It doesn't matter who you are
< rant>
It's becoming more and more apparent to me that the United Methodist Church is spiritually sick. The recent Judicial Council decisions...I will say that the first shouldn't have come as a shock. The Discipline is fairly explicit on the matter. The second decision...it grieves me, especially when I think about the implications for the church as a whole.
For instance, if you define homosexuality as a sin, by the same token, shouldn't you bar a whole lot more people from membership? Given the above assumption, why does that particular sin receive so much more attention than other sins?
While reading a couple of the news articles on www.confessingumc.org, I agree with the fact that pastors are too lenient in membership requirements. Either that or we're just not demanding enough from our members. But anyway, there's a difference between someone joining a church for the sake of joining, as I fear many people do, and joining because the person genuinely wants to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Making disciples should be our baseline -- after all, we are all "going on to perfection" ("going on to salvation," the language the Confessing Church uses, just gives me the willies). We all have our shortcomings, so it shouldn't even matter if one sees homosexuality as a sin or not.
And what kind of message are we sending people? That God's love is only for some? We are already so far out of step with the culture in terms of any sort of relevant messages...we're alienating a whole generation of people and we're hypocrites to boot. "Open doors? Open hearts? Open minds? Yeah, right." You can worship in our churches, you just can't become members. Let's start adding all the marginalized to this list...the homeless, the poor, those of a different ethnic background, single parents, alcoholics...
Obviously pastors should be able to discern who is ready for membership and who is not. But how far will this pastoral discretion go? Could this lead to a closure of the Communion Table? I certainly hope not, but I'm afraid it could go there.
Argh - both sides are so unwilling to come to any sort of meaningful reconciliation because both side is way too concerned about protecting their "truth," forgetting that God is big enough to handle all our squabbling. Both sides think the church is going to hell in a hand basket if either side gets their way. And that's not how we should be treating each other. We need to be approaching each other in a lot more humility than we're showing each other right now. Being open to God mean's letting go of your own expectations, and that's not happening right now, no matter what anybody thinks. Both side wants God's spirit to move through the UMC, but I don't think either side really means it.
Ok, I'll admit it. Sometimes I think about jumping ship. But really, these problems (not the homosexuality issue but the tensions and the lack of commitment to spiritual discernment) are rampant in every mainline denomination. *sighs*
It's becoming more and more apparent to me that the United Methodist Church is spiritually sick. The recent Judicial Council decisions...I will say that the first shouldn't have come as a shock. The Discipline is fairly explicit on the matter. The second decision...it grieves me, especially when I think about the implications for the church as a whole.
For instance, if you define homosexuality as a sin, by the same token, shouldn't you bar a whole lot more people from membership? Given the above assumption, why does that particular sin receive so much more attention than other sins?
While reading a couple of the news articles on www.confessingumc.org, I agree with the fact that pastors are too lenient in membership requirements. Either that or we're just not demanding enough from our members. But anyway, there's a difference between someone joining a church for the sake of joining, as I fear many people do, and joining because the person genuinely wants to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. Making disciples should be our baseline -- after all, we are all "going on to perfection" ("going on to salvation," the language the Confessing Church uses, just gives me the willies). We all have our shortcomings, so it shouldn't even matter if one sees homosexuality as a sin or not.
And what kind of message are we sending people? That God's love is only for some? We are already so far out of step with the culture in terms of any sort of relevant messages...we're alienating a whole generation of people and we're hypocrites to boot. "Open doors? Open hearts? Open minds? Yeah, right." You can worship in our churches, you just can't become members. Let's start adding all the marginalized to this list...the homeless, the poor, those of a different ethnic background, single parents, alcoholics...
Obviously pastors should be able to discern who is ready for membership and who is not. But how far will this pastoral discretion go? Could this lead to a closure of the Communion Table? I certainly hope not, but I'm afraid it could go there.
Argh - both sides are so unwilling to come to any sort of meaningful reconciliation because both side is way too concerned about protecting their "truth," forgetting that God is big enough to handle all our squabbling. Both sides think the church is going to hell in a hand basket if either side gets their way. And that's not how we should be treating each other. We need to be approaching each other in a lot more humility than we're showing each other right now. Being open to God mean's letting go of your own expectations, and that's not happening right now, no matter what anybody thinks. Both side wants God's spirit to move through the UMC, but I don't think either side really means it.
Ok, I'll admit it. Sometimes I think about jumping ship. But really, these problems (not the homosexuality issue but the tensions and the lack of commitment to spiritual discernment) are rampant in every mainline denomination. *sighs*