United Methodism re-envisions marriage and ordination

By Heather Hahn

July/August 2024

Without debate, General Conference removed The United Methodist Church’s ban on the ordination of clergy who are “self-avowed practicing homosexuals” — a prohibition that dates to 1984.

During the morning plenary May 1, General Conference approved the change alongside 22 pieces of legislation on the consent calendar, which allows delegates to pass multiple petitions in bulk if they have overwhelming support in legislative committee and have no budgetary or constitutional impact.

The vote on the consent calendar was 692-51, with approval at 93 percent.

Supportive delegates and observers applauded after the vote.

Also on the consent calendar, delegates voted that superintendents are not to penalize clergy or churches for holding — or refraining from holding — same-sex weddings.

Another change approved exhorts the Council of Bishops to be inclusive of gender, race, ethnicity, age, people with disabilities, sexual orientation and economic condition in naming representatives to ecumenical organizations.

It should be noted that nothing passed by General Conference or under consideration would compel churches to receive a gay pastor. The legislation approved also explicitly protects the right of clergy and churches not to officiate at or host same-sex weddings.

Marilyn Murphy, an observer from the South Carolina Conference who has seen the church debate this issue for decades, said she was surprised it was embedded in the consent calendar but not surprised it passed.

“We’ve been going on like this since the ’70s and, finally, in just a brief few minutes with no debate, it was gone. And now we can get on about the business of the church.”

An ordained deacon in The United Methodist Church, the Rev. Leo Yates serves as accessibility and inclusivity coordinator for the Baltimore-Washington Conference and as pastor at Magothy United Methodist Church of the Deaf. He is at General Conference serving as one of the Deaf interpreters for delegates and visitors.

“I feel like this is a year of jubilee,” Yates said. “This has been a long time coming. So many of us have lived under this yoke and have waited for this (ban) to be removed.”

Yates is married to the Rev. Giovanni Arroyo, who serves as top executive of the United Methodist Commission on Religion and Race and is a clergy delegate to General Conference from the Baltimore-Washington Conference.

“Of all the days for this to pass,” Yates said. “I’ll probably cry when I get back to the hotel.”

Without Debate

Without debate, delegates voted by 667 to 54 for the changes on the day’s consent calendar, which allows the lawmaking assembly to approve multiple pieces of legislation in bulk. To make it onto the consent calendar, petitions must receive no more than 10 “no” votes in legislative committee and have no implications for the denomination’s budget or constitution.

Changes approved on the April 30 consent calendar:

• Remove a ban on annual conferences and denominational agencies from giving United Methodist funds to any “gay caucus group” or using funds to “promote the acceptance of homosexuality.” Instead, the provision now says annual conferences and agencies should honor the denomination’s commitment not to reject lesbian or gay members.

• Eliminate the requirement that the General Council on Finance and Administration, the denomination’s finance agency, enforce the ban. Instead, the provision says the agency should ensure that church funds do not go to anything that rejects LGBTQ people or limits the response to the HIV epidemic.

• Strike the ban on boards of ordained ministry from even considering candidates without evaluating whether they are “self-avowed practicing” gay people, and strike the requirement that bishops rule gay candidates ineligible.

• Erase the mandatory penalty of at least a one-year suspension without pay for clergy found guilty of officiating at same-sex weddings or unions. This was the denomination’s only chargeable offense with a mandatory penalty.

• Allow gay clergy in good standing to be appointed across annual conference lines when their bishop can’t locate an appointment in their conference.

• Set a moratorium on judicial proceedings related to the denomination’s bans against “self-avowed practicing” gay clergy and same-sex weddings. The moratorium will last until General Conference alters it.

The day’s consent calendar also removed provisions in the Traditional Plan that banned bishops from consecrating gay bishops and ordaining gay clergy, and it removed changes that the plan made to the denomination’s complaint process aimed at empowering the people making complaints.

–Heather Hahn is assistant news editor at UM News

 

Concern and jubilation

By Jim Patterson

The mood was mostly jubilation in the hastily arranged celebration in a courtyard at the Charlotte Convention Center on a sunny and temperate North Carolina afternoon.

“I’m deeply troubled, because the church has deviated from the faith,” said the Rev. Jerry Kulah, a Liberia Conference delegate and coordinator of the traditionalist Africa Initiative, in an interview away from the courtyard celebration. “I’m going to deeply reflect and determine how long I can bear with this.”

The Rev. Chang Min Lee, pastor of Los Angeles Korean United Methodist Church and president of the Korean Association of the United Methodist Church, also expressed concerns about the vote to United Methodist News.

“For most Korean American churches that are traditional, we are concerned about today’s vote, but at the same time, we are pleased to see that the legislation approved this morning also explicitly protects the right of clergy and churches not to officiate at or host same-sex weddings.

“While we recognize that this decision will cause some confusion and difficulty for Korean American churches, we will continue to pray and work to move forward to lead the mission of The United Methodist Church in the providence of God, who is ‘greater than all’ (Ephesians 4:6).”

But for many, the prevailing mood was one of “deep, deep gratitude,” especially for all the activists who kept the faith for years, sometimes decades, said Helen Ryde, a home missioner and a Reconciling Ministries Network coordinator.

“We’re celebrating something that hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people have worked for in this moment,” Ryde said. “We got here because of the so many people who worked hard. Some of them are not here anymore.”

Many people who wanted to serve God were prevented from doing so because of the ban, said Bishop Ken Carter of the Western North Carolina Conference.

