The Reconciling Ministries Digest

(Note: Because of the nature of many websites, some of the links to external news sources in this digest may have expired.)

1. New Reconciling Communities in Alameda, CA and Santa Cruz, CA
2. Rev. Bruce Hilton Remembered in San Francisco Chronicle and Sacramento Bee
3. Have You Listed Your Pre-General Conference Event With Us?
4. GC 2008--Judicial Council: Elections at General Conference
5. GC 2008--Judicial Council: Letter to Delegates from Harvard-Epworth UMC on Decision 1032
6. GC 2008--Judicial Council: Decisions on LGBT Issues Since GC 2004
7. Let Us Pray For You
8. Miracle Moments

 New Reconciling Communities in Alameda, CA and Santa Cruz, CA

Buena Vista UMC
Alameda, California 

Reconciling Ministries Network welcomes Buena Vista UMC to the family.

Buena Vista UMC was founded in 1898 as an outreach to Japanese immigrants during a time of social segregation.  The church stored the personal belongings of dislocated families during the World War II internment of Japanese Americans, and was also a refuge for those returning after the war.  Our history and experiences in the Japanese American community continues to inform our community life and spiritual practices, even as the congregation has become increasingly diverse.   Buena Vista is a multi-generational congregation with a strong emphasis on family ties and care for its members.  Buena Vista values the intimacy that comes from being a small congregation while resolutely keeping its doors open to all who seek God’s Spirit. 
 
Our current constituency comes to BVUMC from various parts of the Bay Area, including San Francisco, El Cerrito, Albany, Benicia, Castro Valley, and Oakland, as well as Alameda.   Today, the congregation includes members from diverse Asian ethnic backgrounds as well as broader multi-ethnic participation.

Mission Statement

Buena Vista United Methodist Church is a welcoming, multi-generational community of faith open to all.  Our mission is to be a spiritual and healing place for individuals to develop and deepen a growing relationship with God through Jesus Christ;  nurture loving ties within the congregation that embraces family, heritage, and diversity; live out our Christian faith to our local and global communities through prayer, service, and social justice.

We Believe

• God’s hope, love, justice and healing are embodied in the life of Jesus
• Our faith, deepened and shared through life’s experiences, guides us
• Within each person and all of creation, God can be known through many traditions
• God calls us to welcome all people on their journey of faith regardless of age, abilities, physical condition, race, gender, sexual orientation or socio-economic class
• God works in human history and in the unique experiences of oppressed communities.
• God continues to call forth new roles for the ministry of Buena -Vista UMC as we encounter new realities and reflect upon our legacies. 
• As a prophetic voice for justice, we will be an example and influence in our local and global community.

FEAST
Santa Cruz, CA

Reconciling Ministries Network is pleased to welcome FEAST, a campus ministry at UC Santa Cruz, CA, to the family.

FEAST: The United Campus Christian Ministry at UC Santa Cruz, CA  is a progressive, inclusive, ecumenical, and emergent campus community dedicated to following Jesus and forging a faith that seeks justice for all people and peace in a broken world. For more information, please visit our website at http://www.uccmsantacruz.org or contact our campus minister, Sean Tai, at uccm@ucsc.edu.

We are an ecumenical organization supported by five different Protestant denominations, including the United Methodist Church. We are also open and affirming/ reconciling.

This is our official welcoming statement:

As an open and affirming organization, we recognize that the Body of Christ has always included those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and/or queer and we celebrate the love shared between people of all sexual orientations and gender identities as gifts from God. We therefore work for increasing affirmation within our faith communities and an end to systematic discrimination in our society and government toward LGBTIQ people as part of our Biblical call to justice.

 Rev. Bruce Hilton Remembered in San Francisco Chronicle and Sacramento Bee

We received the following email from Spud Hilton:

Greetings friends and collegues of Bruce!

As we prepare for the memorial celebration on April 5, we're looking for stories (real or imagined) about him that we can share in some format.

Please feel free to go to the band's blog and leave tales and observations by using the COMMENT feature on the post with his photograph. There is also a slide show, links to his obituary in the Chron and the Sac Bee and details about the memorial and the Joyful Noise Jazz Band gig on April 20 that will, essentially, be Part II of the memorial celebration.

