{"id":1144,"date":"2012-05-03T17:09:30","date_gmt":"2012-05-04T00:09:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/gc2012\/?p=1144"},"modified":"2012-05-03T17:45:10","modified_gmt":"2012-05-04T00:45:10","slug":"judicial-council-ruling-invalidates-change-in-episcopal-fund-apportionment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/judicial-council-ruling-invalidates-change-in-episcopal-fund-apportionment\/","title":{"rendered":"Judicial Council ruling invalidates change in Episcopal Fund apportionment"},"content":{"rendered":"

A decision to have each of the five U.S. jurisdictions of The United Methodist Church separately bear the cost of episcopal leadership was deemed \u201cunconstitutional\u201d in a May 3 ruling by the denomination\u2019s top court, which reverses General Conference approval given on the consent calendar.<\/em><\/p>\n

By Linda Bloom*<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The United Methodist Judicial Council also found action that authorizes the General Council on Finance and Administration to negotiate apportionments with designated missionary conferences and the annual (regional) conferences of the central conferences outside the United States to be in violation of the church\u2019s constitution.<\/p>\n

Judicial Council Decision No. 1208 referred to action taken by consent May 1 during the 2012 General Conference on the apportionment formula. Apportionments are the portion of the financial gifts collected by local congregations that support general church ministries.<\/p>\n

Report 8 from the church\u2019s finance agency was amended in committee action to remove the Episcopal Fund \u2014 the fund that supports the U.S. bishops \u2014 from the general church funds apportioned to all annual conferences.<\/p>\n

Members of the council were acting on a request from the United Methodist Council of Bishops for a declaratory decision on the \u201cconstitutionality, meaning, application or effect\u201d of the legislation, Calendar Item 479.<\/p>\n

One of the duties of the nine-member Judicial Council is to determine the constitutionality or legality of acts of the General Conference.<\/p>\n

Oral hearing<\/strong><\/p>\n

During a May 3 oral hearing in the Judicial Council meeting room at the Marriott Waterside, several bishops spoke in response to the Council of Bishops\u2019 request, along with Bonnie Marden, who spoke on behalf of the interjurisdictional committee on episcopacy.<\/p>\n

As the principal spokesperson for the bishops, Bishop Warner Brown said that body believes the adopted legislation \u201cdirectly impacts the role of bishops as general superintendents,\u201d which is their primary identification.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not just ministry to those who can afford to pay for it, it is ministry to all,\u201d Brown declared.<\/p>\n

He argued that a bishop becomes a general superintendent of the church before assignment to residential responsibilities. The council has general oversight for the entire church and authority over all matters connectional, Brown pointed out, including defining the powers, privileges and duties of the episcopacy, adopting a plan for support and providing for retirement or discontinuance because of \u201cunacceptability.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alabama-West Florida Area Bishop Paul Leeland said the Book of Discipline, the denomination\u2019s lawbook, does not give jurisdictions authority to negotiate or administer episcopal salaries. \u201cIf the paymaster were the jurisdictional conference, then it would create a regionalism that would undermine the historical life of the episcopacy,\u201d he declared.<\/p>\n

Mardon said the interjurisdictional committee on episcopacy believed the amended formula to be a transition from a connectional system \u201cto a direct bill concept\u201d that \u201cfeels contrary to our polity.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Don House, representing the financial administration legislative committee, disputed the \u201cdirect bill\u201d description, saying the amended formula is \u201ctrying to create an incentive among the jurisdictions to be aware of the amount of money they pull out of the episcopal fund.\u201d<\/p>\n

The incentive would be a reduction in the number of bishops by each region to control costs. In recent years, he pointed out, annual conferences have used the same strategy by reducing the number of district superintendents as a way to ease budget pressures.<\/p>\n

House said he believes the authority to determine how the church makes apportionments \u201cbelongs to GCFA.\u201d Allocating responsibility for the Episcopal Fund to the jurisdictions does not change how the episcopacy functions or how funds are spent, House added. \u201cAll it does is address the way the funds are collected.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Contrary to the constitution\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

In its decision, the Judicial Council said that while General Conference \u201cprovides the legislative process for action on the Episcopal Fund,\u201d it cannot delegate authority to another body, delegate any legislative powers to subordinate bodies or take action \u201ccontrary to the Constitution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Court members agreed with the Council of Bishops that jurisdictions have no constitutional authority \u201cto bear responsibility for funds that are collected otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nor does General Conference or subordinate bodies, such as the General Council on Finance and Administration, have constitutional authority \u201cto engage in negotiating the apportionments of church funds,\u201d the ruling said.<\/p>\n

In this case, that refers to negotiations with the Rio Grande Annual Conference and the Alaska, Red Bird and Oklahoma Indian missionary conferences, along with the annual conferences of the central conferences.<\/p>\n

The constitution specifies \u201ca unified superintendency and episcopacy,\u201d the council pointed out. \u201cThe proposal in Calendar Item 479 creates a funding mechanism which is dependent upon raising funds from jurisdictions and that invades and undermines the \u2018unified\u2019 nature of the episcopacy.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the church\u2019s finance agency has the authority to recommend apportionment formulas, \u201cthe constitutional authority and legislative responsibility for these matters remain with the General Conference, which cannot delegate or assign them elsewhere,\u201d the Judicial Council ruling stated.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*Linda Bloom is a United Methodist News Service multimedia reporter based in New York. Follow her at\u00a0http:\/\/twitter.com\/umcscribe<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 ornewsdesk@umcom.org<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A decision to have each of the five U.S. jurisdictions of The United Methodist Church separately bear the cost of episcopal leadership was deemed \u201cunconstitutional\u201d in a May 3 ruling by the denomination\u2019s top court, which reverses General Conference approval given on the consent calendar. By Linda Bloom* The United Methodist Judicial Council also found […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1145,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[88,87,10,31],"class_list":{"0":"post-1144","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-umns","8":"tag-constitution","9":"tag-episcopal-fund","10":"tag-gc2012","11":"tag-umns"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/disciple-wesley.jpg?fit=800%2C558&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-is","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1144"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1147,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1144\/revisions\/1147"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}