Author: Elaine Stanovsky

A Call to Action for United Methodists in Response to the Plight of Migrants

Family of Faith in the Greater Northwest,

I am sharing the following Call to Action to relieve conditions for migrants on the U.S. southern border from our United Methodist Immigration Task Force.

No matter what your politics, Jesus teaches us to turn strangers into neighbors and to love those neighbors as ourselves. As you see men, women, and children being held in standing room only cells, without showers, soap or toothbrushes, without medical care or sufficient nourishing food, I know you want to reach out and speak out with tender mercy to relieve the suffering.

Please read and respond with love. In addition to the actions suggested below, you can find a list of organizations working to offer hospitality to our neighbors on the Greater Northwest Area website. Consider how you might partner with one. If you have others to suggest, email them to communications@greaternw.org.

Elaine JW Stanovsky
Resident Bishop

A Call to Action for United Methodists in Response to the Plight of Migrants

Grace and peace to you in the name of Christ Jesus. On behalf of the United Methodist Immigration Task Force we share with you a deep concern for migrants. You have seen the deplorable conditions under which migrant children and families are being detained in the US right now. We cannot be silent in this hour. The voice and actions of The United Methodist Church must be heard and experienced in this moment.

We give God thanks for United Methodists who are providing compassionate care to migrants at the border. Border Conferences have established relief centers for migrants. United Methodists from other regions of the country continue to support migrants seeking asylum with their time, talent and treasures. United Methodist congregations across the country have opened their doors to provide sanctuary for those immigrants whose lives would be endangered if they were to be deported to their home countries. UMCOR has been a partner in assisting this connectional work. The General Board of Church and Society has led us faithfully in our advocacy work in support of justice for the migrant and the immigrant. United Methodist Women have also been a strong voice in advocating for the rights of immigrant children and families.

Let’s continue to do this good and faithful work. Join us in these actions:

Give to the Advance # 3022144 for Migration. Go to UMCOR – Global Migration for further information.

Join the General Board of Church and Society in our United Methodist advocacy work alongside of immigrants. Check in online at UMCJustice.org and to sendletters to your Congressional representatives and the White House.

Encourage your UMW unit to join the action plan set forth at the United Methodist Women website.

We ask that you also speak up in support of persons in Sanctuary and the churches supporting them. In the past week, we have become aware of the Trump Administration’s most recent attack on immigrants who are living in Sanctuary in congregations, among them United Methodist congregations, as they seek to fight for justice in their deportation cases. The federal government is issuing fines of up to $500,000 to these immigrants in Sanctuary. This is an egregiously punitive tactic causing great fear and anxiety to immigrant brothers and sisters who are already deeply burdened by the stress of their circumstances.

Support United Methodist Sanctuary congregations and the immigrants in Sanctuary by praying for them and by sending them a postcard expressing such support. At the end of this letter is the list of multiple United Methodist Sanctuary churches and those immigrant friends whom they are hosting.

Take this moment to act. It will make a difference in these challenging times in the lives of suffering immigrants and the brave churches who are ministering to them. May the words of Paul to Timothy strengthen us all……

For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice,
but rather a spirit of power and of
love and of self-discipline.
II Timothy 2:7
 

Bishop Minerva G. Carcaño, Chair
UM Immigration Task Force

Susan Henry-Crowe, General Secretary
General Board of Church and Society

Thomas Kemper, General Secretary
General Board of Global Ministries

Harriett J. Olson, General Secretary/CEO
United Methodist Women

Download PDF of this Call To Action

Moving FORWARD to what’s NEXT

I just returned from two gatherings that I believe will shape the future of Methodism for years to come. Taken together, they could mark a turn toward LGBTQ+ persons being fully recognized, included and honored in Methodism in the future, whatever form it takes. More than 900 people participated in one or both of the two events, including leaders from the Greater Northwest.

As you know, the actions of General Conference 2019 stirred up deep distress within The United Methodist Church. Many are asking: how do we live in a church that has adopted values and rules that we believe are not Christian? Do we stay and try to change the Church? Or is Jesus, who makes all things new, leading us to create a new expression of Methodism that is more faithful to the gospel? It feels like we are in a great season of sorting out how much diversity can remain united, and what are the limits beyond which some may have to leave.

