UMC is "top heavy"

I love the United Methodist Church and its "Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors" character.

Most people look at our inner turmoil and worry, since we are subject to the culture wars over homosexuality, that we will split. That partisan spirit could well divide our denomination in two. Actually, one side of the controversy would never have come up with the six word character description I note above, though most are largely that way. Maybe that is what is holding us together.

But what I do not hear anyone talking about is a much more destructive "party spirit" in our midst. Far deeper and more difficult for our church is the power of those among the "bishop-wanna-be" party. Although the majority of bishops are not members, enough of them run the Council of Bishops so that even the best bishops don't always stand up to them. The party is that strong.

Like many other institutions in America, our church is top heavy because of the success of that party.

They trump the ideological factions. At our next "ecumenical council" (General Conference), they will be slick in their fight to keep as many bishops and other leaders supported in the style to which they have become accustomed. The costs are significant. Some say they are overwhelming.

Another area where we have become top heavy is in the power of bishops. One of the reasons that bishops have gone from being a personnel officer to a dominant administrative and judicial officer in our system is because of the bishop-wanna-be party.

They tend to be clergy who are ambitious, who have the knack of getting selected or elected to important jobs in the state (annual conference) or at the denominational (national) level.

They know what powers they would like to have if they get to be bishop.

They tend to be the ones who help draft church law to benefit the office of the bishop and put more power into bishops' hands.

Bishops are not supposed to have anything to do with the legislation handled by our quadrennial General Conference where we modify our Book of Discipline. But the bishops provide petitions to other agencies of our church who then put them into the legislative hopper. Because the bishop-wanna-bes are the ones most often elected to the General Conference, they see to it that those bishop-benefiting petitions are the only ones seriously considered for passage.

While most delegates to General and Jurisdictional Conferences are not members of this dominating party, even a few of the lay delegates are. The bishop-wanna-be folks are most adept at operating in the rarefied milieu of those conferences. Most delegates don't even realize they've been manipulated.

Then the bishop-wanna-be party members, most of whom are also involved in the election of other bishops, practice all the politicking needed to help others of their number to be elected. Horse trading is a popular device among them because then in four years, it will be their turn to be elected.

Just to let you know the implications of this in-grown party structure, here is a glimpse at our way of handling complaints.

The bishop or one of his/her assistants, called "district superintendents," may by church law initiate a complaint against a pastor. I have seen some situations where the bishop or superintendent really had no written complaint containing specifics of time, place, and events alleged to have occurred. So the committees meant to handle the process have only the word of the bishop or superintendent and act as though it is true even without the written complaint.

The bishop, by church law, is the one who assigns pastors to their churches. So everyone on those committees will tend to not want the bishop mad at them for not cooperating and then remembering when the next large church opens up to which they might aspire. Committees like the Board of Ordained Ministry, Committee on Investigation, and such are working against their own future careers if they question or challenge something the bishop wants.

The bishop is the only one by church law who can nominate people to those committees. The bishop by church law selects the pastors who will be superintendents. The bishop by church law decides whether a complaint is to be sent into the judicial route which could end in a church trial. The bishop by church law selects the Counsel for the Church (the prosecutor). The bishop by church law picks the "judge" for any church trial. The superintendents by church law pick the jury for the church trials.

By church law, the bishop may also route a complaint of any kind (even serious sexual misconduct complaints whether true or false) into the committees of the Board of Ordained Ministry where there is no level of proof required in order to remove a pastor from ministry.

By church law, if a superintendent makes a mistake that causes harm to a local church or a pastor, he or she is accountable to the bishop and the other superintendents, not to the clergy of the conference as all other clergy are. By church law, if a bishop makes a mistake that harms a church or a pastor, she or he is accountable to a group of bishops in their region. They all make mistakes and are very forgiving toward their episcopal colleagues.

By church law, bishops and superintendents and members of the various committees they appoint who are responsible for handling complaints but make mistakes can only be held accountable if they are shown "by clear and convincing evidence, that such person's actions constituted a chargeable offense committed knowingly in bad faith." The same section of our church law also protects such officers from civil suit. Shoot, all a Counsel for the Church has to prove to get a conviction against an accused pastor is achieve "clear and convincing" without having to prove "knowingly in bad faith."

So, we United Methodists face an immediate future in which the "bishop-wanna-be" party already has most of the cards in their hands to add further to their power. The one thing that they may not be able to handle is the rapidly rising costs of sustaining the levels of compensation, benefits, expenses, and housing to which they have committed us to pay.

As the General Conference of 2008 approaches, I wonder how many of the voices will still be around by May, 2008, who will remind the bishop-wanna-be party that they can't go on as they have.

Ah, power and privilege exemplified by the bishop-wanna-be party ignore the Golden Rule as Jesus gave it but rejoice in it as frequently stated by modern revisionists who say, "Them that's got the gold makes the rules!"

I still love our denomination but this party spirit sure is no help.