JCM 1390

ee.umc.org/decisions/81142

A Slick “Deferral”

The Council of Bishops sought another ruling on the constitutionality and other issues related to the Traditionalists’ Plan passed at the 2019 special General Conference.  This was their third shot at it.  

They asked for a ruling when its petitions were first sent to General Conference.  The Council deferred because it hadn’t any real legal context like being on the floor with other petitions at General Conference.  

The Bishops asked about it after all the petitions were in and the Council fastidiously went through identifying the unconstitutional parts.

The TP was revised before it came to the floor.  Many observers felt the revisions  had not met the Council’s judgments but it passed anyway so the Bishops decided to challenge it again through the instant case.

The Council polled its members about the constitutionality of the TP and there were not enough who felt there was an issue on that.  I do not know if that polling was before or after the Council’s preliminary reviews of the request.  This is not the first time I vaguely recall such a polling and the Council then not taking jurisdiction.  I’m not sure about the qualitative value of any action that occurs before full discussion of the body together.  But it does save time.

The Council recognized that the Bishops’ concerns are not without merit.  They softened their decision by saying it would take up challenges to constitutionality as cases were brought about specific passages.

Note:  While everyone else calls the TP the “Traditional Plan,” I am not comfortable with it. As noted in past blog postings here, my tradition is Arminian and in that, I am strongly traditional.  So when I use the whole name of TP, I feel “Traditionalists” is more appropriate because it is a plan brought by people who call themselves “Traditional” as if their Calvinist theology is the only real Wesleyan tradition.  You probably didn’t even notice but in case you did, now you know why I “misspelled” the term.

JCD 1312

http://www.umc.org/decisions/67274

Keeping All Their Bishops

The Northeastern Jurisdiction’s College of Bishops asked the Council if there was any way to keep all nine bishops in light of the need to increase the number of African bishops and the limited resources made available to support all the bishops needed.  

Actually, they didn’t say that.  They framed their inquiry around the meaning and application of a new constitutional amendment that had been accepted from the 2012 General Conference.  The amendment changed who determined the boundaries, names, number of episcopal areas from the Jurisdictional Episcopal Committee to the Jurisdictional Conference.  But what was unchanged was that the General Conference set the parameters by which the number of bishops a jurisdiction (or central conference) could have.  What the College of Bishops appeared to be trying to do was undermine the validity of the General Conference formula, hoping to make it easier to keep all the bishops it had.  

The Council patiently provided a history of how that number had been determined in the past.  It stated flatly that if something was legitimately in the constitution, it was constitutional even if it was contrary to something else in the constitution.  The Council’s job is to reconcile those and it could in this case:

The formula for determining the number of bishops and the way to handle exceptions was provided by the General Conference (Paragraphs 16 and 404.2).  The Jurisdictional and Central Conferences define the boundaries of the annual conferences within each (Paragraph 40), and the College of Bishops makes sure every annual conference has a bishop who may also have another conference to cover (Paragraph 48).

Nice and neat, except for one thing.  The College of Bishops does not make the original assignments as stated in this decision.  The bishops are assigned to their posts by the Jurisdictional Episcopal Committee (Paragraph 524.3b).  The College of Bishops does not even make the assignments if one of their number vacates a post for whatever reason.  That is done by the Council of Bishops, though the College may nominate (Paragraph 407).

Be that as it may, the Judicial Council’s ruling stands in that the College of Bishops has no final say in how many bishops their jurisdiction may have.  Some of the bishops may end up having to serve two annual conferences until reorganization of boundaries is negotiated.

The principle of “balancing multiple authorities” is sustained because contrary constitutional passages are not necessarily contradictory.  

To my eyes, the passages were not even contrary.  Any contradictions were in the eyes of beholders who hoped for gaining power they didn’t have in the first place.

Update: The Northeastern Jurisdiction has not lost a bishop for the 2016-2020 quadrennium.  An exception was granted and changes will begin in 2020.