The first gathering, Our Way FORWARD brought together justice-seeking communities to hear one another, recognize their shared oppression, and speak their call and commitment to a new Methodist movement that will act for justice inside the Church and in the world. As intended, people of color and LGBTQ+ United Methodists organized and led the event, with a deep commitment to creating a Church in “radical solidarity” with oppressed people.

Around 350 persons attended this event, with 19 of our fellow United Methodists present from the Greater Northwest Area. I was the only bishop present. Here’s what I experienced.

This gathering was church. It was church in the way it intentionally included many voices in the planning and leadership, and in the way it made space for people to be present in the fullness of their beings. It was church in the way the host congregation prepared, welcomed, fed, honored and protected participants. It was church in the depth, passion and beauty of worship. It was church in the prophetic proclamation of the liberating love of Jesus Christ, in the midst of misrepresentation, rejection and agony. It was church through shared sorrow and grief, the bold claim of baptism, the celebration of the goodness and fragility of God’s creation and gathering at the table of grace.

Many wore T-shirts bearing the baptismal promise of all United Methodists everywhere to: resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves. 

In contrast to the fervent voices of some presenters, around tables I heard people saying:

  • I want to be in the Church my parents attend in their conservative town. I don’t agree with them, but I want to be in the same Church.
  • Even if I left the UMC, I would not be free of it. It is the community of my people. It made me who I am.
  • I want gay babies born today to have a church that embraces and nurtures them. If I leave, they are still at risk.
  • Black Methodists stayed in the Church through segregation, even when they were treated as second-class citizens. There can be strength in resistance.

As I left the gathering, I was deeply grateful for the honesty, urgency, and generosity of the community. And I felt confident that the leaders at this gathering and across our Church are ready and able to lead the Church into the future.

The second gathering, UMC NEXT gathered “centrists,” who were outraged at the actions of General Conference, together with progressives longing for real change. This broad coalition of United Methodists denounced the Traditional Plan and vowed to work toward a Church that stands and strives for justice and full inclusion.

But there was concern held by some leading up to this gathering.  

  • Is this the Adam Hamilton show?
  • Will the outcome be pre-determined?
  • Will all voices from the margins be heard?

I had my own questions about how participants were selected, and whether it would be a truly participatory process.

Nearly 30 people came from the Greater Northwest. Some are respected leaders. Others are newer and not as widely known. Some attended both events to ensure that UMC NEXT would benefit from the conversations and perspectives from FORWARD.

Together, participants helped craft a vision for a new, hopeful, inclusive, just Methodist movement based on four core commitments:

  • To be passionate followers of Jesus Christ, committed to a Wesleyan vision of Christianity that is anchored in scripture and informed by tradition, reason and experience as we live a life of personal piety and social holiness.
  • To resist evil, injustice and oppression in all forms and toward all people, and to build a church which affirms the full participation of all ages, nations, races, classes, cultures, gender identities, sexual orientations and abilities.
  • To reject the Traditional Plan approved at General Conference 2019 as inconsistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ and resist its implementation.
  • To work to eliminate discriminatory language and the restrictions and penalties in the Book of Discipline regarding LGBTQ individuals. We affirm the sacred worth of LGBTQ persons, celebrate their gifts, and commit to being in ministry together.

These commitments are consistent with statements and actions taken by our Greater Northwest annual conferences for many years. I embrace these commitments and find them helpful as I lead United Methodists in the Northwest. I believe that inclusive community is the Jesus way and that it is the future of our Church.

At the same time, I intend to continue to honor all lay and clergy members and churches in the area I serve, whether they support or reject the actions of the recent General Conference. Over 23 years in Conference leadership, I have never discriminated against clergy or laity, based upon their theology. To the best of their ability, my cabinets have placed clergy in settings where their gifts and graces, as well as their theological perspectives, serve the needs of the community and congregation. I pledge to continue to lead in this way. I will also continue to try to keep you informed of possibilities and plans as they develop.

How will these gatherings affect you? Us? Participants from the Greater Northwest met yesterday before leaving Kansas City, to begin to plan together. There are no concrete plans at this time but these gatherings, and the coalitions that are being built, will help us in shaping what comes next. Before and during annual conferences we are considering conducting surveys or polls to get a “sense” of how United Methodists in Alaska, Oregon-Idaho and Pacific Northwest view the future of Methodism. Policies to guide processes of disaffiliation are being developed for churches that feel they must leave the denomination. In the next few weeks, the Alaska, Oregon-Idaho and Pacific Northwest Annual Conference sessions will give us a chance to learn more, and to think and pray together about our future in the Northwest.

