wfn.org | Bishop, evangelicals express willingness to resume dialogue

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

June 5, 2000        News media contact: Tim Tanton·(615)742-5470·Nashville,
Tenn.     10-21-28-71B{262}

By United Methodist News Service

United Methodist evangelicals and California-Nevada Annual Conference
officials say they are open to entering into dialogue with each other, two
years after direct communication ended.

Relations between the two are strained. Evangelicals have complained about
not having a voice in the conference leadership. They also have been
critical of conference officials for what they view as liberal
decision-making that is out of step with the denomination as a whole.

The Evangelical Renewal Fellowship (ERF) in California had asked the
church's top legislative body to approve the creation of an Evangelical
Missionary Conference in the West, but delegates to General Conference
rejected that proposal during their May 2-12 meeting in Cleveland.

The question now is whether communications and fellowship can be established
between the evangelicals and the conference, said the Rev. Robert Kuyper,
president of the evangelicals' group. The two haven't had dialogue since
1998, he said. "In some ways, the ball is in their court."

"We stand ready for dialogue," said Bishop Melvin G. Talbert, who leads the
conference. "We have never closed any doors. My vision for this conference
has always been the table is long enough and wide enough for everybody. We
all belong to the same table. We have not sought to exclude anybody. That
invitation still stands."

The evangelicals have said their voice is not heard in the conference.
Talbert, an African-American who worked in the civil rights movement, said
he understands. "I come out of a protest struggle myself. There are ways to
make your voice heard." He doesn't believe a group makes its voice heard by
first withholding apportionments and then deciding not to participate in the
church until things are done its way. People are heard by coming to the
table as full participating members, sharing perspectives and learning from
each other, he said.

About 40 to 50 pastors identify with the fellowship, Kuyper said, and most
of them had expressed an interest in presenting the idea for creating a
missionary conference.

"A lot of people who weren't at General Conference feel like the General
Conference didn't do anything to help Western Jurisdiction evangelicals,"
Kuyper said. "There's certainly a great deal of disappointment," he said.
 
However, he found reasons for encouragement at the gathering. "I feel like
we were well received, and people were certainly very concerned about our
situation here," he said. "We felt that concern." He said he was pleased
that the proposal received as many votes as it did -- 312 out of 927 votes
cast.

Though the missionary conference idea was rejected, Kuyper believes the
General Conference's actions on homosexuality affirmed the evangelicals.
"What was passed at General Conference only affirmed the things that we
believe in and to me say that we're part of the United Methodist Church." 

The General Conference delegates affirmed by roughly 2-to-1 margins the
denomination's stance that the practice of homosexuality is incompatible
with Christian teaching, that "self-avowed, practicing homosexuals" shall
not be ordained in the church, and that same-sex union ceremonies shall not
be conducted by the church's ministers nor held in its sanctuaries.

Talbert is one of a number of bishops opposing the denomination's position,
and this has been a point of friction between him and the evangelicals. The
bishop feels that the evangelicals want him to draw a line against including
everyone at the table. "I refuse to do that," he said, adding: "The General
Conference has not excluded anybody from the table."

Evangelicals also are upset at the conference's treatment of a local pastor,
the Rev. Kyle Phillips, who said he is being reappointed to a smaller church
because of his criticism of Talbert. 

"Whatever happened at General Conference has been greatly overshadowed by
this in the minds of many evangelicals," Kuyper said.

Phillips and five other evangelical pastors wrote an open letter to
conference churches March 8 that was critical of the bishop's leadership,
and they suggested that churches consider withholding apportionments. The
pastors wrote that the conference's decision not to bring charges against 67
clergy members (the number at one time was 69) for performing a same-sex
service in 1999 represented a breakdown in authority. The committee's
decision represented "the latest expression of gay and lesbian affirmation
that our conference leadership has chosen," the pastors stated.

Talbert, who announced the decision on Feb. 11, "has placed personal
conscience over mutual submission to our shared covenant," the evangelicals
wrote. The bishop was not a member of the committee and did not participate
in its deliberations, but expressed support for the decision. 

The pastors said they have established an escrow fund to receive
apportionment payments until conference accountability is established, a
missionary conference for evangelicals is created or a "gracious means" is
developed for allowing individual churches to leave. 

Phillips said Talbert told him on May 18 that he would not be reappointed to
his church in Tehachapi, Calif., but would be sent to a smaller
congregation. Phillips has led the Tehachapi church for 10 years, building
it from a worship attendance of 60 people to 200. The pastor sensed that he
was singled out because he was perceived as the leader of the group that
signed the letter, although the group didn't have a leader, he said.

Talbert told United Methodist News Service on June 2 that he is still
working on appointments. "I have not finalized appointments, and I am not
prepared to make any comments about that at this point," he said. All
conference appointments become effective July 1.

He added that it is "unfortunate that everything we do" will be seen from
the perspective of being punitive against evangelicals. He is doing his work
as bishop to the best of his ability, he said. "I have no reason to be
punitive if people are doing their work in their churches."

Phillips said he will challenge the validity of the appointment process at
the annual conference session, which meets June 14-18. "We will be asking
for a ruling by the bishop at the annual conference whether or not the
appointment was valid, and then we'll go from there."
 
At the upcoming annual conference session, the evangelicals also will
request that members ask the United Methodist Judicial Council to rule on
whether or not the committee on investigation's decision in the case of the
67 pastors was valid. Kuyper doubts that the annual conference will agree to
do that, but he expects similar requests to be supported by other annual
conferences.

The issue also spurred the filing of a complaint against the bishop himself
by an Orangevale, Calif., laywoman, with assistance from the newly formed
Coalition for United Methodist Accountability, an unofficial conservative
group. In essence, the complaint was critical of Talbert's handling of
initial complaints that had been filed against the 67 pastors.

Kuyper and ERF members are working on their strategy during meetings leading
up to the annual conference session. One possibility is that if Phillips is
not reappointed to Tehachapi, the evangelicals might pull out of the annual
conference session and have their own meeting - "an annual conference in
exile" - during that period, Kuyper said. That would be a way to express
displeasure with what they view as the use of appointments "for punitive
purposes," he said. "It's just tentative at this point.

"A lot of things are up in the air," he said. There's "a lot of room for
dialogue and for healing."

An opportunity for healing and dialogue might occur during the annual
conference session itself. Kuyper said that he and the Rev. Don Fado of
Sacramento, Calif., are planning a two-hour period of "spiritual
conferencing" during which conference members will deal with their covenant
and divisions. Fado organized the 1999 same-sex ceremony in Sacramento that
led to the complaint being filed against the 67 pastors.
# # #

*************************************
United Methodist News Service
Photos and stories also available at:
http://umns.umc.org