Thanks to all for the generous support and kind words.

The Hilton Family

--------------------

The Rev. Bruce Hilton, co-founder of the Parents Reconciling Network, was remembered in an article by the San Francisco Chronicle.

The Rev. Bruce Hilton believed his whole life he could change the world.

In the 1950s, the United Methodist minister walked black children to school through predominantly white neighborhoods - even after his insurance company canceled his homeowners coverage for window breakage.

In the 1960s, he moved to Mississippi with his wife and children to help register 70,000 new black voters while training black candidates to run for political office. There the family found a bullet hole in the living room window one night and later was evicted after the Ku Klux Klan spread rumors that the couple were communist, the Rev. Hilton said after his wife, the Rev. Virginia Hilton, died in October.

The activist, minister, author and jazz musician died of kidney failure on Friday in Sacramento. He was 77.

It was in the South that he saw the worst side of humanity.

"It was the first time we'd faced clear and present evil," he later said of the experience, according to his family. "Most of our lives, the evil we face is in shades of gray. This was clear."

Through six decades, the Rev. Hilton fought against that clear and present evil, whether it was directed at minorities, gays, women or those facing a health crisis.

He was born in 1930 in Plymouth, Wis., the son of a preacher who once took on Al Capone when the mobster tried to open a distillery in town during Prohibition.

He followed in his father's footsteps, becoming an ordained minister in Dayton, Ohio. In 1956, he joined the Delta Ministry Civil Rights group to work in Mississippi, an experience he documented in his book, "The Delta Ministry."

Later, he and his wife became activists for gay rights, co-founding a support group for United Methodist parents of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender children. The reverend was among the Sacramento 68, a group of clergy who participated in the holy union ceremony of a lesbian couple in 1999.

Full story:
Rev. Bruce Hilton - activist, journalist dies
Click here

Additional coverage:
Sacramento Bee
Obituary: The Rev. Bruce Hilton, 77, was a social justice champion
Click here

 Have You Listed Your Pre-General Conference Event With Us?

During General Conference Reconciling United Methodists (RUMs) will worship, pray, and participate in the "holy conversations". This will not be confined to Fort Worth!

Visit our In Your Home Community page for detailed instructions on how to organize a RUM Cluster.

Notify RMN – We will list your gathering through our event's page.

• Send date, time, place, hosts, and email contact to antony@rmnetwork.org.
• If you have a flyer, send to antony@rmnetwork.org.
• Publicize through local congregations or email lists.

Here are the pre-General Conference events we have listed so far:

Renewal or Ruin?
Orlando, FL
March 29, 2008

Transforming Faith: Divining Gender
Portland, Oregon
April 3-6, 2008

Renewal or Ruin?
Charlotte, NC
April 5, 2008

For the Bible Tells Me So
Bethesda, MD
April 6, 4–6 pm

Renewal or Ruin?
Oak Ridge, TN
April 12, 2008

Rainbow Saturday
Dallas, TX
April 19

Observing Our Reconciling Anniversary
Dallas, TX
April 20

The UMC Global AIDS Fund Committee
Fort Worth, TX
April 22, 2008

General Conference of The United Methodist Church
Ft. Worth, Texas
April 23-May 2, 2008

 GC 2008--Judicial Council: Elections at General Conference

The United Methodist News Service provides an excellent overview of the upcoming elections at the 2008 General Conference.

One of the most watched moments of the 2008 General Conference will be elections to the Judicial Council. Five of the nine members are eligible for re-election.

Four members––Dr. James Holsinger, Mary A. Daffin, the Rev. Keith D. Boyette and Rudolfo C. Beltran––were elected in 2000 to an eight-year term. Also ending his term this year is the Rev. Paul Shamwange, who replaced the Rev. Larry Pickens in 2004 when Pickens became chief executive of the United Methodist Commission on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns.

Council members may serve two consecutive eight-year terms before they rotate off, according to Paragraph 2602.1 of the Book of Discipline.

General Conference will elect three clergy and two laity to the council, which will be made up of five clergy and four laity through 2016. Since 2000, the council has had four clergy and five lay members. The conference also will elect six lay and six clergy alternates for four-year terms.

