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Judicial Council reverses lower court, rules against Beth Stroud

Oct. 31, 2005

NOTE: Photographs, a logo and a sidebar report, UMNS story #612, are
available at http://umns.umc.org.

By Neill Caldwell*

HOUSTON (UMNS) - The United Methodist Judicial Council has reversed an
appeals court ruling in the case of a lesbian pastor, restoring the
original trial court ruling and verdict that had resulted in the
minister losing her clergy credentials.

The Rev. Irene Elizabeth "Beth" Stroud, an associate pastor at First
United Methodist Church in Germantown, Pa., was convicted by a clergy
trial court last December after stating that she was a practicing
lesbian - a violation of church law, which forbids the ordination and
appointment of "self-avowed practicing" homosexuals. The trial court
revoked Stroud's credentials, but a jurisdictional court of appeals set
aside that ruling in April. The Oct. 31 decision by the denomination's
top court restores the original decision.

"The Northeast Jurisdiction Committee on Appeals erred in reversing and
setting aside the verdict and penalty from Rev. Stroud's trial," the
court said in its eight-page ruling.

"Stroud was accorded fair and due process rights enumerated in the (Book
of) Discipline and Judicial Council decisions," the court said.
"Regulation of the practice of homosexuality does not violate the
'status' provisions of the Constitution. The Northeast Jurisdiction
Committee on Appeals was without jurisdiction to declare that Paragraph
304.3 established a new standard of doctrine contrary to our present
existing and established standards..."

The council also determined that the presiding officer of the original
trial court "correctly stated the law of the church" in instructing the
court regarding the penalty phase.

The Stroud case was one of several related to homosexuality heard by the
Judicial Council at its regular fall session in Houston (see related
story). Oral arguments in the case were heard Oct. 27, in a public
session at First United Methodist Church of Houston's Westchase campus.
Stroud attended the hearing, sitting in the front row with her partner,
Chris Paige, but did not address the council.

In an Oct. 31 telephone interview, Stroud said she "will continue to
stay in the United Methodist Church and work for change. Today's
decision shows that the existing discrimination in the United Methodist
Church is clear. There's no room to be in denial about that. But if you
stay in the relationship, there is opportunity for conversation. That's
the beauty of our United Methodist Church. We're all in this together."

"It's been a sad morning for us here, very tearful and emotional," she
added. "My partner and my family are here with me. We wish the outcome
would have been different. We thought we had a strong case, and the
appeals committee though we had a strong case.

"I'll continue to work at the church as an associate lay pastor as I
have been doing (since December). The silver lining out of all this is
that by being out of the closet, my partner and I have started the
process to become foster parents. We've filed the final papers. So if
that works out, I will be taking some maternity leave. That's a joyful
thing for us to look forward to."

At the oral hearing, Alan Symonette, lay leader at Stroud's church, told
the council that action against Stroud was discrimination based on her
status as a homosexual person. "This has everything to do with status,"
he said. "The church is asking gay people who are called to ministry and
want to practice ministry not to admit their homosexuality."

"The United Methodist Church is an inclusive church, one body in
Christ," Symonette added. "Beth Stroud is called to ministry in that
church by God."

Stroud's other advocate, the Rev. Jim Hallam of Lima, Pa., lifted the
thick United Methodist Book of Resolutions and said it "teaches us that
racism, sexism, war ... are 'incompatible with Christian teachings.' Why
is homosexuality the only issue that is prohibitive?"

The Rev. Thomas Hall, pastor of Crossroads United Methodist Church in
Chester Springs, Pa., and counsel for the Eastern Pennsylvania Annual
Conference, said the case was not about Stroud, who has "wonderful
pastoral gifts," but about the "clear language" in the Book of
Discipline.

"This is about the authority General Conference has to determine and
enforce requirements for ordained ministry in the United Methodist
Church," Hall told the court. "What is at stake is the very integrity of
the Book of Discipline. If we lose, everyone loses."

The Book of Discipline states the United Methodist Church's belief that
"all persons are individuals of sacred worth. The church is committed to
be in ministry with all persons, and to support civil rights for all
persons, regardless of sexual orientation." The book also states that
"the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching,"
and that "self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as
candidates, ordained as ministers or appointed to serve in the United
Methodist Church."

Stroud's advocates noted that the denomination's Constitution says "no
conference or other organizational unit of the church shall be
structured so as to exclude any member or any constituent body of the
church because of race, color, national origin, status or economic
condition." They argued that the word "status" in that section is
ambiguous.

