wfn.org | Delegates to South Central Jurisdiction to elect four bishops

[NewsDesk <NewsDesk@UMCOM.UMC.ORG>]

June 6, 2000 News media contact: Linda Green·(615)742-5470·Nashville, Tenn.
10-21SC-71B{267}

By United Methodist News Service

United Methodist delegates from the south central United States will gather
in Albuquerque, N.M., July 12-15 to elect four bishops and to assign seven
others to geographic areas for the next four years.

A United Methodist bishop is elected for life and normally serves no more
than eight years in an episcopal area.  New bishops cannot be appointed
immediately to serve an area where they have their conference clergy
membership.

The episcopal elections in the South Central Jurisdiction will be held to
fill vacancies created by the retirement of Bishops J. Woodrow Hearn of the
Houston Area; Raymond Owen of the San Antonio Area; Dan E. Solomon of the
Louisiana Area; and Joe Wilson of the Fort Worth Area.

The jurisdiction comprises 17 annual conferences and 11 episcopal areas. The
annual conferences and the presiding bishops are: Louisiana - Dan E.
Solomon; Oklahoma and Oklahoma Missionary - Bruce Blake; Rio Grande and
Southwest Texas - Raymond Owen; Missouri East and Missouri West - Ann B.
Sherer; Kansas East and Kansas West - A. Fritz Mutti; Nebraska - Joel N.
Martinez; North Arkansas and Little Rock - Janice R. Huie; New Mexico and
Northwest Texas -Alfred Norris; North Texas - William Oden; Central Texas -
Joe A. Wilson; and Texas -- J. Woodrow Hearn.

Martinez, Mutti, Sherer and Norris are completing eight years in their
current episcopal assignments. Each of them has another eight years of
eligibility to serve. The others were first assigned to their current areas
in 1996.

Although eight years is the standard term for a bishop to serve in an
episcopal area, it is not unusual for a bishop to be assigned to one area
for 12 years for "missional reasons."

Bishops are charged by the church's Book of Discipline to "lead and oversee
the spiritual and temporal affairs" of the church and to "lead the church in
its mission of witness and service in the world."  

The 332 delegates who will attend the conference will include an equal
number of clergy and lay members and reserves that were elected by their
respective annual (regional) conferences in 1999. They will represent the
1.8 million United Methodists in the eight states of the south central
region.

The jurisdictional conference will convene downtown at the Hyatt Hotel at
6:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 12, and adjourn by noon Friday, July 15. This
meeting and four other jurisdictional conferences will be held concurrently
in the United States to elect 13 new bishops and to assign all active U.S
bishops to geographic areas. The appointment of bishops to new geographic
areas is effective Sept. 1.

Ordained elders may be elected bishop without any endorsement, but usually
their respective delegation, annual conference or church group supports
them. 

United Methodist News Service will provide detailed information on the
candidates, balloting, elections, and assignments on a special
Jurisdictional Conference Web site at  http://umns.umc.org/elections .  

Several annual conferences in the South Central Jurisdiction are meeting
through June 10 and others have already endorsed candidates for the
episcopacy. 

 Receiving endorsements from official church groups are:

·	Aaron D. Black, 51, African American, pastor of First United
Methodist Church, Lincoln, Neb., endorsed by the Nebraska Conference
delegation and South Central Jurisdiction Black Methodists for Church
Renewal.

·	Minerva Carcano, 46, Hispanic American, director of the Mexican
American Program at Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist
University, Dallas, endorsed by Rio Grande Conference delegation, MARCHA,
the second National Hispanic Consultation held last August, and the Women's
Leadership Team in the South Central Jurisdiction.

·	Ben R. Chamness, 59, white, superintendent of the Houston Northwest
District, Texas Conference, endorsed by the Texas Conference delegation and
by the South Central Black Methodists for Church Renewal.

·	Donald Cottrill, 55, white, pastor of Aldersgate United Methodist
Church in Slidell, La., endorsed by the Louisiana Conference delegation. 

·	Joe Harris, 48, African American, general secretary of the
Commission on United Methodist Men, Nashville, Tenn., endorsed by the
Oklahoma Conference delegation.

·	William Hutchinson, 58, white, executive director of the New Mexico
Conference United Methodist Foundation, endorsed by the Northwest Texas-New
Mexico Conference delegates.

·	Rhymes H. Moncure Jr., 54, African American, pastor of Missouri
United Methodist Church, Columbia, Mo., endorsed by the Missouri East and
Missouri West conference delegations, South Central Jurisdiction Black
Methodists for Church Renewal and the Women's Leadership of the South
Central Jurisdiction. 

·	D. Max Whitfield, 54, white, superintendent of the Fayetteville
District of the North Arkansas Conference, endorsed by the North Arkansas
and Little Rock conference delegations and the Little Rock Annual
Conference.

Each candidate's race is noted because of the emphasis that the denomination
places on diversity in its leadership. The United Methodist Book of
Discipline  (Para.407.2a) states that jurisdictions "shall give due
consideration to the inclusiveness of The United Methodist Church with
respect to sex, race and national origin."  

Voting at the jurisdictional conference will begin with each delegate
putting a name on a blank ballot. The first ballot usually results in dozens
of names, but the number drops on subsequent ballots as some delegates move
their votes to those more likely to get elected. The number of ballots
before an election has ranged from one or two to more than 40.  A person may
also be elected by conference delegates in another delegation or may be
transferred from one jurisdiction to another.

During a jurisdictional conference, a bishop is elected when at least 60
percent of the delegates present have voted. However, each jurisdiction may
establish its own necessary percentage points for election.

A jurisdictional conference not only elects bishops but also has the
following power and duties:
·	To promote the evangelistic, education, missionary, and benevolent
interests of the church and to provide for interests and institutions within
their boundaries. (The South Central Jurisdiction institutions are Mt.
Sequoyah Assembly, Fayetteville, Ark.; Lydia Patterson Institute, El Paso,
Texas; and Southern Methodist University, Dallas.)
·	To establish and constitute jurisdictional conference boards as
auxiliary to the general boards of the church.
·	To determine the boundaries of their annual conferences.
·	To make rules and regulations for the administration of the work of
the church within the jurisdiction.
·	To appoint a committee on appeals for itinerant pastors.

The United Methodist Church was created in 1968 with the merger of the
Evangelical United Brethren and Methodist churches. Methodists elected their
bishops at one national gathering until 1940, when the jurisdictional system
was created. Bishops in the EUB church were elected at one national
gathering until the 1968 gathering.
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United Methodist News Service
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