In this CrossOver year, we are finding our way, and making the road, by walking. Almighty God continues to find the goodness in each created being. Companion, Christ, walks with us, as guide and savior. The Holy Spirit continues to breathe life into each one of us moment by moment, with grace in every breath.

I’m grateful for each of you who has participated in Table Talks, held information sessions in your church, sought out and read information about all the many conversations that are unfolding across the church. I hope you are talking with people in your families, your home church, in nearby churches, and outside the church, about the critical challenge we face. I hope you are talking to people whose life experience is different from yours. Where two or three are gathered, God is present.

“I pray that… Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Ephesians 3: 15-19

Elaine JW Stanovsky

UM Forward and UMC Next Gatherings

“For where two or three are gathered in my name,
I am there among them.” – Matthew 18:20 NRSV

I ask for your prayers for those of us from the Greater NW Area who will attend two significant conversations on the future of The United Methodist Church in the aftermath of the 2019 Special Session of General Conference.

The first event, UM Forward, will take place in Minneapolis, Minnesota May 17-18. Organizers have designed the gathering to center voices too often marginalized including people of color, and persons from the LGBTQI+ community. As they prepare for this event, some persons from the GNW Area expressed these thoughts:

  • The spirit before us, our creator behind us, and Jesus alongside us we continue a march toward liberation. The justice of God will continue to set us free to be church we are meant to be! – Esteban Galan, lay, Boise ID
  • Our way forward must empower those who are most impacted by the harm the church and world have caused. Only then, can we be the church. – Joseph Lopez, lay, Seattle WA
  • Wherever the church ends up I am sure of one thing, if it does not fully embrace LGBTQIA+ people it will not stand. – Ryan Scott, clergy, Toledo OR
  • I’m hoping to make connections and learn from other people who are passionate about the future of our denomination and our movement towards full inclusion. – Emily Wright, lay, Seattle WA

A second event, UMC Next, is being held at the Church of the Resurrection near Kansas City on May 20-22. This gathering will bring together over 600 United Methodists with groups of 10 from each Annual Conference in the United States. Of this event, some who will attend from our area have offered these hopes:

  • We must move beyond old prejudices and entrenched patterns and be as committed to the life and well-being of others as we are to ourselves and our own preferences. – Mary Huycke, clergy, Yakima WA
  • My hope is we name the reality—including what is at stake, what we lose in remaining/exiting—then tell the story that enlivens our movement. – Jeremy Smith, clergy from Oregon-Idaho Conference, Seattle WA
  • My hope for the UMC Next gathering is that progressives, centrists and conservative compatibilists would be able to find enough common ground on which to raise a new expression of Methodism, built on the foundation of faith, mission, grace, inclusion, equality, justice, and mercy. – Carlo Rapanut, clergy, Anchorage, AK
  • Business as usual is over; now we are given the opportunity to step into our call toward radical love. I hope we can be brave. – Nica Sy, lay, Seattle, WA
  • In this trying time, we need to follow Christ’s example and prove that Christians can show love to the world as well as to each other. – Teri Watanabe, lay, Monroe OR

As United Methodists striving to live faithfully and serve missionally in the Greater Northwest, we are a diverse group of lay and clergy who expect to listen and speak from our context. And we expect the Holy Spirit to be among us as promised. Please keep us, and all who gather, in prayer during this time.

We’ll do our best to bring you into the conversation after we return.

Elaine JW Stanovsky | Resident Bishop, Greater Northwest Area

Click here for a list of persons attending from the GNW Area. Let us know if we have missed anyone!

Why I’m hopeful …

Bishops remember thier baptism at COB

This week the Council of Bishops met and issued a public statement that aspired to be pastoral and prophetic. Thank you for your prayers as we met. Here are some of the reasons I am hopeful after the meeting.

The bishops are keenly aware that United Methodism is in crisis. The backlash in Europe, parts of the United States and other places around the world to the recent General Conference, makes a unified future for the UMC appear impossible. Some people hold out hope for a change at the 2020 General Conference. Others anticipate schism. No-one seems to believe that United Methodists around the world will simply implement policies that exclude and punish LGBTQ+ people.