“It was harmful to people,” Carter said. “It was not helpful to the church’s mission, and the body, with an almost unprecedented consensus, removed it.

“It’s like removing something harmful from the body, that frees the body to be healthy.”

The Rev. Adam Hamilton, a Great Plains Conference delegate, mega-church pastor and author of bestselling books on aspects of Christianity, also welcomed the church’s on inclusivity for LGBTQ persons.

“In 1972, we singled gay and lesbian people out and created exclusionary language for them, and we’ve been fighting ever since,” he said in an interview in the convention center. “For 52 years, we’ve been a conflict-driven church and today we’ve become once more a mission-driven church and a church that’s saying everyone’s welcome in our congregations.”

Hamilton added, “I’m really proud of The United Methodist Church and I’m proud to be a United Methodist today.”

–UM News

Reaction to LGBTQ approval votes

By Sam Hodges

United Methodist bishops famously have neither voice nor vote in General Conference decision-making, but they have had plenty to say since delegates moved this week to change the church’s official policies on homosexuality.

Their tone and points of emphasis have varied, with some clearly feeling exultant.

“This is a historic day that has been decades in the making,” said Iowa Conference Bishop Kennetha Bigham-Tsai on May 1, in a video posted after delegates lifted a ban on LGBTQ ordination. “We have finally beaten our swords into ploughshares.”

Northern Illinois Conference Bishop Daniel Schwerin shared in a Facebook video that he was celebrating the General Conference actions.

“I’m so grateful for the freedom, the justice and mercy for our LGBTQ siblings and for those who love them,” he said.

Other bishops acknowledged that the actions of this General Conference will have a mixed reaction in the churches they oversee.

“I know that some of you are celebrating, some are mourning and some are uncertain about what your future holds — for the denomination, for your local church and perhaps even for yourselves as followers of Jesus Christ,” said South Carolina Conference Bishop Jonathan Holston.

In areas hard hit by disaffiliations, bishops stressed what the changes mean — and what they don’t.

“First, pastors have always decided who they will marry,” said Tennessee-Western Kentucky Conference Bishop William McAlilly in a written message to his conference. “This has not changed. Pastors will continue to decide who they will marry. There is no mechanism in conference leadership nor desire on my part to determine who a pastor will marry.”

Bishop David Graves of the Alabama-West Florida and South Georgia conferences noted in a statement that petitions to change the church’s position on human sexuality were approved on the consent calendar, reserved for non-controversial legislation.

“While it might seem unusual for such a significant topic to be voted through on a consent calendar, it represents a spirit of love and unity,” he said in a statement. “This General Conference has placed a considerable amount of trust in the legislative committees, which met last week. There has been very little debate about most petitions because the committees were thorough with their work.”

Graves also addressed the matter of pastoral appointments.

“Let me clarify that a church is not required to receive a gay pastor,” he said in a statement. “Like any clergy appointment, an extensive consultation process will happen between the local church, district superintendent, cabinet, bishop and (staff parish relations) committee to ensure the church and incoming pastor are honored

Bishops from the central conferences — church regions in Africa, Europe and the Philippines —  offered comments to UM News on General Conference’s move toward full LGBTQ inclusion.

North Katanga Area Bishop Mande Muyombo said that African United Methodists will continue in a traditional understanding of marriage as between one man and one woman. But he said that this General Conference’s passage of regionalization legislation will enhance Africans’ ability to be “authentic” in their faith while remaining in connection with United Methodists who see things differently.

“I see a great future for The United Methodist Church in Africa,” he said.

East Africa Area Bishop Daniel Wandabula applauded regionalization but said the church’s new stances on human sexuality “will have a legal, spiritual and ministry impact on some of our countries in Africa.”

He added, “While I do not know the extent of the impact that these petitions will have on the UMC in the East Africa Area, I know that as we continue to live in the new realities of The United Methodist Church, we will have to develop new ways of partnerships and doing ministries together.”

Bishop Christian Alsted gave a European United Methodist perspective in an email response.

“General Conference’s decisions on regionalization and of giving the central conferences authority to set policies and boundaries for marriage, ordination and licensing for ministry and enabling them to delegate the same authority to annual conferences will empower the global church to move forward out of decades of conflict into a time with renewed focus on our mission to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world,” said Alsted, who oversees the Nordic-Baltic Episcopal Area.

Many bishops have underscored the generally harmonious spirit in Charlotte.

Texas Conference Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey presided in the late afternoon plenary of May 1, and she told delegates she still had a touch of post-traumatic stress disorder from having presided during the contentious 2019 special General Conference in St. Louis, when restrictions against full LGBTQ inclusion were tightened.

Harvey was feeling differently this time around.

“Y’all, we are making history. We are making history,” she told delegates as the plenary wrapped up. “And I believe this is that new thing that the prophet Isaiah talks about in Isaiah 43. … I pray that you perceive it, that you recognize it, that you receive it as a gift, because God is doing a new thing, certainly in this General Conference, this United Methodist Church and certainly in each of us.”

Heather Hahn, Jim Patterson, and Sam Hodges wrote these news stories for UM News. Image: Bishop David Graves of the Alabama-West Florida Conference presides over a debate about the United Methodist Church’s stance on marriage during the 2024 United Methodist General Conference in Charlotte, N.C. Delegates affirmed ‘marriage as a sacred, lifelong covenant that brings two people of faith into union with one another and into deeper relationship with God and the religious community.’ Same-sex marriage is now allowed by the United Methodist Book of Discipline. (Photo by Mike DuBose, UM News.)