JCM 1303

JHYPERLINK "http://www.umc.org/decisions/64866/eyJyZXN1bHRfcGFnZSI6IlwvZGVjaXNpb25zXC9zZWFyY2gtcmVzdWx0cyIsInNlYXJjaDpkZWNpc2lvbl9udW1iZXIiOiIxMzAzIn0" http://www.umc.org/decisions/64866/eyJyZXN1bHRfcGFnZSI6IlwvZGVjaXNpb25zXC9zZWFyY2gtcmVzdWx0cyIsInNlYXJjaDpkZWNpc2lvbl9udW1iZXIiOiIxMzAzIn0

PLAN UMC REVISED

As predicted (see this blog’s post on JCD 1210), “CALL TO ACTION/PLAN UMC” with most of its worts has been resurrected to eat up time and attention at General Conference in Portland, OR, next year.  

It is still based on the presumption that the bishops have been flawless in their ministries and that the blame for the decline of our denomination lies with everyone else, especially with the General Commission on Religion and Race and the General Commission on the Status and Role of Women, which the revised plan marginalizes.  Oh yes, they also want to diminish Archives and History.  I find it interesting that the three agencies which have the facts about what is happening in the Church and have an advocacy role (history does so by just being there!) that can challenge the bishops are the principle targets of the “reorganization.”  

I do not believe it is coincidental that the Council of Bishops sent in the request for a declaratory decision.  The Council Table, a body “created or authorized by” the General Conference” (¶2610.2c), could have done it.  I really think it is the Council of Bishops’ arrogance, unrecognized by them, and rarely withstood, that caused them to try to triangulate the Judicial Council into the argument.

Wisely, the Judicial Council has deferred any decision on the constitutionality of Plan UMC Revised.  They have thus avoided being sucked into the argument.  They are waiting to allow other plans to be presented before they decide on the constitutionality of Plan UMC Revised.

They did not say the request was hypothetical.  They have jurisdiction since a request for a declaratory decision may be prospective when the decision directly affects the work of the conference addressing the issue.  

I believe the same arguments laid out in JCD 1210 will make this “revision” unconstitutional, primarily that it directs bodies to give up their constitutional authority to other bodies.  That would be how decision-making and financing are put into the wrong hands.

We live in tumultuous times.  It is sorely tempting to let someone else handle the difficult decisions rather than fight the good fight in democratic processes.  There are those who believe all authority resides with them and would love to take over decision-making to make it easier for the rest of us and to make it easier to make decisions.  What a blessing these self-identified “servant leaders” can bestow upon us by accepting the power we don’t mind letting slip away.  That’s how autocracies devolve from democracies.

I could be incorrect about my presumption that Plan UMC Revised is unconstitutional.  The Council may actually think it is okay and are just postponing having to say so.  An endorsement at this time would ease the railroading of it through General Conference.  In any case, I hope the wise heads among the delegates will do a better job of identifying causes for whatever malaise there is in our Church and provide better solutions than the top-heavy Plan UMC Revised offers.

Postscript:  The Judicial Council occasionally does things that seem counter-intuitive.  In this case, it has to do with who is actually the appellant.  

In a case a few years ago, a bishop was appealing his being dropped from episcopacy.  When questions related to his case went before the Council, however, he was not considered the appellant.  The bishops who pushed for his unseating were.  In that case, the advocate failed to bring the questions in writing and the College of Bishops did!

In this case, the ones most critical of the Plan UMC Revised were not considered the appellants.  In fact, they were not even allowed to address the open hearing of the Council.  The Council of Bishops pre-empted criticism of Plan UMC Revised by bringing the question of constitutionality and none of the ones who were identified as parties to the request were actually arguing against it.

JCD 1272

http://www.umc.org/decisions/59633/eyJyZXN1bHRfcGFnZSI6IlwvZGVjaXNpb25zXC9zZWFyY2gtcmVzdWx0cyIsInJhbmdlLWZyb206ZGVjaXNpb25fZGF0ZSI6IjEwXC8yNVwvMjAxNCJ9

HANDLING OF CENTRAL CONFERENCE ADAPTATIONS OF THE DISCIPLINE

A pastor in Northern New York Ammual Conference thought that Paragraph 101 should have been acted on in 2012 as a constitutional amendment rather than being passed as simply a law.  It was added in 2012 as a means of identifying what of the Discipline is adaptable and if so, how.  The pastor wondered about limiting adaptability to only some of the Discipline where before Central Conferences had broader options for adaptation.  He wondered if the Standing Committee on Central Conference Matters should have authority to change the Discipline even to adapt it for local conditions without having constitutional authority.