The bishops kept the main thing the main thing. Placing the mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world, at its center, we devoted 11 hours over 4 days focused on the deep fractures in our Church. We felt deeply the despair of LGBTQ+ persons, their families, and of a new generation of leaders in the United States. We also awoke to the increased risk to poor and vulnerable people caused by funds being withheld or re-directed from apportionments, The Advance, UMCOR, Africa University and other United Methodist causes.

The bishops recognize that this crisis offers a rare opportunity. United Methodism is overdue for a spiritual and practical revival to address systemic racism, sexism, colonialism, heteronormativity, irrelevance to young people, and a governance system that is not designed or capable of addressing our global complexity. How can the Church use this crisis to help God give rise to a new movement of Methodism? Don’t waste a good crisis!

The bishops see that division keeps us distracted from mission. We’ve had split decisions on sexuality for 45 years as a denomination. In February we took our best shot at adopting legislation that could hold us together and failed. Our established legislative and judicial processes are not able to heal the breach. United Methodist spiritual practices and resources are weak. We find ourselves adrift in turbulent waters.

The bishops began to tell the truth: maybe not the whole truth, but a lot of new truth. We spoke more frankly about our ministry contexts and the conflicting demands within our areas. We challenged each other honestly about ways our leadership may contribute to division and distrust. Some challenged participation by bishops in caucuses and reform groups on both sides of the divide. Some reported conservatives being blamed for the actions of the General Conference. I recalled that the Western Jurisdiction has been fully inclusive since before the Church prohibited ordination of LGBTQ+ people and blessing of their relationships.

The bishops acknowledged that worldly powers and principalities are at work, intending to divide the Church and silence its prophetic voice.

Leaders of the Reform and Renewal Coalition, a group of unofficial traditionalist advocacy groups, pose with bishops from Africa and Europe, after a closed-door meeting to discuss the denomination’s situation and possible future. Photo by Heather Hahn, UMNS.

In some places, bishops report that disruption in their areas was amplified by outside groups spreading accusations of influence peddling, delegate voter fraud and defamatory rumors about individuals and regions of the Church. We asked ourselves, are we just too nice to investigate and expose these actions? Should bishops identify ourselves with these groups? Should there be a standard of disclosure and transparency for any group that wants to be considered a trustworthy partner? You may have seen the photo of bishops meeting with the Reform and Renewal Coalition comprised of Good News, the Confessing Movement, the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD) and The Wesleyan Covenant Association (WCA), during the Council meeting. Bishops who were not there asked the other, “Why did you go to the meeting?” Bishops who attended raised strong objections to unethical and dishonest tactics of some affiliated with the coalition.

African American bishops testified to their survival in an unjust system. In a wrenching witness, African American bishops described decades of racial segregation within the Church in the United States and the faithfulness of African Americans who stayed and supported the Church, despite being marginalized. The church has never healed those wounds, and black voices are still not heard in the Church today. Some resent the outcry in support of LGBTQ+ people, when there has never been acknowledgement and advocacy for full racial inclusion. Through their pain, these colleagues offered another oppressed group encouragement to survive in structures that deny your humanity. I heard them saying – don’t leave. You can stay, despite the pain inflicted on you, because God loves you and makes you strong. The Church needs you to be whole.

The bishops began to see that human sexuality cannot be considered as an either/or proposition to be settled by an up or down vote. If there is one new thing I am learning from the LGBTQ+ community, it is that binary options are not adequate. Either/or choices don’t take account of how fearfully and wonderfully God has made us. Making sense of LGBTQ+ requires and deserves deep conversation, biblical scholarship, ethical consideration and prayer-filled spiritual maturity. It requires the wisdom of scripture, tradition, reason and experience. People are not simply male or female, slave or free, Jew or Gentile, biblical literalists or biblical critical thinkers, rule-follower or people-lover. Binary choices cannot reveal the whole truth, because you have to ignore part of the truth to answer a complex question with a simple answer.

In the midst of the messiness of the struggle I find hopeful signs that the Church is alive, and at work, humble, and learning. The Council of Bishops did not propose a top-down 5-year plan. It’s not time to have a plan yet. Most of us are so rooted within our side of the divided question, we don’t know how complicated the questions are for someone stuck on the other side. We have to keep listening, and searching for the whole truth that has room for each of our particular truths.

Later this month I’ll travel to Minneapolis to participate in the UM Forward Conference, inviting voices of Young, Queer and people of Color to speak at the center of the conversation. From there I will travel to Church of the Resurrection near Kansas City, where some 600 people will gather at the invitation of Pastor Adam Hamilton, to pray and think together about the future of the Church. I hope there will be lots of listening and truth-sharing in both groups. I’ll check in with you after I return, as we prepare for Annual Conferences.

In the meantime, by every prayer, every step, every sermon, every Bible study, every act of generosity, we are crossing over, and making the road by walking.

Elaine JW Stanovsky | Greater Northwest Area

Ashes of Sorrow and Resistance

To the People of God in The United Methodist Church,

“Spare your people, O LORD, and do not make your heritage a mockery, a byword among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?'” – Joel 2:17b

This past week, the special session of the General Conference of our church gathered in search of a way forward out of a decades-old conflict over attitudes toward homosexuals and LGBTQIA people. Rather than finding a way forward, the church chose to turn back the clock and to intensify its exclusion.

Bishop Elaine Stanovsky offering a blessing during worship at the 2019 General Conference.

The conference did not create space for United Methodists with different perspectives to live together. Rather, the church reaffirmed its assertion that “The United Methodist Church does not condone the practice of homosexuality and considers this practice incompatible with Christian teaching,” (UM Book of Discipline, 2016, ¶ 161.G). It intensified standards and punishments for bishops who ordain and appoint gay clergy, and for clergy who perform marriages for same-sex couples. The outcome was devastating for LGBTQIA people, whose very self-worth was debated, and for all persons in the church who believe Jesus models and invites us to become a radically inclusive community of faith.

To LGBTQIA persons in our churches and other ministry settings, I say, 

I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ” – Philippians 1:3-6

I appeal to every pastor, member, and attendee, to be tender and merciful as you extend care to LGBTQIA persons in your care, and their families, and to continue to create opportunities to promote understanding and justice within the church and society.

I join many of you who feel abandoned by your Church home. I am ashamed that the Church has turned its back on so many people who Jesus has loved and called. I cannot abide by or enforce the new rules in conscience. My soul cries out to God, “do not make your heritage a mockery. Why should it be said among the people, ‘Where is their God?’” And I know that many of you also find yourselves adrift. I hear questions like, Is our Church redeemable? Or, is it time to leave the church that has left us and form a new expression of Church that opens doors and affirm people, rather than closing doors and denying or punishing them.

Let me offer you some reassurances. First, none of the actions of the General Conference take effect until January 1, 2020. Practices of candidacy, ordination and weddings will continue unchanged for the time being. Challenges to the constitutionality of some of the new provisions are underway that may overturn them. Regardless of how that turns out, as your bishop, I don’t intend to lead us backward. We have come too far together to turn back now.

Pastors and people from large and small churches across the United States are looking for an expression of Church that affirms LGBTQ persons and recognizes them as full members and leaders. Coalitions of individuals and groups who will not submit to the recent actions are forming to develop plans for full inclusion, either inside or outside the existing UMC. We do know that a majority of the North American delegates to the recent General Conference opposed the actions taken. If you are among them, please indicate your interest in being part of this movement at: OneChurch4All.org

At the same time, I strongly believe that the Church should and must be a place where people who love Jesus, but don’t see eye to eye, are in fellowship, prayer, study, and conversation with one another. I don’t want to be in a church that does not welcome and honor people who hold different opinions from mine. I hope that our love of Jesus, and the people Jesus loves and asks us to love, is stronger than our differences of opinion.  I believe we must stay together in charity, if we can. For, as Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus,

“There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of our calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.” (Ephesians 4:4-6)

With trust in God, who will lead us even if the Church wanders away and loses itself.

Your bishop and friend in Christ,

Elaine JW Stanovsky

If you haven’t already seen it, please watch the Western Jurisdiction College of Bishop’s response to the actions of General Conference that you’ll find below. Please also share it with your congregation on Sunday Morning or whenever you are able.

Download | English Transcript | Version en español

Expect Miracles

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky’s General Conference Blog
Installment 5 | February 26, 2019

After a discouraging heart-breaking day yesterday when the General Conference chose NOT to move forward rejecting the One Church Plan in favor of the Traditional Plan to cling to the church’s policies of exclusion and marginalization of LGBTQ people.

