Eco-Justice Notes - 8/6/04 - Time for That Stuff

Check out this week's eco-justice notes from Peter Sawtell:

Eco-Justice Notes - 8/6/04 - Time for That Stuff

I think Peter's perspective on this issue can, as he suggests, apply to many issues in ministry. Do we have a lot of work to do? Yes. Does being overwhelmed get us out of responsibility for doing it? Nope!

Meanwhile, I'll be out of touch with computers and hopefully in touch with God this week at the Red Bird Mission in Kentucky. I've never been before, and am really looking foward to it.

links/blogroll

Hey! Take a minute to check out some of the other blogs I've found on my sidebar. Thanks to everyone who responded to my call from some other progressive UMC bloggers. I really appreciate the responses, and am glad to have some great links to show off.

UMAction - Bigger is Better?

I just popped over to UMAction's website to see what they were up to. (I won't link to them.) I have to admit I had never heard of UMAction until I started serving on the General Board of Church and Society, a particular favorite target of theirs. Mark Tooley, who covers UMAction, comes to all the GBCS meetings, and at one of the first ones I was at we were debating the INFACT boycott directed at Phillip Morris. After the meeting, I read Tooley's account on the IRD website, and was shocked - the account of what had happened was totally skewed - whole sections of the conversation were left out to make it seem as though the Board had made a totally irrational decision that would end up hurting poor mothers instead of limiting tobacco advertising to children. It was ridiculous. Anyway, I digress, but that was my eye-opener to the methods of UMAction.
Today, on their site, I was reading responses and reactions to the politics of General Conference 2004. What make me made is that they equate growing/larger church membership in the South with greater faithfulness to the church and to Christ. Actually, I think great faithfulness is a difficult journey - it is not surprising, then, that great faithfulness does not attract the masses. Jesus suggested it would be so, that this way was narrow and difficult to travel. When did big numbers come to mean better Christian discipleship? It's so frustrating, and frustrating to see the UMC adopting policy that supports such thoughts, such as granting 37% representation on all general boards and agencies to the Southeaster Jurisdiction. I find it frustrating as a pastor. How can we make sure are voices, voices of justice, are heard? I think it is unethical, for instance, to inflate church membership rolls, or to fail to follow the process in the Discipline for removing inactive members just to keep our statistics up. But I also don't want to get stuck in a numbers game that cares only about increasing membership for the wrong reasons. I want people to hear the Good News of God's reign on earth. But not just so "we" have more "faithful" Christians than "they" do.
Anyway, I hate that groups like UMAction seem to claim that their supporters are the only ones who are faithful Christians, as if the rest of us who believe differently are only putting time and effort into justice movements because we are unfaithful or want to hurt and destroy our own church. I guess it is really a parallel thing to what is happening in the nation as a whole, with Republicans emphasizing morality, as if Democrats didn't care about ethics and values...
My rant for the day ...

Horatio G. Spafford - "It is Well with My Soul"

This summer at St. Paul's I'm preaching on the favorite hymns of the congregation, and tying them into the lectionary. This week is "It is Well with My Soul." (view sermon) I thought I remembered that the hymn author didn't have a happy ending to his life, despite the inspiring and touching story of how the hymn was written, but I had to search long and hard before I found the ending to his story:

from the Christian Network: "In his late life Spafford experienced a mental disturbance which prompted him to go to Jerusalem under the strange delusion that he was the second Messiah. He died there in 1888 at the age of sixty."

It's a sad ending to his life, but I wish people wouldn't tend to exclude it from the story and try to make him into some saint who never faltered in the face of sorrow in his life. Sometimes the real story is more moving . . .

another trial for the UMC...

United Methodist clergywoman to face trial:
Aug. 2, 2004

By Linda Bloom
United Methodist News Service

A United Methodist clergywoman in Philadelphia faces a church trial as the result of an investigating committee decision.

The Rev. Irene Elizabeth (Beth) Stroud, 34, associate pastor of First United Methodist Church of Germantown since 1999, talked about being a lesbian in an April 27, 2003, sermon to her congregation. She also said she and her partner "have lived in a covenant relationship for two and a half years."

Church law forbids "self-avowed, practicing homosexuals" from being ordained or appointed as clergy to churches.

An investigating committee from the denomination's Eastern Pennsylvania Annual (regional) Conference met July 23 to review evidence on a complaint brought against Stroud. "The committee on investigation voted that reasonable grounds exist for a church trial as provided in the United Methodist Book of Discipline," according to a statement from the annual conference.

The committee's vote was 5-3.

Stroud told United Methodist News Service that the committee chairman "called me personally to share the results and was very pastoral and very caring."

A trial date will be set after Bishop Peter Weaver, who leads the denomination's Philadelphia area, has selected a retired bishop to preside over the trial."

I imagine, sadly, that this trial will go much differently than the Karen Damaan trial given the way decisions of judicial council at General Conference 2004. What will it take to open people's minds and hearts? A stream of painful trials of gifted and qualified clergy? Using up all of our time and resources in church trials until we have nothing and no one left to preach the gospel?

reading right now - marva dawn and victor hugo

quotes from a couple books i'm reading right now.
ashamed to say i still haven't finished marva dawn's unfettered hope - i'd kind of abandoned it for a month or so. but i pulled it out yesterday. a quote she shares, a quote from she highlights from Augustine: "Hope has two beautiful daughters, anger and courage; anger at the way things are, and courage to work to make things other than they are." (pg. 119)

then, from Les Miserables by Victor Hugo (I'm SLOWLY wading through the unabridged version - about 600 pages in right now...) Here are a couple quotes - "where there is an infinite outside of us, is there not an infinite within us? . . . There is a 'me' in the infinite above, as there is a 'me' in the infinite below. The 'me' below is the soul; the 'me' above is God." (pg 517)
and on the next page, (518) "there are, we know, illustrious and powerful atheists. These men, in fact, led back again toward truth by their own power, are not absolutely sure of being atheists as with them, the matter is nothing but a question of definitions and, at all events, even if they do not believe in God, they prove God, because they are great intellects."

progressive united methodist blogs?

are you out there? progressive united methodist blogs? i've found a lot of episcolpal/anglican progressive blogs. some UCC blogs. where are the umc blogs? if you have one, or know of a good one, let me know!