January 9, 2004
A UMNS Commentary
By the Rev. Dean Snyder

The United Methodist Judicial Council has instructed people elected to annual conference committees on investigation to step aside and allow others to serve in their places if they are "unwilling to uphold the (Book of) Discipline for reasons of conscience or otherwise."

They have also ruled that people "who state that they cannot in good conscience uphold the Discipline are ineligible to serve on a (church) trial jury." (Judicial Council Decision No. 980. See http://umc.org/judicial/900/980.htm.)

It seems to me that this is a ruling that may require additional thought and discussion among United Methodists.

If serving on a committee of investigation would require me to enforce every word of the Discipline's 721 pages, without considering whether a specific line might be unjust or inconsistent with the spirit of Christ or in conflict with other deeper principles within the Discipline, I guess I am disqualified. And apparently, if I choose to interpret the Discipline differently than the Judicial Council, I must step aside, even if my annual conference has elected me to serve.

The Judicial Council's order that committee members vote the "right" way or step aside is part of a ruling concerning the Rev. Karen Dammann, a pastor who informed her bishop that she was living in a "partnered, covenanted, homosexual relationship." There were no other complaints about her ministry.

The job of a conference committee on investigation is to determine, when there are charges made, whether "reasonable grounds" exist to proceed with a trial. The Pacific Northwest Annual Conference Committee on Investigation decided that the circumstances regarding the Rev. Dammann did not provide reasonable grounds for a trial. The Western Jurisdiction Committee on Appeals chose not to overrule this decision.

The Judicial Council overruled the decisions of the conference and jurisdictional committees. It sent the case back to the conference committee with instructions as to how it should rule and included an order that anyone who could not, for any reason, comply with its interpretation should "step aside" from the committee. This kind of ruling is hard to understand.

The Judicial Council's interpretation of the role of members of committees of investigation and trial juries would seem better suited to a computer than to a human being, much less a thoughtful, prayerful follower of Jesus Christ. Our church is not as neat and antiseptic as this ruling by the Judicial Council would seem to suggest.

One of the difficulties of movements to exclude people is that they tend to spread. We begin by attempting to exclude the Rev. Dammann from ordained ministry because of her sexual orientation, her desire to be in a committed relationship and her honesty. Now we are attempting to exclude those who refuse to prosecute her, essentially barring them from positions to which they have been duly elected.

It may be frustrating for the Judicial Council to deal with real people who make decisions based on conscience, intellect, feelings, experience and their understanding of the spirit behind the church's Book of Discipline, rather than a strict interpretation of a particular sentence or two. But the church is not a machine. It is a community of praying people.

I hope the Judicial Council refrains, in the future, from these kinds of rigid, exclusionary mandates, and that it retracts this one. I hope annual conferences continue to elect committees of investigation in accordance with the disciplinary requirement that members "shall be in good standing and should be deemed of good character." I hope that members serve in a Christian spirit of love without checking their consciences, caring or intellect at the door. I hope committee members who disagree with the Judicial Council's interpretations do not step down from the responsibilities to which they have been duly elected.

Our church can stand the strain of disagreement. Our judicial process does not need to be lock step. We may even grow in grace from the tension between conference or jurisdictional committees and the Judicial Council without purging committees. Let us be patient and slow to resolve disagreements by forcing others out or into the margins. I do not think that is the kind of church we are or want to be.

In 1670, William Penn, the Quaker, was tried in England for street preaching. He was prosecuted for violating the "Conventicle Act," which prohibited any meetings for worship other than those of the Church of England. Members of the jury refused to find him guilty despite the judge's insistence that they do so. The judge ordered the jury to be locked up without food or water until it changed its verdict.

As the jurors were being led away, Penn called out to them: "Ye are Englishmen; mind your privilege, give not away your right." The jury refused to change its verdict. Those jurors' courage helped break the back of the English ban against street preaching.

My encouragement to the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference Committee on Investigation is this: "Ye are United Methodists."

United Methodist News Service
Dean Snyder is pastor of Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington and former editor of UMConnection, the newspaper of the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference.