The MethoBlog - Conversation from the Methodist World

No More Anonymous Commenting

jvoorhees — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:56:20 +0000

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To Purge or Not To Purge

jvoorhees — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 18:33:57 +0000

Every year around this time United Methodist pastor's find themselves locked in the horns of a dilemma. It's Charge Conference season and those of us who sit in the congregational oversight seat are faced "auditing" the membership rolls, which includes the possibility of removing inactive persons from church membership, known lovingly at "purging the rolls." It's a tough decision, for on the one hand one wants to help a congregation be honest about those who are truly committed to life together in that place, but on the other hand we don't want to suggest that all hope is lost, and admit that these folks who haven't been in worship for ten years are likely never coming back. In addition to those questions there is always the institutional reality that membership decline doesn't look good on the year end reports, and there is really no particular gain in removing folks from the rolls in most Annual Conferences that don't base apportionments on membership statistics.

This is one of those ethical dilemmas that call into question pastoral, congregational, and institutional honesty. The fact is, as we all know, there are folks who have simply moved on, and have no intention of moving their membership anywhere else, especially since concepts like "membership" seem to mean less and less. There are also folks who want their names to remain on the roll for all sorts of strange reasons, such as access to the cemetery plots or out of nostalgia, even though they and we know that they will never again be likely to be part of the gathered community, especially when they live many states away. At what point should we acknowledge in a formal way that these folks aren't a part of the community, especially in a system that rewards the dishonesty of padding the rolls, making our churches often seem much better off than they actually are?

The congregation that I serve has had to wrestle with that. At the height of their success in the late eighties and early nineties, they had reached well over 500 members on the rolls (and approaching 300 in worship). However after an unsuccessful pastoral appointment and a great deal of infighting well over half of that membership had moved on to other places, and worship attendance had declined by 120 persons each week. My predecessor, recognizing that he was nearing retirement, decided that honesty was the best policy, and decided to help make the rolls accurate. He started the process the year before his retirement, so when my first charge conference rolled around we removed 180 names from our rolls. What this meant was that rather than having 30% participation of members in worship, we went to having some 70% of members present on any given Sunday.

I share all this for a rather strange reason. Over the years we have had many folks submit their blogs to the MethoBlog for inclusion. But as I look over our "rolls," I find many blogs that have had no posts in at least the last four weeks, and most likely even longer than that. On the one hand these blogs don't cost us anything in terms of bandwidth or disk space, but continuing to list them does make wading through menus and blog roll much longer. So I am trying to decided whether it is time to have our own MethoBlog "purge" here and remove some of those who aren't regularly (at least once every 8 weeks) posting.

What do you think? It is time for a MethoPurge, or do you like seeing those names on the right even if they don't lead anywhere?

Creatio Ex Nihilo: Can You Convince This Guy to Become Methodist?

jvoorhees — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 20:21:29 +0000

Without saying “We could use someone like him,” how would you convince an innovative creative and entrepreneurial person that United Methodism was a good match their personality type? Or is it more accurate to say that the UMC is a great denomination for those of a certain mindset, just not someone with those traits? Do hierarchies inevitably squelch creativity? Is the kind of innovation and creativity that works and is needed in our churches compatible with the UMC structure? For those of you in other denominations, is it compatible with your structure?

Creatio Ex Nihilo: Can You Convince This Guy to Become Methodist?.

What do you think MethoBloggers? How would you answer Don’s question?

How Techie Are You?

jvoorhees — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 18:40:11 +0000

Help out the UMPH by giving them a sense of the mobile apps you use. Please complete the poll below:

http://answers.polldaddy.com/poll/2009522/

We're looking at creating some wireless applications. What kind of wireless communication device do you use?(survey software)

Lying In The Practice of Ministry

jvoorhees — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 21:57:06 +0000

Dan Dick’s post today, “Caught on the Horns of an Ethical Dilemma,” shares a troubling conversation that Dan had with several pastors at the recent School for Congregational Development. The article talks about the ease with which these pastors believed that lying was an acceptable ministerial practice in the right circumstances. This was not only about maintaining confidentialities, but also such things as soft peddling difficult questions of theology and faith.

He writes:

These are just some of the topics we discussed and the reasons given to defend pastoral lying. Yet, to me the whole discussion is a bit surreal. What happened to let your “yes” be “yes,” and your “no” be “no?” What happened to speaking the truth in love? What happened to just about everything Jesus and Paul ever said? When did lying become a spiritual gift? Like Jesus before Pilate, the question is raised once more, “What is truth?” Certainly there are times for discretion. Truly, there are sensitive issues. Indeed, we need confidentiality. But none of these demands that we lie.

Take a minute to read Dan’s full post and then let us know what you think about Dan’s points. Are there times when not telling the truth is acceptable in ministerial practice? What do we gain or lose if this is the norm for Christian life? Is the unwillingness to tell the truth part of what is driving persons away from the church in general?

Was Wesley Relevant?

jvoorhees — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 20:34:00 +0000

“Wesley believed in a form of social networking before there was new media,” said Rev. Larry Hollon, the general secretary of communications for the United Methodist Church. “He’d have small groups meeting face to face, studying the Bible, interacting with each other and studying with each other. His understanding of networking, applying his concern for individual support and sustainability, makes him very relevant.”

The Wesleyan world of social networking | Shift.

What do you think? Was Wesley ahead of his time in networking, or is this simply an chance to spin Wesley in a new way?

United Methodist Reporter Blog: Rethink trademarking?

jvoorhees — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 21:59:10 +0000

With the $20 million the UMC invested in this effort, I'm kind of surprised that it didn't include some kind of copyright protection for the slogan. But, then again, it's more than just the United Methodist type of Church that needs to be rethought, isn't it? And if it reaches new people (or, in this case, people who have been involved previously and drifted away), it's definitely worth considering, regardless of which organization is behind the effort.

United Methodist Reporter Blog: Rethink trademarking?.

What we have here is a failure to indoctrinate « John Meunier's blog

jvoorhees — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 11:11:47 +0000

The Rules of the United Societies speak not at all of holding proper doctrines. The Holy Club’s self-examination included not a question about doctrine. At the band meetings, Christians were not asked whether they held any improper doctrines since the last meeting.

What we have here is a failure to indoctrinate « John Meunier's blog.

Cranky Christians

jvoorhees — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 10:54:54 +0000

Our world is broken and in deep need of healing and help. Most of the issues that divide and sometimes destroy our local congregations are truly insignificant — worship styles, leadership styles, preaching styles, and other selfish demands. Oh, certainly these are symptomatic of deeper issues, but we never get to the deeper issues. We often can’t get to the important stuff, because we are bogged down by the selfish, narrow-minded, and insignificant issues of the nominally Christian. Cranky Christians rule the roost. We can’t deal with truly important issues because we are divided over such earth shattering disagreements such as music styles, copier contracts, and the way the pastor chooses to dress.

-Dan Dick at United Methodeviations

Do we know a bad pastor when we see one?

jvoorhees — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 20:28:07 +0000

In the absence of any clear sense of shared values, clergy are left to work things out for themselves. And there is not standard by which we can say whether Pastor X is advancing the mission of the UMC or hurting it. Couple this with queasiness about numbers and don’t we create a system in which it is hard to know what is expected and even harder to spot those who meet expectations.

Do we know a bad pastor when we see one? « John Meunier's blog.

Thinking About Amendment 1 After The Fact

jvoorhees — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:43:53 +0000

This past week, the Tennessee Annual Conference where I serve engaged in debate and voted on the proposed constitutional amendments for the United Methodist Church. There were few surprises, both in the nature of the debate or in the actual outcome of the vote given our location in the Southeast. However, as I listened to the debate and considered how I would vote (as a person dedicated to full inclusion of all truly seeking after God) I found myself moving to a different line of thinking from much of what I was hearing from my colleagues.

Here is my concern. The impetus behind the change in the constitution was a horribly flawed ruling by the Judicial Council on who is eligible to be a member of the United Methodist Church. The flaw in the ruling was the determination that the pastor is the sole determiner of these eligibility requirements, and thus can choose on their own to exclude certain classes of persons not explicitly mentioned in our statements of inclusion in the constitution. In response, Amendment 1 was created, removing any means of interpreting that some persons are not eligible for membership in our church, thus (in the minds of the makers of the amendment) forcing pastors to welcome all people.

The problem with this approach is that it doesn’t truly address the core problem of the Judicial Council ruling – the issue of pastoral authority in regards to membership. Yes, pastors theoretically will have to welcome all, but the passage still has pastors doing the interpretive work of what that means, and those who are determined to exclude gays and lesbians (the core group being addressed in this amendment) will continue to find ways to do so.

My fear in painting with such a broad legislative brush that doesn’t address the core issue is that it doesn’t engage in the real conversation needed on the meaning of membership in a post-modern / post-colonial world, nor the issue of appropriate boundaries. Even though I disagree with many of those on the conservative side about inclusion of homosexuals in the church, they raise important points about the nature of who IS eligible for inclusion in the covenant community of membership. Are there classes of persons who fall outside the realm of membership (not outside the realm of God’s grace and love, which is offered and given to ALL)? Why do we exclude some and not seem to take seriously the failure of most current members to keep their vows? And, as David Lowes Watson shared at our annual conference, why are homosexuals excluded and not divorcees, given that Jesus talked much more about divorce than homosexuality?

Being “open to all” is great in theory, but it also raises issues as well. Should openly racist and sexist persons be allowed to be a part of a covenant community which lifts up diversity and openness as a key value? And if so, how then do we deal with what we claim to be their sin?

The problem with board legislative brushes is that they fail to recognize the complexity of the world we live in. Whether on the left or the right, the absolutes we create always seem to be challenged by exceptions to the rule. That is, after all, why we have a Book of Discipline with hundreds of provisions. They are a recognition of the realities of life, an acknowledgment that we do the best we can to live out an ideal, but that life is much more complicated than our idealistic dreams.

Hear me . . . God’s grace is open and available to all. God loves all persons. We are God’s precious children, created in God’s image, and deeply loved. That we should all affirm and raise up as a source of life and hope to the world.

But membership in the United Methodist Church is not about God’s grace. It is about an affiliation in a covenant community seeking to live a certain way of life. All communities, whether a Benedictine monastery or a local neighborhood, have boundaries to define a particular identity. What we must do is have better conversation on the nature of those boundaries, for without that conversation, our legislative fits and starts are doomed to fail.

MethoBlogger Retreat at SoulFeast

jvoorhees — Fri, 29 May 2009 19:31:01 +0000

For the past several years, my family and I have made the trek to the North Carolina mountains to the Methodist Mecca at Lake Junaluska to participate in the Upper Room's Soulfeast event. Last year I had the privilege to lead some workshops and this year Beth Richardson and I will be leading all the worship sessions at this great event.

Soulfeast is an excellent opportunity for persons of all ages to gather and think about how they are formed spiritually. This year there will be programming for children, youth, young adults, and those of us creeping into maturity. I want to share this experience with you and am talking with the Upper Room folks about a MethoBlog premium, such as a discount on registration or a free book offer. I will also be offering a workshop on blogging as a spiritual practice, and would love to have you share in that session. So, click on link above to find out more about the event (featuring South Africa's Trevor Hudson).

UPDATE: Hey everybody, the Upper Room is willing to give MethoBloggers a discount on registration. At the bottom of the registration page is a box titled "Enter Staff Code." If you will enter "MethoBlog" into that box you will get $10 off on your registration.

We're Back

jvoorhees — Wed, 06 May 2009 10:17:23 +0000

You may have never known we were gone, but we were having some severe technical difficulties last night. Thanks to some work by our ISP everything seems back to normal for our conversation about the United Methodist Church.

More Amendment Stuff

jvoorhees — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 14:35:53 +0000

The West Ohio Conference has put together a good page with a PDF outlining pros and cons related to the constitutional amendments. Visit http://www.2009annualconference.org/content/proposed-constitutional-amendments for more information.

A tip of the ole’ hat to Betsey Heavner at GBOD for this link.

The Video Debate

jvoorhees — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 18:55:45 +0000