He put together a request for a declaratory decision about these concerns.  The conference forwarded them to the Judicial Council.  The Council could have refused jurisdiction because it was not directly related to the work of that annual confeence.  However, upon consideration, the Council decided that even though it was not specific to the life and ministry of Northern New York, it raised a constitutional question seeking clarity of a law that impacts all annual conferences.

Perhaps the Council anticipates the time when the United States will be in a position to seek adaptaton through the Standing Committee on Central Conferences or its successor.  Otherwise, they could have just stopped at clarification of constitutionality as sufficient grounds to take jurisdiction.

The Council affirmed the right of the General Conference to put into law the principles established in the constitution, spelling out in this case, just how adaptation may be done, what may not be adapted (mainly the constitution, faith statements, and the Social Principles), a relatively small part of the Discipline, and who may do it.  They ruled Paragraph 101 was constitutional.  Just as Paragraph 20 of the consitution identifies the right of trial and appeal, it takes Paragraphs 2701-2719 to spell out that right and the processes that properly fulfill Paragraph 20’s intentions.

Paragraph 101, please note, directs the standing committee to return the General Conference of 2016 with recommendations about which parts of the main body of the Discipline may also not be adapted.  That too will be based on whether adaptations fulfill the related constitutional articles or not.  

Look for a lot of requests for clarification in the future!  Each continental segment of Central Conferences may need to have its own Judicial Council in order to take the load off the current Council when that begins to happen.

May 1 - Guaranteed Appointment Removed

The Council of Bishops has been deeply concerned about incompetent pastors and removing them because they were the obvious cause for the malais of the denomination. Every bishop, foreign or domestic, raised the question with me, “What do we do about incompetent pastors?” See the posting below entitled “Incompetent Pastors.”

Having worked with many pastors identified as incompetent by their Cabinets over the years, I saw that those who were really incompetent got removed sooner rather than later.

Those who were competent either walked away, wiping the dust of the UMC off their shoes as they walked out the door, or stayed and fought. The bishops had a hard time with the latter.

They had judged the pastor and now the pastor was disagreeing with them! That shouldn’t happen. No one should disagree with as Christian, hard-working, and conscientious a person as their bishop.

Why should the system slow down the process of removing them outright, especially in “right-to-work” (right to fire-at-will) states? Bishops have the authority to fire-at-will Local Pastors simply by not giving them an appointment.

That kind of power is needed to unload pastors who are too old (50 or older males) so that women and ethnics can replace them. That kind of power is nice to have to deal with the ones who are not loyal to the bishop (those who raise question at conference, advocate for a pastor in trouble, or disagree openly or in writing with something the bishop says or does).

For this General Conference, the bishops again sought the right to remove incompetent pastors by seeking an end to guaranteed appointments for the ordained members of annual conference. The presumption is that then the bishops would not have any more problems and the church should wax strong again, unencumbered by lousy pastors.

That Tuesday morning, the legislative committee and then the General Conference gave the bishops the removal of the words “guaranteed appointment.” And in effect, the legislation allows bishops to choose to place an Elder into a part-time ministry or to not appoint a pastor at annual conference.

BUT NOT UNTIL AFTER JANUARY 2013 when the new Discipline goes into effect.

But there are two things that the bishops did not ask for. One is that the legislation has been referred to the Judicial Council for consideration of its constitutionality which will be ruled on in late fall. I expect a very carefully thought through decision from the Council since Dr. Lawrence is a real Discipline wonk and will not allow any carelessness to be featured in the decision. And I will not predict what that would be.

The other thing the bishops did not anticipate, as I understand the legislation, was that while a pastor can be put involuntarily on transitional leave for up to two years, the Cabinet then has to document why that pastor may not then return to be appointed. They could not get away from having to prove incompetence sooner or later.

Practically speaking, they can dump a pastor any time they want. They do already, contrary to the Discipline. But some pastors are pretty motivated by unjust treatment and will follow all the options they have to fight what they see as unjust. If they don’t walk away the first week, being out for two years will not stop their seeking to return to full appointment status. The confrontations and processes have only been put off.

If the Judicial Council feels the change is unconstitutional, the bishops are right back where they started from.

Will any of them learn creative imagination to re-examine their presumptions and find wiser and more Christian alternatives? Will they realize their own role in discouraging pastors into unenthusiastic ministry?