I’ve backed away from blogging a bit. Too many emotions hitting, not able to sort it out, too many articles I need to write, too much utter fatigue. But oh so many thoughts!!!
So, time to leap in.
Twice now, I have attended breakfast planning meetings held by Good News, a conservative action group that holds the goal of reclaiming the UMC for orthodoxy. For me, they represent my past that I needed to leave for the sake of my own theological integrity. Nonetheless, I do respect where they are coming from and understand their language.
This report came from an interview from two people who had attended the first breakfast. My time with them provoked much thought on my part, but it was also a flawed report as I had not been there in person.
On Saturday, I attended the second of the breakfasts. This report is a simple “just the facts and nothing but the facts report.”
I attended the third one today, but have not written it up and probably will not for an article. I went because I learned on Saturday that they present a simply top-class overall summary of legislation and I find it helpful as I try to stay on top of it.
Today, I also had two great conversations with people “on the other side,” as so many are termed at General Conference, David Watson, Dean of United Seminary and Walter Fenton, the Good News Director of Development.
They are good, decent, intelligent people who love God. We probably agree on little, but . . . we are all part of this great connection. They add to my life because their positions encourage me to clarify my own.
In other words, I need them. And if we could acknowledge that they also need me (I am putting myself as a representative as the progressives here, although I am not on the more radical fringe), we could have a church.
One thing seemed clearer to me during the breakfasts: on the Good News side, they appear to have landed deeply in the land of “sola scriptura.” And landed there in a dangerous way.
The Saturday testimony of a young woman who took a month to do nothing but pray and read only her Bible has, in my opinion, moved pretty far from an ecclesiastically and biblically sound theology. She has set herself up as an expert on biblical interpretation. She is sure that what she “hears” from God, or in my world, thinks she is hearing from God, is the absolute truth, free of cultural or time constraints.
It’s that kind of stuff that can eventually end up with a Taliban or an ISIS. Don’t get me wrong–I think she is lovely and well-intentioned. BUT, she does not appear to acknowledge the need for a larger community to confirm or to help perfect (to use a Wesleyan term) her understandings of revelation.
I know this because I used to do this. I was so sure, so very sure, that I heard with utter clarity God’s voice and direction. I take a deep breath and acknowledge much sorrow when I think about this.
How very wrong I was about so very much. How much more cautious I am now to declare “This is the Word of the Lord!” How much more aware I am now that God is BIG–and there is a great mystery there, much that will always stay unknown. And I am little, small, partial, and hugely limited.
But I still say, “IF those on the far right and those on the far left (and I want to state clearly here that, while I stand in theological agreement with those who want a fully inclusive church, I am not in agreement with many of the methodologies I am seeing) could acknowledge that we genuinely need each other to perfect the church, again using the Wesleyan language, we would quickly transform into most powerful movement for grace that the world has ever seen.”
But I don’t think either extreme can find that kind of humility. And for that, I say, “Maybe we need to die.” Because we most surely will if these “take-no-prisoners” battles continue.
Now, my backed up interviews/articles are saying, “GET BACK TO WORK” (uh, yeah, I am here as a volunteer but am part of a spectacular team and don’t want to let them down), so I need to GET BACK TO WORK!
In the meantime, don’t forget to tune into our nightly podcasts! You can find links to them here. Keep checking the United Methodist Reporter for the many news updates, commentaries and often lighthearted videos being posted. We all need time to laugh. Especially now.
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