North Carolina Christian Advocate, July 19, 2005

ANNUAL CONFERENCE NEEDS TO TAKE RESOLUTIONS SERIOUSLY

by Rev. Paul T. Stallsworth

     The 2005 session of the North Carolina Annual Conference has come and gone.  Each time our annual conference (or any other annual conference, for that matter) gathers, things are learned about the gathered conference.  This year the clergy and lay delegates learned that resolutions and the resolutionary process are not as popular as they used to be.   

     Resolutions considered and approved by the annual conference, it should be remembered, are “official expressions” (to use a phrase from The Book of Discipline [Paragraph 510.2a] on General Conference resolutions) of the will of the annual conference for the year to come.  So by approving resolutions, the annual conference officially expresses its position on pressing injustices and other matters of the day, and thereby witnesses beyond the conference itself.

     The annual conference’s consideration of resolutions is always one of the high points of the annual-conference session.  The deliberations over, and decisions on, the resolutions are interesting, informative, and unpredictable.  In those deliberations and decisions, clergy and laity work (and work hard) to hear God’s Word, to sense God’s leading, to discern God’s will, to consider where the Church’s faith should have public expression.  Because participants are bound together by the baptismal covenant, and because the Holy Spirit abides throughout the annual conference, the resolutionary deliberations and decisions by United Methodists are usually a strong sign of conference unity and vitality.

     But things seem to have changed.  According to the events of the 2005 Annual Conference, it appears that some in the conference want to restrict the resolutionary process.  Please consider the following five pieces of evidence.

     First, the daily agenda of the 2005 Annual Conference scheduled Report 1 -- from the Committee on Resolutions and Reference, which formally presents resolutions to the annual conference -- for late Thursday afternoon, on the first full day of conference.  Report 2 was slated for Saturday morning, just before the Worship and Sending Forth.  Since the reports of the Committee on Resolutions and Reference were not orders of the day on the agenda, they could be delayed as needed.  (And delayed Report 1 was -- especially by the disproportionately lengthy debate over the location of the 2006 Annual Conference.  Was that issue really that important?)  Not surprisingly, the dinner hour and the end of conference served as boundaries beyond which the resolutions could not be considered.  Result: the time for resolutionary discourse and decision-making was severely limited.

     Second, most debate on the 2005 resolutions occurred on Friday night between 10:00 and 11:00.  At that late hour, the conference floor had depopulated and the delegates’ energy level had dipped.  It was not a time for optimal consideration of the resolutions at hand.

     Third, the resolutions not acted on on Friday night were, on Saturday morning, bunched by motion and referred by vote to the Board of Church and Society.  In doing so, the conference suggested that it was tired of resolutions and deliberation over them.

     Fourth, the Committee on Resolutions and Reference proposed, and the annual conference passed, a rules change (beginning with the 2006 Annual Conference) that limits the number of resolutions that can be brought, by an individual delegate and by an “unofficial organization,” to one.

     And fifth, the motion was made, on Saturday morning, to eliminate altogether the consideration of resolutions from the 2006 Annual Conference.  Lengthy debate was required to make sure this motion failed.

     Why have resolutions become so unpopular in the annual conference?  Because they require some very hard work from the conference delegates.  Because some United Methodists are tired of theological and moral debate in the church.  Because what can be called the Norman Vincent Peale wing (or the Rodney [“Why-can’t-we-just-get-along?”] King wing) of The United Methodist Church, which wants the positive always to erase the negative, has become much more aggressive of late.  And because some United Methodists do not want to show forth any disagreement to the world.

     Yes, some really are concerned that disagreements at annual conference will make United Methodists look as divided as Americans in general.  Well, to be honest, there are some serious disagreements in United Methodism today.  There are some serious divisions in our denomination and in our annual conference.  But the honest way to handle those disagreements and divisions is through a respectful, resolutionary process, in the annual conference, in which the participants strive to speak the truth in love to one another.  That, in itself, can be a strong witness.  That, in itself, can be a great and a good witness to the larger Church and the larger society.  That, in itself, can be a sign of the Kingdom of God.

     But for that to take place, conference time and energy -- sufficient time and energy -- must be given to resolutionary matters.  In annual conferences to come, let us make sure that the resolutionary process is protected and sufficient time for resolutionary discourse is allotted.  This will help to establish the most faithful, annual-conference witness to the greater Church and to the larger world.    

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Rev. Stallsworth is the pastor of St. Peter’s United Methodist Church in Morehead City, NC.

To respond to this article and continue the dialogue, please send your article to: St. Peter’s United Methodist Church/111

Hodges Street/Morehead City, NC 28557.