6 June 2009 by Glen Lauber.

It’s the last day and we have a lot to do. I had breakfast with Melissa in the staff dining room.

The UMConnection Daily on Friday’s events is available.

We approved the trustees report and then began to debate a resolution on dialogue on many aspects of sexuality. There were a few amendments proposed, some accepted, some rejected. The amendments are not yet available for me to report accurately.

There were proposals not considered because they were submitted late and we ran out of time. Had there been time they would have been considered.

I left at 10 a.m. once the business was concluded. Following the business was an observance for clergy and clergy spouses who died in the preceding year, and ordination.

It was a good conference. They are always exhausting, and sometimes it’s hard to see what was accomplished. There is a web page where one may review the entire conference.

That’s all for this year.

Glen

Posted in News Item, General Nourishment | No Comments »

5 June 2009 by Glen Lauber.

It’s Friday morning, and I am tired. Last night went late and, of course, it took me a while to relax in order to sleep. See the UM Connection Daily for today to get a synopsis of yesterday’s events and actions.

We will have to vote on the amendments, again, because a class of pastors, known as, “Local Pastors,” were allowed to vote and should not have been. It was a curious discussion about the amendments last night. Frankly, while I was out of the country I did not have the time or energy to study either the amendments or their background. I learned that they 23 amendments concerning church organization were proposed by the Council of Bishops. As a result, Bishop Schol offered remarks, with the consent of the body, on what the council says the amendments mean. It’s too much to go into here, but most of the amendments appear to increase flexibility for organizing the church around the world, not actually reorganize it. Those in opposition suggest that this will result in different regions adopting different doctrines. The bishop emphasized that those kinds of changes are reserved solely for the General Conference, and therefore no regional group could change them for their region.

Here are some snippets one should know, about which I am not writing:

·      This is the 225^th annual conference for this part of the church; that means the first one was held in 1784 (Lovely Lane, in Baltimore, creating the denomination)

·      Twenty-six pastors are retiring with 638 years of experience, include former Glen Mar pastor, Rev. Donna Martin

·      White House Religion Liaison, Paul Monteiro, spoke Thursday night and participated in a panel discussion on community ministry

Today we will here reports from the Discipleship and Stewardship parts of the conference (including voting on the budget) and celebrate our partnerships with parts of the church in Zimbabwe, Latin America, Korea, and Russia. Other legislation will also come before the body.

Well, nothing super remarkable about this morning. We heard an interesting discussion by Rev. Jessica Duckworth, a professor at Wesley Theological Seminary, about Young Adult Ministry (18-35). Andy was taking notes. One note I wrote was that churches with about 30% or more people age 35 or younger attract young adults.

Also, the body approved a motion to target the proceeds from the sale of a district superintendant parsonage to starting a new church, and Hispanic ministry.

We celebrated retirees, those who will be ordained Saturday, those who were commissioned and two new local pastors. We also celebrated those whose appointments were changing. That included John and Mary Ka.

One of the speakers today was Erin M. Hawkins, the General Secretary of the General Commission on Religion & Race, based in Washington, D.C. She spoke powerfully of story and the language we use to tell the story. She asks us to consider if our story as individuals and church hamper us or help us move forward. She also asks us to consider whether the language we choose to use in our stories reflects hope or hurt.

The budget (page 46) was adopted, but not before some strenuously urged adding some items in their personal agendas without a plan or suggestions from where the money would come. They were referred to the Council Finance & Administration, which will consider, in consultation with the bodies responsible for those programs what to do about the proposals.

We also approved, with some amendment, revisions to the policies that guide decisions on how many staff persons a church can afford (page 61).

It was a long day. Al and I had dinner at 8 p.m. and I was asleep before 9:30 p.m.

Glen

Posted in News Item, General Nourishment | No Comments »

4 June 2009 by Glen Lauber.

Well, here I am. It’s 7 a.m., Thursday, and I’m in the hotel lounge waiting for breakfast with Andy. Arrival at the Waterfront Marriott in Baltimore yesterday was uneventful. There are very few places in our region that can accommodate roughly 1400 people, and allow them to meet in one room and satisfy accessibility requirements, and some of those are prohibitively expensive.

Today there will be a meeting of all the clergy and a meeting of all the laity. Worship, a speech by the bishop on the state of the church, more worship, and a speech by Paul Monteiro, the president’s religion liaison. In addition, the conference will consider various pieces of legislation. We will debate and vote to ratify 32 amendments to the Constitution of The United Methodist Church approved by the General Conference of the church last year. Most of the amendments address the global nature of the church. At present the church in the United States dominates the church in other parts of the world. These amendments propose that there be a balance in the church around the world. While at first blush this might seem an obviously good thing to do, not everybody agrees. The arguments against it have merit.

For a review of conference preparations and pre-conference news, see the UM Connection Daily for Thursday.

I am not the only one here. Glen Mar sends four lay people to the conference as members of the conference. As such we vote our consciences for the good of the whole region. Why four? It’s not based on size relative to other churches, but rather on how many ordained clergy we have. Our ordained clergy are Andy, John, Al, and Ruth, who are members of the conference, not Glen Mar. Our lay members this year are: me, Dottie Byers, Karol Hess, and Lynne Phillips.

The laity session was so-so. The speaker, Joseph Robinson, Jr., was average. We heard the usual reports from the United Methodist Women, United Methodist Men, the Lay Speaking leadership and Young Adult Council. Nothing remarkable happened. Lunch was a nice fish dish.

Sadly, I will miss the entire afternoon while tending to family matters. I should be back for the evening session. Tomorrow’s conference daily newspaper should be able to fill you in.

Well, I got back in time for the elections of conference officers for the next year. Andy, Al, Dottie, and I went to dinner. After dinner we approved the consent calendar and discussed the 32 proposed amendments to the constitution. After an hour of questions and speeches we completed our ballots and adjourned for the night.

Glen

Posted in News Item, General Nourishment | No Comments »

3 June 2009 by Glen Lauber.

Last year I decided to get with it, and blog. I chose the Annual Conference of the Baltimore Washington Conference of the United Methodist Church. Take a deep breath before you say it. I will make the same attempt this year, trying to post each day’s events either that night or the next morning.

Two important publications for following events are the Pre-Conference Booklet and the Annual Conference Booklet. The second has updates from the first and material not found in the first.

It will be an important record for Glen Mar of this important convention. As Lay Members of the Annual Conference from Glen Mar, we are charged with keeping you informed about conference business. It is my hope that these blog entries will satisfy that requirement. I will also post links to each daily edition of the UMConnection, published Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

I’ll be in touch.

-Glen, Church Council Chair and Lay Member to Annual Conference

Posted in News Item, General Nourishment | No Comments »