{"id":147,"date":"2012-04-18T11:00:34","date_gmt":"2012-04-18T18:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/gc2012\/?p=147"},"modified":"2012-04-18T17:17:37","modified_gmt":"2012-04-19T00:17:37","slug":"gc2012-will-the-umc-say-i-do-to-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/gc2012-will-the-umc-say-i-do-to-all\/","title":{"rendered":"GC2012: Will the UMC say \u2018I do\u2019 to all?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Kathy L. Gilbert*\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

A UMNS file photo by Mike DuBose.\u00a0The communion chalice, broken at the 2004 General Conference in Pittsburgh in protest of the church’s stance on homosexuality, was mended and returned to the altar as a symbol of healing.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

11:00 A.M. ET April 18, 2012<\/p>\n

Impassioned pleas, protests and prayers. Broken chalice, broken hearts. An altar draped in black, a same-sex wedding, arrests, amends and a statement of unity.<\/div>\n

At each General Conference for more than 40 years, The United Methodist Church has debated its position on homosexuality.<\/p>\n

Church law states<\/a>\u00a0all persons are children of God and of sacred worth but homosexual practice is incompatible with Christian teaching. Gays cannot be ordained and United Methodist pastors may not\u00a0perform same-sex marriages<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When the\u00a02012 General Conference<\/a>\u00a0convenes in Tampa, Fla., April 24-May 4, the language and laws about homosexuality will be up for debate once more.<\/p>\n

Will gay rights be debated with the same fervor in 2012?<\/p>\n

Complicating matters is that while the stance against homosexuality has softened in some quarters in the United States, the church\u2019s worldwide growth is in the Philippines and in Africa, where the support for an outright ban can be more stringent and backed by the force of law. In Liberia, for example, \u201cvoluntary sodomy\u201d is punishable by a year in prison.<\/p>\n

Painful past<\/h3>\n

At the\u00a02000 General Conference in Cleveland,<\/a>\u00a0more than 200 people were arrested, including two bishops, and charged with \u201cdisrupting a lawful meeting\u201d when protesters moved to the platform area after the vote to retain the church\u2019s stance on homosexuality.<\/p>\n

In a particularly emotional moment, one non-United Methodist protester threatened to leap from the balcony.<\/p>\n

A broken chalice became a symbol of the body\u2019s division at the\u00a02004 General Conference<\/a>\u00a0in Pittsburgh. Rumors of a proposal to form a task force to study splitting the church ended with the delegates holding hands, singing and approving a resolution affirming the unity of the church.<\/p>\n

At the\u00a02008 assembly in Fort Worth, Texas,<\/a>\u00a0two lesbians celebrated a marriage across the street from the convention center. After the vote to retain the church stance on homosexuality, some delegates, bishops and visitors draped a black cloth over the altar and their faces, and everyone left the center to find chalk outlines of bodies on the sidewalks.<\/p>\n

Pledges and a trial<\/h3>\n

Activity has been stirring since the 2008 assembly.\u00a0More than 900 active and retired clergy signed a pledge calling on the church to remove its ban on homosexual clergy<\/a>. In response,\u00a0more than 2,500 clergy and 12,000 laity signed letters urging the Council of Bishops to take a public stand and uphold the denomination\u2019s lawbook.<\/a><\/p>\n

After their\u00a0November meeting, the bishops issued a statement<\/a>\u00a0declaring their commitment to their covenant \u201cto uphold The Book of Discipline as established by General Conference.\u201d The statement also acknowledged the denomination\u2019s \u201cdeep disagreements over homosexuality.\u201d<\/p>\n

In June 2011, the church wrestled with the issue in a\u00a0public church trial for the seventh time in 20 years.<\/a>\u00a0The Rev. Amy DeLong, a lesbian clergy member of the Wisconsin Annual Conference, was charged with violating the church\u2019s ban on non-celibate, gay clergy and its prohibition against clergy officiating at same-sex unions.<\/p>\n

Acquitted of being a \u201cself-avowed practicing homosexual,\u201d DeLong was found guilty of celebrating a same-gender union. The trial court suspended her from ministerial functions for 20 days and sentenced her to a yearlong process to \u201crestore the broken clergy covenant relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sentence marked the first time in 20 years in which a United Methodist elder was not stripped of clergy credentials or placed on indefinite suspension in a case related to issues of homosexuality. Although\u00a0the Rev. Greg Dell<\/a>\u00a0was initially suspended indefinitely in 1999 after performing a same-sex union ceremony, the North Central Jurisdiction Committee on Appeals later amended the suspension to one year.<\/p>\n

