Stroud case likely to continue
May 3, 2005
A UMNS Report
By Linda Bloom*
Next steps are being considered in the case of Irene Elizabeth "Beth"
Stroud, recently reinstated as a United Methodist pastor by a
jurisdictional appeals committee.
Bishop Marcus Matthews, who presides over the denomination’s Eastern
Pennsylvania Annual (regional) Conference, said the conference would
"thoroughly and thoughtfully digest" the decision of the Northeastern
Jurisdiction’s Committee on Appeals before deciding how to proceed.
On April 29, the appeals committee overturned the Dec. 2 verdict of
an Eastern Pennsylvania trial court, which found Stroud guilty of
violating church law forbidding the participation of "self-avowed
practicing" homosexuals in the ordained ministry.
The conference has 30 days to file an appeal with the Judicial Council, the supreme court of the United Methodist Church.
"We will continue to be in prayer as we seek God’s guidance in this
matter," Matthews added in a statement. "We trust God will lead us in
this time of discernment and reflection."
Some United Methodists expect the decision of the appeals committee to be overturned.
"This ruling was an ill-reasoned, obtuse and tortured attempt to
avoid applying the plain, unequivocal meaning of the scriptures and
church law," said Mark Tooley, a United Methodist spokesman for the
Institute on Religion and Democracy, an ecumenical alliance of churches
seeking renewal in the church. "It will be overturned by the
church's top court. It represents the fading voice of a declining, elite
minority within United Methodism that is still enthralled by the
failed, revisionist theologies of the last century."
Also expecting a reversal of the appeal court’s ruling by the Judicial
Council is the Rev. James Heidinger, president of Good News, Wilmore,
Ky., an unofficial evangelical renewal movement within the United
Methodist Church. "We are not surprised at the appeals court ruling," he
said. "We expect this to go to the Judicial Council and we are
confident that the Judicial Council will not sustain the appeal court’s
ruling."
He said the court’s citing of legal errors as the reason for
overturning the Dec. 2 guilty verdict for Stroud " are a real stretch,
if not amusing" and called the decision "simply a clear attempt to find
something wrong in that unpopular verdict."
Bishop John Schol of Washington, who testified during the Stroud
trial, said he considered the decision of the appeals committee to be
"one step in the continued dialogue about the issue of homosexuality."
In a statement issued after the decision, Schol encouraged church
members to use the ruling as an opportunity to "build understanding"
rather than create more divisiveness.
"The ruling of the trial court was appealed on a number of different
issues. The hearing essentially said that not everything was done to
give Beth a fair trial last December," he wrote. "As United Methodists,
we believe in fair process in trials, particularly when it involves the
possibility of withdrawing someone’s clergy credentials."
*Bloom is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in New York.
News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
