiv.) does not necessarily assure that a person has the “gifts and graces” to be an effective pastor in the UM Church.

Pastoral leadership can never be a strictly academic endeavor. A formally trained and educated clergy is of great value, but it cannot be at the expense of results. Montgomery points to a significant factor in church decline: too many of our pastors, though seminary trained, have not “the gifts and graces” for leading, renewing, and building up the Body of Christ. I concur. Some of our local pastors do a better job of leading our congregations than a number of our elders. The key need, whether it be an elder, a deacon (moving toward elder’s orders) or a local pastor, is finding Spirit-led, energetic, biblically guided leadership for our churches. Admittedly, defining “gifts and graces” is open to interpretation, and that is the responsibility of District Committees on Ordained Ministry and Conference Boards of Ordained Ministry. Those committees and boards would be wise to look for guidance in the Bible and John Wesley’s writings.

Montgomery posits a two-tiered hierarchy of pastors with unequal rights (and compensation): elders and local pastors. In truth we have a three-tiered system, the episcopacy being the third tier. Bishops are elders but serve a different function than most elders. Unfortunately their functional difference has morphed into an ontological difference. We have allowed them to assume a position of privilege above elders (and local pastors) in a variety of areas (accountability and compensation come to mind). In sum, we treat them as a completely separate (and superior) class as compared to elders and local pastors. (This is not the case in other Methodist churches.) Perhaps further discussion of church leadership and orders of ministry should include the role of the episcopacy in relation to renewal, church growth, and church planting. All levels of the church are in dire need of Spirit-led, energetic, biblically guided leaders for the twenty-first century.

Richard Thompson
First United Methodist Church
Bakersfield, California

 

UM alcohol and drug ministries
I beg to differ with Howard Lydick’s letter to the editor in the March/April 2008 issue. The General Board of Church and Society and the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church are not only doing something about alcohol and drug problems but they are doing it together in a very effective way! As of March 2008, as a result of their collaboration, there are thirty-three United Methodist congregations in seven states doing alcohol and other drug abuse prevention, education, referral assistance, recovery support, and advocacy activities, and there are more congregations scheduled to be trained.

A United Methodist team in Davenport, Iowa, reaches out to young people in the community, offering them a place to talk about alcohol and drugs and advocating for a safe recreational area. A United Methodist pastor in Aberdeen, Maryland, shares with other clergy her team’s “Recovery Connection,” a ministry in which church members support those who are moving through stages of recovery from addictions. In San Antonio, Texas, a team is doing prevention activities with all ages of children and youth. In Snellville, Georgia, the team, commissioned by the pastor and congregation, are committed “to be a ministry of presence serving individuals and families afflicted and affected by addictions, promoting prevention and healthy lifestyles, and affirming recovery.”

According to over 2100 congregational surveys from 23 United Methodist churches, people in United Methodist pews are ready for this ministry. Seventy-four percent think it is very important for their congregation to help those with alcohol and drug problems and over eighty percent want the church to offer prevention programs. In an historic move forward, both boards of the United Methodist Church, with the assistance of the Faith Partners congregational team approach developed by a United Methodist lay person, cannot be said to be uninterested or uninvolved. Thanks be to God.

Trish Merrill, Director
The Rush Center of Johnson Institute
Austin, Texas

 

Demonizing viewpoints
As a pastor, I serve people whose theology and politics may differ greatly from my own. Both as pastor and as Christian, I am asked to love them deeply—period. In reading letters and articles in the March/April issue of Good News, I am reminded of ways in which we—often those with leadership responsibilities—violate this mandate from God. I will cite two examples from the recent issue.

Mark Tooley, writing about a given group’s perspective on the Virgin Mary, draws this sweeping conclusion: “…the Religious Left always strains to reduce Christianity down to a lobby campaign for the domestic statist  causes de jour.” One of the ways in which we demonize those whose viewpoints differ from our own is to lump them into some broad category: Left Wing Liberal, Conservative, Evangelical, Religious Left, Religious Right, etc, etc. Most of us are not so easily pigeon-holed. On some issues I see myself as quite “traditional” or “conservative,” while on other matters I may be more “liberal.” None of those boxes are all that comfortable or comforting, however, and most certainly are not helpful in encouraging an atmosphere of open and loving dialogue.

