An Addendum to My Previous Post
I am officially the President of a small organization that supports Scouting ministry. It's very small these days- we had all of three members at our last annual meeting. The implosion of the UMC destroys other things that have become attached to it over the years.
In any case, two of us were explaining the situation with the UMC to the third and then discussing what to do with the remains of a Fund we were gently closing down in preparation to possibly shutter or remake the organization. And the man asked me why, if the UMC is not keeping its promises or playing by the rules, we had to be so careful with how our money is spent.
My reply at the time was "someone has to be", and I still think that's the heart of it. But a more thoughtful answer is that the UMC and our little organization did not make promises to each other. These rules and principles don't exist for the sake of the organizations getting along (we're not like Emmaus- the UMC mostly doesn't know we exist). Both the UMC and our group made promises to the people who put their trust in our organizations.
Keeping those promises has nothing to do with the leadership of the UMC and everything to do with the handful of people who believed us, believed in what we were doing, and wanted to support that. For them, we will do our utmost to respect that trust, to behave with integrity, to keep that faith. Every decision is spelled out with lots of warning. We don't owe anything to the Bishops and Boards out there. We are careful with our money and our promises and our actions because that's who we are. That's what we lead young Scouts to be like (we hope). We can't teach a morality we don't embody, so our character must be something worth modeling. Even if the only people who care are a handful of members scattered around our home state.
My dad has said for years that the UMC treats people badly. I have kept that in mind when it comes to working with people- that how you treat people is as important as what you're all trying to do together.
The agony of the UMC's dissolution is as much because we're all treating each other despicably as any other reason. If we had resolved to treat each other by the agreed rules, to make our decisions with respect, to bring grace to our conversations, we might still have had to part ways in the end. There would have still been grief and some hard decisions and discussions. But it would have been a better parting, and the wounds would have been smaller and fewer.
Alas.
In any case, two of us were explaining the situation with the UMC to the third and then discussing what to do with the remains of a Fund we were gently closing down in preparation to possibly shutter or remake the organization. And the man asked me why, if the UMC is not keeping its promises or playing by the rules, we had to be so careful with how our money is spent.
My reply at the time was "someone has to be", and I still think that's the heart of it. But a more thoughtful answer is that the UMC and our little organization did not make promises to each other. These rules and principles don't exist for the sake of the organizations getting along (we're not like Emmaus- the UMC mostly doesn't know we exist). Both the UMC and our group made promises to the people who put their trust in our organizations.
Keeping those promises has nothing to do with the leadership of the UMC and everything to do with the handful of people who believed us, believed in what we were doing, and wanted to support that. For them, we will do our utmost to respect that trust, to behave with integrity, to keep that faith. Every decision is spelled out with lots of warning. We don't owe anything to the Bishops and Boards out there. We are careful with our money and our promises and our actions because that's who we are. That's what we lead young Scouts to be like (we hope). We can't teach a morality we don't embody, so our character must be something worth modeling. Even if the only people who care are a handful of members scattered around our home state.
My dad has said for years that the UMC treats people badly. I have kept that in mind when it comes to working with people- that how you treat people is as important as what you're all trying to do together.
The agony of the UMC's dissolution is as much because we're all treating each other despicably as any other reason. If we had resolved to treat each other by the agreed rules, to make our decisions with respect, to bring grace to our conversations, we might still have had to part ways in the end. There would have still been grief and some hard decisions and discussions. But it would have been a better parting, and the wounds would have been smaller and fewer.
Alas.