Cultural differences<\/h3>\n

The United Methodist Church is a global church with a membership of more than 12 million. While the membership in the United States has been declining, membership is increasing in Africa and the Philippines.<\/p>\n

The statements of lifelong United Methodist Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf represent the views of many Africans.<\/p>\n

She said she will\u00a0uphold laws in Liberia criminalizing homosexuality<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Johnson Sirleaf, who addressed the 2008 United Methodist General Conference and last year was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, stood by her country\u2019s law of up to a year\u2019s imprisonment for \u201cvoluntary sodomy.\u201d She also endorsed two new laws that would make sexual advances toward a person of the same sex punishable by up to five years imprisonment and gay marriage punishable by up to 10 years.<\/p>\n

“We\u2019ve got certain traditional values in our society that we would like to preserve. We\u2019re going to keep to our traditional values,\u201d she told The Telegraph of London, England.<\/p>\n

During the debate at the 2008 General Conference, the Rev. Eddie Fox, world director of evangelism, The World Methodist Council, said that\u00a0leaving out the statement that homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching would be confusing for members of the church outside the United States.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI have seen and experienced the pain and the brokenness in parts of our global movement whenever our church has failed to hold fast to the essential teaching of the Holy Scripture,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Will 2012 be different?<\/h3>\n

When the 2012 United Methodist General Conference convenes in April, members of unofficial United Methodist organizations on various sides of the issue will be lining the halls and entrances handing out pamphlets for and against the church\u2019s stance.<\/p>\n

In January during the pre-General Conference news briefing, Sue Laurie, one of the women who was married during the 2008 meeting, told a panel discussing holy conferencing that she was\u00a0more concerned about \u201cinflammatory silence than inflammatory language.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSilence maintains the status quo. It hurts the church. Silence stops that transformation. This will be my fifth General Conference; we are tired of telling our stories. Some of the hurtful language I have heard just now is \u2018we need more time.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Since the 1972 General Conference, when the phrase \u201chomosexuality is not compatible with Christian teaching\u201d was added to the denomination\u2019s law book, emotions have run high, tears have been shed and people on all sides of the debate have been hurt.<\/p>\n

Are lesbians, gays, bisexual, and transgendered people deliberately defying God\u2019s word or just being the person God has called them to be?<\/p>\n

Where will the discussion end this time?<\/p>\n

The UMC on homosexuality<\/p>\n

[tabs tab1=”Petitions” tab2=”Stance” tab3=”History”]<\/p>\n

[tab id=1]More than 70 petitions on homosexuality from United Methodist annual conferences, unofficial caucuses, individuals and general church agencies will be debated during the 2012 April 24-May 4 global assembly. Petitions are printed in the advance issue of the\u00a0Daily Christian Advocate.<\/a>Most of the petitions can be found in Volume 2, Section 1, Church and Society Committee B on pages 263-278.<\/p>\n

Many of the petitions amend or rewrite\u00a0\u00b6161F<\/a>\u00a0and\u00b6161B\u00a0<\/a>in the 2008 United Methodist Book of Discipline.[\/tab]<\/p>\n

[tab id=2]An overview of the church\u2019s stance is online\u00a0\u201cWhat is the denomination\u2019s position on homosexuality?<\/a>[\/tab]
\n[tab id=3]A summary of what happened during the\u00a02008 United Methodist General Conference on the issue of homosexuality<\/a>\u00a0is also online.<\/p>\n

The United Methodist General Commission on Archives & History<\/a>\u00a0has General Conference records online for the 1996-2008 General Conferences.[\/tab]<\/p>\n

[\/tabs]<\/p>\n

*Gilbert is a multimedia reporter for the young adult content team at United Methodist Communications, Nashville, Tenn.<\/p>\n

News media contact: Kathy L. Gilbert, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or\u00a0newsdesk@umcom.org.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Kathy L. Gilbert*\u00a0 A UMNS file photo by Mike DuBose.\u00a0The communion chalice, broken at the 2004 General Conference in Pittsburgh in protest of the church’s stance on homosexuality, was mended and returned to the altar as a symbol of healing.\u00a0 11:00 A.M. ET April 18, 2012 Impassioned pleas, protests and prayers. Broken chalice, broken […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":148,"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":[10,14,12],"class_list":{"0":"post-147","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-umns","8":"tag-gc2012","9":"tag-sexuality","10":"tag-umc"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/UMNS12_136_1_319.jpg?fit=319%2C480&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-2n","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147","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=147"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":154,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions\/154"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}