In the same issue, John Montgomery offers a passionate and informative article about the “rights” of local pastors as now defined by our Discipline. I am one of those local pastors whom he describes as “highly educated” (which does not necessarily equate with highly intelligent), entering licensed ministry after a long career in academia. I am also one of those persons who, when denied the right to vote on delegates to General Conference, did indeed experience feelings of disenfranchisement. However, I do not fully subscribe to Mr. Montgomery’s conclusion that “only because local pastors are not seminary graduates are we being denied benefits and privileges.” Having attended Course of Study (COS) classes, I have had first-hand encounters with classmates whose intellectual curiosity and/or capacity, interest in, or connection to their chosen denomination (which many are quick to criticize while readily accepting its benefits, including COS) are all open to question. But then comes this sweeping condemnation: “In general, they [local pastors] support biblical authority, placing their faith in the Lord, not a liberal institutional surrogate.” In other words, in general we local pastors are the good guys, while those other people (seminarians, mostly) are not even people of genuine faith. Once again, the issue is reduced to an us verses them mentality, one that I hear ad nauseum at COS. I do not suppose that Mr. Montgomery sees any irony when later he asserts: “If we are the body of Christ, we might start by acting like Christ towards all of our clergy.”

I too have been guilty of dismissing those whose understanding and practice of faith, or politics, differ from mine. And yet I am increasingly aware of the damage which results from such practice. It renders impossible any constructive, open, and Christ-centered dialogue. I appeal to Good News and to its contributing writers to seek higher ground.

Piet R. Knetsch
Big Springs UM Church
Lecompton, Kansas

 

Evaluating the legacy
My sincere congratulations for a superb 40th Anniversary issue (November/December 2007)!

It is interesting that your successful four decades of the revitalization of United Methodism parallels the incompetent, feckless liberal leadership of our denomination. Church historians will be anything but kind when evaluating that legacy. Like the leaders of the American “Big Three” automobile companies, the official Church has been in denial and has been producing a “product” that has not been selling. Thank you for keeping faith with Methodism’s Wesleyan tradition and its evangelical and orthodox heritage.

Best wishes to the continued success of Good News!

Walter W. Benjamin
Via e-mail

 

Incisive observations
Bishop Willimon (January/February 2008) outlined some incisive observations concerning the current spiritual condition of the church and society. As he describes, making people feel good about themselves is not only a cultural condition but a necessity for speaking to a “Me” generation. While Jesus speaks about his relationship to God, his teachings constantly point out how we are to live our lives here and now. Guides for living are an essential part of both the Old and New Testaments so that preaching about them completes the Christian message. Bishop Willimon seems to downplay this important aspect of the gospel in favor of emphasizing preaching about the Trinity.

Should we not also meet this generation with those same teachings that Jesus would have us do in order to be believers? Happiness is found in not only hearing the word of God but obeying it (Luke 11:28). Telling a congregation about the real strength of humility (Luke 14:7-14) and how to settle legal problems (Luke 12:57-59) is exactly what Jesus did. The surprising thing about these 2,000 year old instructions is how relevant they still are. Not to elaborate on the everyday demands of the gospel is perhaps what Dietrich Bonhoeffer was referring to as “cheap grace.”

John Wesley was disliked most for changing people’s lives through Christ, e.g. having Welsh miners spend less time and money in the taverns. This could be called a “hard sell” in today’s consumer-oriented society.

Robert Moser
First United Methodist Church
Madisonville, Kentucky

 

Expected more from Good News
The March/April 2008 issue of Good News carried the article “Why Christians Should Care About Creation,” and I read the article with great interest. Sadly, I read it with the same interest I might read a publication from Sojourners or our own Methodist Federation for Social Action.

The author, Matthew Sleeth, M.D., begins his article with a heart-wrenching story of eight-year-old Etta who died of an asthma attack one hot, sultry day in Washington, D.C. The pain Dr. Sleeth felt at her passing was (and is!) real and still close to his heart. He ends the story with the phrase, “She died of air pollution on that summer day.”

Now, I am not a physician, but I seriously doubt whether “air pollution” is a recognized cause of death. But even if it were, the solutions that Dr. Sleeth recommends are predictable and formulaic. As a way of preserving the great creation God has given us, he sites “downward mobility,” and we may look with some admiration on the hospital chief of staff who moves from his “expensive home” into “a house the exact size of our old garage,” but for many Americans that would mean living outside or moving their family into a structure little bigger than a dog house. Many of us already serve in communities where downward mobility is not an aspirational choice but a cruel reality forced on them by the closed factory or shuttered mine—sometimes even closed due to well-intentioned environmental regulation.

Predictably, Dr. Sleeth laments our dependence on imported foreign energy. Unfortunately, his proposed solutions are just as predictable. He implicitly condemns SUVs yet never mentions the economic collapse that would overwhelm some communities in the wake of their decreased production. Every Subaru Legacy, for example, is produced right here in Lafayette, Indiana.