At 8 pm last night, nearly 200 people gathered at a spontaneous gathering of people from the Western Jurisdiction and friends. It was a battered but joyful multi-colored, multi-languaged, LGBTQ-friendly community that sang the songs of the faith, prayed, shared words of encouragement. The gathering became a reminder and a foretaste of the One Church we strive to become. 

God bless the grass that grows through the cracks…

Today we await the judicial council decision about the constitutionality of the Traditional Plan, and a Minority Report in support of the One Church Plan. By the end of the day all petitions before the body will have been acted on, and delegates will turn toward home as the bishops prepare to meet tomorrow. 

Nothing can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ — not even the Church!

No Way Forward in Sight

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky’s General Conference Blog
Installment 4 | February 25, 2019

By the tender mercy of our God, the dawn from on high shall break upon us,
To give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death.
To guide our feet into the way of peace.  Luke 1: 78-79

I’m writing to people who awaken to shadows this morning, after yesterday’s actions at the General Conference. I’ll address the rest of you another time. I care about all of you, and I have worked to ensure that there is space for a wide diversity of people in our United Methodist Church. But today, I suffer with those who suffer. 

We knew yesterday that the prioritizing process would give an indication of the will of the Conference. It did. Wespath proposals for the future of pensions received highest priority, not apparently because we care more about pensions than mission, but because we can all agree that we care about pensions, but not about how we care about mission. Of the various plans put forward, more than half of the delegates indicated that the Traditional Plan is the priority that should be considered first. While it is not determinative, this likely indicates strong support for adoption of some version of the Traditional Plan, which would preserve the statement that “homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching,” and prohibitions against same-sex weddings and LGBTQ clergy.

The action to consider the Traditional Plan first was deeply harmful to LGBTQ people, and all who support their full inclusion in the Church and its ministries. It suggests that our global church is not ready to extend the recognition and blessing of the Church to LGBTQ people, or to recognize their monogamous, covenantal relationships as holy and blessed by God.  Many LGBTQ clergy and laity feel betrayed by the church’s apparent willingness to use and abuse them as long as they are closeted, but not to embrace and affirm them.  

General Conference will reconvene this morning in a day-long legislative session, beginning by perfecting the Traditional Plan, followed by consideration of all the other petitions that are properly before the body.  Protests and lamentations will undoubtedly erupt. Common wisdom is that, while these are understood and tolerated in a North American democratic context, they are seen as disrespectful and further polarizing to delegates from other parts of the world.

So, the walls do not seem likely to come down today, though I am eager to be proven wrong!  

Questions that come to my mind are:

  • Do delegates from around the world understand the cost of adopting the Traditional Plan—how it will weaken the church’s institutions that maintain global mission initiatives, disaster relief, educational, health, economic and agricultural initiatives?How it will weaken the credibility of the Church in America, where more than 70% of people accept homosexuality and homosexual marriage. 
  • How should and will United Methodists around the world who have waited and worked for a step toward full inclusion of LGBTQ people react if the Traditional Plan is adopted? Will they be defeated? Defiant? Will they leave? Will they stay? Will there be more church trials? Fewer trials?
  • Having done its best to find a way forward, how do I, or any of us, live in, and lead the Church if all it can do is double-down on policies that have divided us for decades?  
  • How do we continue TODAY to bear witness to the way we have seen God at work in and through the lives of Christian LGBTQ siblings? How do we stand in solidarity as they are once again told they are unworthy?

Don’t get me wrong. I am not without hope. But I am sobered. And I am keenly aware that it is possible that we will fail to move forward. 

How is today different from all other days?

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky’s General Conference Blog
Installment 3 | February 24, 2019

By the end of today, the General Conference will have decided which of several plans for “a way forward” it will prioritize for consideration. The day starts with worship, followed by a presentation of the three plans developed by the Commission on a Way Forward (CoWF). Under consideration will be:  

  • The One Church Plan, with the strongest support from the CoWF, the Council of Bishops and a Coalition of Uniting Methodists, Mainstream UMC, the Reconciling Ministries Network, and several other groups
  • The Connectional Conferences Plan
  • The Traditionalist Plan
  • The Simple Church Plan
  • And a variety of other related proposals.  

At stake will be whether to split into groups that uniformly embrace or marginalize LGBTQ people, or whether we make space for United Methodists in different cultural contexts and with different theological understandings to adapt in different ways while remaining united.  

The prioritizing process today will give a strong indication of which plan will be perfected and adopted. 

