wfn.org | Faith and Life commentary-Guidelines for disagreement

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

April 14, 1998 Contact: Thomas S. McAnally (615)742-5470 Nashville,
Tenn.  10-21-71B {226}

By Phil Wogaman*

The late Jesuit theologian John Courtney Murray made a shrewd
observation when he said that genuine disagreement is a rare
achievement. Often we think we are engaged in argument when we re only
talking past one another. It can be an "achievement" to arrive at the
point where we know the extent of our disagreement with somebody else.
Only when we have arrived at that point can we begin to figure out how
to turn genuine disagreement into genuine agreement.

I thought of Father Murray's point every now and then during the course
of the Dialogue on Theological Diversity within the United Methodist
Church. Having met twice, in November and February, the dialogue
participants have completed their work. Their final report, In Search of
Unity, has been published and is available from the General Commission
on Christian Unity and Interreligious Concerns of the United Methodist
Church.

There were such sharp disagreements among the 23 participants that I
doubt whether anybody was happy with all aspects of the final document.
I know I was not.  Still, we had met, we had come to know and understand
one another better, and we were able to agree on several proposals.

In some respects, our best contribution may have been a list of
"Guidelines for Civility" that are included in the report. The
guidelines are mostly common sense rules for getting along with people
with whom you disagree. They are not based on the assumption that we
will ever do away with disagreement, but they offer the hope that we can
disagree constructively.

One of them calls upon us to "respect the personhood of others, while
engaging their ideas."  That is a pretty good reminder that the most
basic idea of all is that we are all precious in the eyes of God. Then
we are admonished to "carefully represent the views of those with whom
we are in disagreement." After all, we haven't won an argument until we
have faced and thought through the strongest points the other person has
made - and when we are careful with the views of others, we may find
that we are sometimes persuaded by them! Then we should seek to
understand the life experiences, the "stories," of those with whom we
disagree.

There are seven other guidelines, each calling us to be humbler and more
open. Do such guidelines lead us to water down our convictions?  I
suppose they could, but there is a deeper point. They all remind us that
God is also a participant in every church dialogue.  None of us should
claim to have the last word; that is reserved to God. As Christians we
already possess deep truth. But is it not typical of our experience as
Christians that we continue to grow in our understanding of that truth?
God isn't through with any of us yet.  

Far from being an obstacle, a frank confrontation of our disagreements
can enable all of us to grow -- but only if we follow the kind of
guidelines the dialogue has shared with the church.

# # # 

*Wogaman, pastor of Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington and a
seminary professor of Christian ethics, is the author of 13 books. He is
a clergy member of the Baltimore-Washington United Methodist Annual
(regional) Conference.
	

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