wfn.org | Scholar urges General Conference delegates to heed Wesley

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

March 23, 2004 News media contact: Linda Green 7 (615)742-5470 7 Nashville,
Tenn. 7 E-mail: newsdesk@umcom.org 7 ALL{124}

NOTE: A head-and-shoulders photo of Marjorie Suchocki and audio are available
at http://umns.umc.org.

By Linda Green*

NAsHVILLE, Tenn. (UMNS) - Before the temptations of resentment, anger and
suspicion arise at the 2004 General Conference, a United Methodist scholar
advises delegates to look to John Wesley's writings for guidance.

Marjorie Suchocki, professor emerita at Claremont (Calif.) School of Theology
and Wesleyan scholar, gave a history and Bible lesson to General Conference
delegates who are also members of the United Methodist Board of Higher
Education and Ministry.

Using Wesley's book, A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, as a
foundation, Suchocki said Methodism's founder "cautioned us that we should
expect disagreement (and) we should expect contradiction, and that this is of
God."  

General Conference, the church's top legislative assembly, becomes a "testing
ground of being able to move away from those temptations to those awful
emotions to caring for the well-being and to actually loving and respecting
those who differ from us," she said.

Suchocki provided a keynote address for the March 19-22 semiannual meeting of
the United Methodist Board of Higher Education and Ministry. General
Conference will convene a month later, April 27-May 7, in Pittsburgh.

Christian love is the ability to love across differences, as God loves all of
humankind, Suchocki said. "It is less on what we should think and more on how
we should think."  

Although most United Methodists and Christians agree on the fundamentals of
being saved by God through Jesus Christ and that the church is the body of
Christ, questions and conflicts arise as to how the body should live,
Suchocki said. 

"This is where there should be both disagreement and love, and prayerful
coming together, as we think about how we disagree with one another," she
said.

In the United Methodist Church, the homosexuality issue has enlarged the gulf
between people typically labeled "conservatives" and "liberals" and talk of
schism frequently surfaces. Because differences threaten to divide, Wesley
provided advice to help Methodists move toward Christian perfection, and he
urged that schism be avoided, Suchocki said.  

"He tells us that we should avoid pride, which is the refusal to learn from
those who disagree with us," Suchocki said. "A schism is pride carried out to
its extreme, where we not only refuse to learn but we also separate from." 

Wesley advised not giving pride a place because it is not of God, and
"therefore we must struggle to be together," she said.

As she talked about issues affecting the world today, Suchocki said the first
response to disagreement is to destroy, but God calls people to something
different. "We must learn to disagree in love and find ways to move together
toward what God calls us to in the future and be open in it," she said. No
one but God knows what the future holds, but "we have to trust enough to stay
together in the process and to love one another."

Reflecting on Wesley's writings and theology, Suchocki advised the board
members and General Conference delegates to turn to prayer when they feel the
temptations of schism or hatred.

"If possible, we should try to find and pray with those whom we disagree with
to recognize and realize their own Christian spirit," she said. "Then through
prayer can they achieve the wonder of Christian love."

Suchocki's advice to the 998 delegates to General Conference is to love,
pray, be aware of the temptation to go against love, wrestle together in the
spirit, and respect one another in Christian love.

The Board of Higher Education and Ministry is implementing strategic plans
designed to increase youth involvement in ministry, to strengthen their
educational system, to form faithful leaders for the church and the world,
and to tell the church's story.

Referring to the board's plans, Suchocki referred the members back to Wesley
for guidance. The purpose of Christian life is that our hearts and minds are
to be filled with the love of God, she said. In the Wesleyan spirit,
Christians are to live together in the contradictions because in and through
the contradictions, they will be Christlike, she said.

The deepest contradiction today is over feelings about homosexuality, what
God is doing with homosexuality and what its role might be in the world, she
said.

"Homosexuality is used as the lightning rod against hatred," she said. "We
should use this opportunity to move to new heights of love rather than let it
be the dividing wall that comes between us."

In her writings and speeches, she has urged United Methodists to return to
Wesley's A Plain Account of Christian Perfection. "If we returned to this
wise man's teachings, we would actually value theological diversity within
our church as an opportunity for each and every one of us to avoid idolatry,"
Suchocki wrote in a paper titled, "How We Might Become Deeply Loving People,"
distributed to the board.

In valuing theological diversity and loving those who are different, Suchocki
said United Methodists would be enabled "to practice the love which is the
glory of God - not by separating from one another in the foolish name of 'my
correct doctrine,' but by hanging in together for love of one another and
God."

In other actions, board members:
7	Received more information about the agency's General Conference
legislation, including a $10 million request for a proposed Global Education
Fund that would strengthen United Methodist institutions and their worldwide
network.
7	Applauded a "diversity at work" citation from the United Methodist
Commission on Religion and Race recognizing the board's efforts to improve
diversity.
7	Received an introduction to the Pastoral Leadership Search Effort, a
joint project of the United Methodist Church, Presbyterian Church USA,
Episcopal Church, United Church of Christ and Theological Education Fund of
Atlanta, to serve as a source of information and inspiration for young people
who may be interested in entering the ministry.
7	Approved in principle a Consulting Bishops Program proposal that
would provide for a retired bishop in each jurisdiction to promote the
board's strategic plan and the apportioned funds, and to provide United
Methodists with a better understanding of the connectional church and the
global church.
# # #
*Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville,
Tenn.

 
 

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United Methodist News Service
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