As he convened the opening session, Bishop Christian Alstead (Nordic and Baltic Area) reminded us that the football stadium we are meeting in is Church for these three days. All Greater Northwest delegates are in their seats, ready to speak and vote their faith. Observers, staff, volunteers, and advocates are also here and taking their respective roles. Nothing can undermine the gracious and persistent shared life of the United Methodists of the Greater Northwest Area.

We pray with you for a good future for our Church, on this day that is different from all others. 

A Prayer for St. Louis

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky’s General Conference Blog
Installment 2 | February 21, 2019

St. Louis is more than just the place where United Methodists will gather this week.

We have to talk about genocide of Native Americans…
This country was built on the genocide of Native Americans and slavery.
That’s the foundation of this country.

That’s how genius filmmaker, Spike Lee, summed up the distorted image many Americans have of our nation’s history of discovery, exploration and manifest destiny last week. He was talking about his academy award nominated film, BlacKkKlansman, a documentary about a Black man who joined the Ku Klux Klan in the 1970s. But he also referred to his disturbing 2000 film, Bamboozled, which explores the traditions of minstrel shows and blackface, among other racist practices. United Methodists gather in St. Louis this week at a crossroads of America’s history of racial violence.

Gateway to the West
Last night on the ride downtown from the St. Louis airport, the Gateway Arch shone in the night sky. It was built as a monument to American Progress and westward expansion across the American continent. But the “expansion” of European Americans across the continent depended upon the removal, displacement and genocide of the people whose home it already was. Cherokee people travelled through St. Louis when they were removed from Appalachia to Oklahoma, Indian Territory. And countless European-American migrants passed through St. Louis passed on their way west along the Oregon Trail or the Santa Fe Trail, claiming land that was not theirs. The Gateway Arch is meant to be a proud reminder of American Progress. Progress came at a cost that is still being paid by the suffering of Native Peoples who lost home, land, language, cultural integrity, social structure, independence, self-sufficiency in its wake.

So, here, on the banks of the Mississippi River, I remember the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 in Colorado, led by Methodist minister, John Chivington. And all the Methodist and other Christian Indian agents who started Indian boarding schools, where children were ripped from their families and stripped of culture and identity. I remember Father Wilbur, Methodist minister turned Indian Agent in 1864, who built the boarding school at White Swan, Washington.

And I learn that just east, across the Mississippi River, eighty Cahokia pyramid mounds mark the largest pre-Columbian Native American city north of Mexico, a reminder of the great cultural heritage of the people who were in this land before Europeans arrived.

Hands Up, Don’t Shoot
St. Louis was a destination city during the Great Migration of African Americans from the South in the early 20th Century. Today it is home to roughly equal numbers of African American and White citizens. I remember Anthony Lamar Smith, a 24-year-old African American, shot and killed in 2011 by a police officer found not guilty. And, I remember unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown, shot and killed in 2014 by police in Ferguson, Missouri, 15 miles from where I sit. I remember Hands Up, Don’t Shoot. And the Black Lives Matter.

The Church is Here for Healing
Wouldn’t it be something if the Church came to this great city for healing, for peace, for restoration? This morning I pray:

Gracious God, lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.
Put our hearts at peace so that we can see this city and all its people;
              this nation and all its people; this world and all its peoples.
Heal our divisions so that we might be a healing presence to each other and your world.

Corrupted or Conforming, God Loves the Church

Bishop Elaine JW Stanovsky’s General Conference Blog
Installment 1 | February 20, 2019

Who will we be in a week? What will become of The United Methodist Church at the special called General Conference that begins on Saturday, February 23rd?  Elected lay and clergy delegates from across the United States, Europe, sub-Saharan Africa, and the Philippines will gather to decide the future of The United Methodist Church, after nearly 50 years of disagreement and antagonism over the role of LGBTQ persons in the Church, and in the household of God’s creation.

I’ll be flying to St. Louis by the time you read this, preparing to turn a corner as a church between Saturday and Tuesday.  Over the weekend friends sent me off with a hymn by Brian Wren that speaks of God’s love of the deeply flawed Church.  I share it today—#590 in your United Methodist Hymnal and also available online here on Hymnary—as a blessing for all who watch, wait, witness, and wonder who we will be a week from today.  I travel with the promise that our God “outwits us, spinning gold from straw.”

Come, Holy Spirit, come.  Make of us something we do not have the power to ask or imagine.

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