The Judicial Council ruled that Paragraph 304.2 of the Book of
Discipline "is not directed at the status of being a homosexual or
having a particular sexual orientation." The court said the regulation
applies to "practicing" homosexuals rather than a person's sexual
orientation: "No provision of the Discipline bars a person with same-sex
orientation from the ordained ministry in the United Methodist Church.
Rather, Paragraph 304.3 is directed toward those persons who practice
that same-sex orientation by engaging in prohibited sexual activity.
Likewise, persons who have a heterosexual orientation who practice that
orientation in prohibited ways - by not practicing fidelity in marriage
and celibacy in singleness as required by Paragraph 304.2 - are subject
to chargeable offenses."

The council also determined that the appeals court lacked jurisdiction
to determine whether or not Paragraph 304.3 establishes a new church
doctrine that is contrary to established doctrine. "Such a determination
would require an interpretation of doctrine which is beyond judicial
authority under United Methodist polity," the ruling said.

The case began with an April 19, 2003, letter written by Stroud to her
congregation in which she said she was "a lesbian living in a committed
relationship with a partner," and acknowledged that the disclosure would
put her "credentials as an ordained United Methodist minister at risk."
She also shared the information in a sermon.

Following that admission, Stroud was charged with "engaging in practices
declared by the United Methodist Church to be incompatible with
Christian teachings." In December, 2004, a trial court of 13 fellow
clergy from her own Eastern Pennsylvania Annual Conference found Stroud
guilty by a vote of 12-1 and then voted 7-6 to withdraw her credentials.
Stroud then appealed to the Northeast Jurisdiction Committee on Appeals,
which reversed the ruling in April. That decision was promptly appealed
to the Judicial Council by the Eastern Pennsylvania Annual Conference.

The committee on appeals referred to Judicial Council Decision 702 in
its due process argument. The council later said that the use of that
decision was wrong and that the appeals court "ignored ... a host of
other decisions of the Judicial Council and actions of the General
Conference..." "In Decision 702, the clergyperson was accorded none of
the fair and due process rights accorded to Rev. Stroud," the council
said. Decision 702 said the General Conference or annual conferences
must define "self-avowed practicing homosexual" for themselves, which
led to the addition of a footnote to Paragraph 304.3 offering a
definition for the phrase.

As to due process, "The Judicial Council ... has painstakingly outlined
the procedures which are to be applied at each stage of the proceedings
to ensure that a clergyperson's fair and due process rights are
protected while the disciplinary provisions enacted by the General
Conference are given force and effect. These procedures have been
meticulously followed in the proceedings involving Rev. Stroud."

In an Oct. 31 brief of partial concurrence and partial dissent, two
council members- the Rev. Susan Henry-Crowe and layperson Beth Capen -
said they regretted the outcome and wrote that "the church continues to
struggle with the issue of homosexuality. The church is clearly of many
minds on this issue. People of deep faith and conscience continue to
struggle and pray over these matters. While the Judicial Council must be
faithful to its charge from the church, we are also sensitive to the
hurt, pain and brokenness of the family of God."

Henry-Crowe and Capen suggested that the meaning and intent of Paragraph
33 of the church's Constitution - which gives the annual conference the
right to vote on "all matters relating to the character ... of its
clergy members, and on the ordination of clergy" - may need to be
addressed by a future General Conference, and charged that prohibiting
ordination because of one specific category amounts to discrimination.

"The prohibition was inserted into the section on qualifications for
ordination (Paragraph  304). Must not all candidates and clergy be held
to the same standards?" Henry-Crowe and Capen wrote. "It would seem that
matters of character and qualification of all candidates and ministers
must be the sole consideration."

At the oral hearing, Richard Shoemaker and the Rev. Richard Heitzenrater
also spoke for the Eastern Pennsylvania Annual Conference. Shoemaker
noted during the hearing that Stroud's camp was "not happy with these
most recent Judicial Council decisions," but he said: "If we cannot rely
on these decisions, we're up a creek without a paddle. It's chaos."

Of the court's nine members, the Rev. Paul Shamwange Kyungu of the
Democratic Republic of Congo was absent from the deliberations.

*Caldwell is a United Methodist News Service correspondent based in High
Point, NC.

News media contact: Linda Green or Tim Tanton, (615) 742-5470 or
newsdesk@umcom.org.

********************

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

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