Any new members will join the council at the end of the 2008 General Conference and serve through the end of the 2016 session. The alternates will serve through the end of the 2012 General Conference.

Full story:
Judicial Council to be 'on call' at General Conference
Click here

 GC 2008--Judicial Council: Letter to Delegates from Harvard-Epworth UMC on Decision 1032

March 14, 2008

Dear General Conference Delegate,

We are writing this brief letter to you to lift up a concern that we believe will shape the immediate future of the United Methodist Church.  We would not have taken such a direct approach if two Judicial Council members who are running for re-election had not already mailed multi-colored campaign literature to all of the delegates.  We believe it is important for another side of the story to be told.

The Reverend Keith Boyette, Secretary of the Council, and Mary A. Daffin, Vice President of the Council are each campaigning to be elected for another eight year term.  It is essential that delegates be aware that both of these candidates have strongly supported Judicial Council Decision 1032, which one member of the Council fears “will prove harmful to the credibility of the Judicial Council because it abandons the traditional and limited role of the Judicial Council as interpreter of church law and assumes a new mantle as creator of church law.”  (Judge Jon R. Gray)  Mr. Boyette and Mrs. Daffin joined James Holsinger, Dennis Blackwell, and Rudolfo Beltran in the majority opinion.  (Only Mr. Blackwell has years remaining in his current term.)

As you may know, JC 1032 (in upholding the right of a pastor to bar a homosexual man from joining his church) states that the pastor is “solely responsible for making the determination of a person’s readiness for membership.”  It goes so far as to reject the notion that the bishop and district superintendent are charged to give guidance in the exercise of this unfettered right.  The decision puts church membership at the mercy of any pastor to determine the grounds for barring an individual from joining a church.  It violates the guarantee of open membership protected in Article IV of our Constitution and the spirit of paragraph 138 in the Discipline, which declares “inclusiveness denies every semblance of discrimination.”  The decision so alarmed the Council of Bishops that they unanimously endorsed a pastoral letter to the church expressing their deep concern about its implications.

Please read the whole decision before coming to General Conference.  It is available on the United Methodist web page (www.umc.org).  Please pay particular attention to Jon Gray’s eloquent and respectful dissent from the majority.  And please remember that when you are electing candidates to the Judicial Council you are voting for the kind of church we are going to be.

Grace and Peace,

The Church Council of the Harvard-Epworth United Methodist Church

(The Council voted unanimously to send this letter of concern on March 10, 2008.)

Additional coverage:
Harvard-Epworth UMC
Click here

--------------------

The back side of the letter contains excerpts from several different sources regarding Decision 1032:

“We… affirm our Wesleyan practice that pastors are accountable to the bishop, superintendent, and the clergy on matters of ministry and membership.”
           
(From the Pastoral Letter of the Council of Bishops, Nov. 2, 2005)

“We cannot begin to comprehend the unwanted and undesired consequences of this ruling. The majority’s ruling has dangerous potential to create adversarial relationships between pastors and persons who seek membership in our denomination. It encroaches upon the authority of the office of bishop by judicial whim rather than through a deliberate legislative process. It upsets the delicate system of checks and balances inherent in our governance. These consequences will result in serious ramifications.”

(From the dissenting opinion of Jon R. Gray, JC 1032)

“Decision 1032 cannot be viewed in isolation from the recent history of our church. Numerous warnings have been sounded that the decision to enshrine discriminatory policies in our Book of Discipline would lead us down a slippery slope, ultimately threatening much of what we cherish in our Methodist heritage.”

(From Here We Stand, a document signed by more than 2500 United Methodists.)

“The General Conference (not the Judicial Council) retains the right to fix the conditions for membership and the charge conference retains the responsibility to insist that questions pertaining to membership are handled according to disciplinary requirements. The Judicial Council, in our polity, has neither legislative nor executive authority. In Decision 1032 it runs roughshod over two bodies that are duly charged with both of those responsibilities.”

