JCM 1159

http://archives.umc.org/interior_judicial.asp?mid=263&JDID=1279&JDMOD=VWD&SN=1100&EN=1189

A question from South Carolina Conference about the authority of the General Conference Secretary to determine the number of delegates to be allowed to each annual conference under the Discipline was not answered because the Council took no jurisdiction.

Their rationale is identical in wording to several other such decisions in the recent past. I expect we’ll see it in the future again . . . and again . . . and again.
The Council provided a rationale to the requesting conference.

I happen to agree with the dissenting opinion because a decision would affect the numbers in all of the conferences with respect to the coming elections in conferences around the world as they choose delegates to General Conference.

Here there are two issues.

One, there has been a competition among the southern conferences over getting more votes at General and Jurisdictional Conferences because each vote means that much more power to elect bishops. Political power is the ambition in the southern conferences, compared to the programmatic ambitions of the northern and western conferences. So the question raised in South Carolina is a critical part of their view of church life.

Two, resolving the issue of dealing with the huge number of United Methodists in Cote d’Ivoire was put off in JCD 1128. Though not mentioned here at all, that elephant in the room haunts the church in the United States, especially those conferences in the Southeast and South Central jurisdictions. The southern church has a greater ability to understand and use power than the other three jurisdictions. The Africans may be more skilled at it and that could become a problem.

Watch for these two dynamics to return again and again to the Judicial Council over the next eight years.