He endorses green-friendly “efficient light bulbs.” These are the corkscrew-shaped CFLs (compact fluorescent lights) we now see in stores. On one hand these do reduce the consumption of electric energy, and that is good, but what Dr. Sleeth fails to mention is the dangerous amounts of mercury contained in each bulb. The contents of these bulbs are so dangerous that in the event a consumer breaks one of the bulbs in his or her home, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recommends an 11-step cleanup procedure (epa.gov)! Can we say the expanded use of such a product is really an improvement?

Dr. Sleeth correctly identifies many problems with our dependence on imported energy, but he never even considers the possibility of using our domestic resources such as increasing Alaskan oil production or tapping into our own offshore reserves, just as China is already doing not far off the Florida coast.

Europe is often cited as the paradigm of environmental virtue, and as of September 30, 2007 even the European Union draws 35 percent of its electrical energy from nuclear power. Yet all Dr. Sleeth can recommend for the United States is the increased use of environmentally dangerous mercury-filled compact fluorescent lights.

According to the EPA’s own publication, Protecting the Environment: Thirty Years of Progress: Major air “pollutants have been cut by more than half—from 273 million metric tons of annual emissions to 133 million metric tons. The reductions for individual pollutants are just as impressive. Over the same period, emissions of lead decreased 98 percent, volatile organic compounds (contributors to ground level smog) 54 percent, carbon monoxide (CO) 52 percent, sulfur dioxide (SO2) 49 percent, and nitrogen oxides (NOx) 24 percent. Perhaps most impressive, these reductions in air pollution came during a period of robust economic growth. Between 1970 and today, the U.S. economy grew by more than 187 percent, the number of vehicle miles traveled in the United States increased by 171 percent, and U.S. energy consumption grew by 47 percent” (usinfo.state.gov).

It’s clear. In order to be good stewards of God’s creation we need not force ourselves into ever smaller and more dangerous vehicles. Perhaps it’s an inconvenient truth, but as the EPA reminds us, it is possible to grow an economy, create jobs, and raise the standard of living while at the same time reducing major pollutants.

Yes, God has given us a grand creation, and we are called to be faithful stewards, but faithful stewardship calls for creativity and ingenuity, not mere repetition of the same predictable canards we’d hear from the Methodist Federation for Social Action or Greenpeace. I expected more from Good News.

Bob Land
United Methodist elder
Centerville, Indiana

 

Ignoring theology
Your editorial, “Recovering Our Wesleyan Theology” (September/October 2007), brought to mind an incident. I was once accosted at Annual Conference by a pastor, who had received his theological degree from Asbury Seminary. He objected to my “liberal’ theological views. “Don’t you know that it is the conservative churches that are growing?” he asked.

I replied that the Methodist Church was growing in the fifties and was not conservative. He was surprised by this answer and admitted that it caused him to re-think his views on theology and church growth. Being an honest guy and willing to think, I appreciated his response.

Since I have been attending congregational development seminars to learn about transitioning an aging church to a renewed and vital one, I am surprised by how little theology of any stripe is discussed. I wonder why we continually hear that theology is so critical to the growth of a church, if church developers largely ignore it. The stress is on methods and personal “affinity groups,” not beliefs held in common. The Church of the Resurrection in Kansas is often held up as a spectacular example of church growth, but its theology is liberal. In fact, I might say that church growth practice today is based more on the sociology of religion than New Testament ecclesiology and practice, which brought together Jews and gentiles (non-affinity groups).

Of course, if church growth is supposed to prove a theology true, it proves too much. Churches grow for various reasons, most of which have nothing to do with their theology. Would United Methodists want to admit the truth of Mormonism just by the fact that it is growing fast? That is theological pragmatism gone to seed.

Not that I am against recovering our Wesleyan theology, but I do not know how you distinguish “recovering” from “repristination.” This is a distinction with a real difference in reality.

Repristination swallows Wesley’s teachings whole, “feathers and all” (Luther). It does not ask what in his teaching we can honestly affirm in light of modern questions and thought; in big words, the hermeneutical task. If we are going to hang “Methodist” on our signs out front, we need to have a Methodist form of spirituality. I think we can agree on that. Where we disagree importantly is in how we understand Wesley’s teaching of free grace.

I once quoted Wesley’s answer to question 23 in the “Large Minutes” to another conservative Asbury graduate, in which Wesley denies all “natural free will.” He told me that Wesley believed in free will and, if he wrote that, it was a slip he didn’t mean.

What I think this shows is that even the most conservative among us have been influenced by modern doctrines of autonomous free will to the point that we cannot understand what Wesley really meant in his teaching on free grace. Theological arrogance will hardly clarify this or give us a Christian self-understanding like Wesley’s.

David McCreary
Faith United Methodist Church
Grand Island, Nebraska



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