(From an article by Scott Campbell, UM Nexus, April 2007)

“While the specific case in 1032 involved homosexuality, the principles enshrined in 1032 really allow pastors to discriminate at will without any accountability to others in the denomination for their decisions. For example, a pastor could decide that anyone overweight should be denied membership because they are poor stewards of the body God has given them. A pastor could decide to refuse membership to an undocumented person because they are violating federal law. A pastor could decide to exclude someone from membership for having an abortion. A pastor could deny someone membership for buying a new SUV which makes a huge carbon footprint with its ensuing contribution to global warming.”

(From a letter by Richard Bentley, March 2008)

 GC 2008--Judicial Council: Decisions on LGBT Issues Since GC 2004

According to UMC.org:

The Judicial Council is the highest judicial body or "court" of The United Methodist Church. Its nine members are elected by the General Conference. The Judicial Council determines the constitutionality of acts or proposed acts of the General, Jurisdictional, Central, and Annual Conferences. It acts on these either on appeal of lower rulings or through requests for declaratory decisions. It also rules on whether acts of other official bodies of the denomination conform to The Book of Discipline. This is done in accordance with procedures established in The Book of Discipline.

Here are the key links to understand the work of the Judicial Council:

Rules of Practice and Procedure that governs the Judicial Council
Click here

The Judicial Council Docket
Click here

Judicial Council Decisions and Memorandum
Click here

 ---------------------

The Judicial Council rules on the following paragraphs related to LGBT issues in The Book of Discipline:

What is the denomination's position on homosexuality?
Click here

Here are decisions and memorandums issued by Judicial Council since the Pittsburg General Conference in 2004 relative to LGBT concerns:

JCM = Judicial Council Memorandum
JCD = Judicial Council Decision

JCM 1004
JCD 1020
JCD 1021
JCD 1027 (See 2/13/2008 Flashnet on Ordination, Sexual Orientation)
JCD 1028
JCD 1030
JCD 1032 (See 2/6/2008 Flashnet on Membership)
JCD 1041
JCM 1044
JCM 1045
JCD 1052
JCD 1074 (See 2/20/2008 Flashnet on Ordination, Gender Identity)
JCD 1075
JCD 1080
JDM 1081 (See 3/5/2008 Flashnet on Funding Ban)

 Let Us Pray For You

Please let us be part of your support and let us know how we might help. One way is to let us pray for you. We invite you to send your prayer requests to us and be counted in the weekly offering of joys and concerns. You may call (773-736-5526), write (RMN 3801 N. Keeler Ave. Chicago, IL 60641) or email these requests to prayer@rmnetwork.org.

Please pray for the gay Nigerian Christian leader brutally beaten by an angry mob outside a funeral ceremony last week. Anti-gay efforts within the Anglical church are suspected to be behind the attack:

Full story:
Gay Nigeria Christian Leader Narrowly Escapes Death in Brutal Attack
Click here

--------------------

Please continue to pray for gay Iranian teen Mehdi Kazemi. Mehdi, who awaits deportation from The Netherlands to the UK, was granted a temporary reprieve from deportation from Britain by the Home Secretary last week after public outcry.

Full story:

Gay Iranian gets temporary reprieve
Click here

Photographs from the London Protest
Click here

Prior coverage:
1/16/2008 Flashnet
Click here

 Miracle Moments

We include these Moments of significant cultural shifts in the hope these societal events may positively impact life in our Church. The implication is not that these events happen spontaneously or miraculously. These highlights occur after years, even decades of struggle and hard work by many people. We offer them as blessings for our journey. Please send us your Miracle Moments to be included when space allows. Send to Moments@RMNetwork.org.

According to the Human Rights Campaign:

For the second year in a row, the Kentucky legislation to ban state universities from offering domestic partner health insurance benefits was defeated in the state’s House Health & Welfare Committee on Thursday. The bill, SB 112, failed on a 9-6 vote. Democratic Committee member and physician Rep. David Watkins (pictured below) strongly criticized the bill's sponsor, Sen. Vernie McGaha (R), and supporters of the bill for focusing on narrow divisive measures rather than on the real healthcare needs of Kentuckians:

Full story:
Kentucky committee (again) kills bill to take away domestic partner health benefits from state university employees
Click here