The Deacon's Bench
More than 600 members of the United Methodist Church have issued a formal complaint against Attorney General Jeff Sessions, a fellow church member, charging that his “zero tolerance” policy on immigration violates church rules and may constitute child abuse.
Officially, the complaint charges Sessions with violating the United Methodist Church’s Book of Discipline, its code of laws and social principles. Such charges could lead to a church trial, though few expect that to happen to the attorney general, the country’s top lawman.
Instead, the 640 Methodists charging Sessions, who include both clergy and lay members, have asked for a “reconciling process that will help this longtime member … step back from his harmful actions and work to repair the damage he is currently causing to immigrants, particularly families and children.”
The complaint is addressed to the pastors at two churches Sessions attends, in Mobile, Alabama, and Clarendon, Virginia. It charges Sessions with violating church rules or principles on child abuse, immorality, racial discrimination and “dissemination of doctrines contrary” to those of the United Methodist Church.
Not everyone is impressed, with one conservative Methodist observer branding this a “publicity stunt.”
From the complaint:
Pursuant to Paragraph 2702.3 of the 2016 United Methodist Book of Discipline, we hereby charge Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, Attorney General of the United States, a professing member and/or active participant of Ashland Place United Methodist Church (Mobile, Alabama) and Clarendon United Methodist Church (Alexandria, Virginia), with the chargeable offenses of:
• Child Abuse (examples: advocacy for and implementation of documented practices that indefinitely separate thousands of young children from their parents; holding thousands of children in mass incarceration facilities with little to no structured educational or socio-emotional support)
• Immorality (examples: the use of violence against children to deter immigration; advocating and supporting the separation of children from their families; refusal of refugee/asylee status to those fleeing gang or sexual violence; oppression of those seeking asylum or attempting to enter the United States with refugee status; directing employees and staff members to kidnap children from their parents)
• Racial discrimination (examples: stopping investigations of police departments charged with racial discrimination; attempting to criminalize Black Lives Matter and other racial justice activist groups; targeting incarceration for those engaged in undocumented border crossings as well as those who present with requests for asylum, with a particular focus on those perceived as Muslim or LatinX)
• Dissemination of doctrines contrary to the standards of doctrine of the United Methodist Church (examples: the misuse of Romans 13 to indicate the necessity of obedience to secular law, which is in stark contrast to Disciplinary commitments to supporting freedom of conscience and resistance to unjust laws) .
Read the whole thing.
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