Judicial Council reaffirms decision on Cote d’Ivoire
By Neill Caldwell*
May 2, 2007 | MANILA, Philippines (UMNS)
The United Methodist’s Church’s Judicial Council has upheld its
earlier ruling that the Methodist Church of Cote d’Ivoire (Ivory Coast)
has not been fully admitted to the denomination and may be limited to
two delegates at the next General Conference.
Meeting for the first time outside the United States, in the capital
city of the Philippines, the denomination’s top court reaffirmed the
decision it made last October that the 2004 General Conference was
within its authority to award Cote d’Ivoire two delegates – one clergy
and one lay – at the 2008 General Conference in Fort Worth, Texas.
"Once the process of joining The United
Methodist Church is fully achieved, Cote d'Ivoire would have the right
to full representation in its delegations to the 2012 and succeeding
General Conference sessions."
-Judicial Council ruling
In Decision 1051, the council made it clear that the action by the
2004 General Conference "was not a final act of admission" of Cote
d’Ivoire into the larger church, and that additional legislation is
expected to give that West African area full rights and representation.
General Conference, which meets every four years, is The United
Methodist Church’s top lawmaking assembly.
On the last day of the 2004 General Conference, the Commission on
Central Conference Affairs proposed the addition of Cote d’Ivoire to the
West Africa Central Conference. The committee’s recommendation was that
the West Africa Central Conference, the Commission on Central
Conference Affairs and the church’s Board of Global Ministries work
together on the entry of Cote d’Ivoire into the denomination in the
upcoming quadrennium.
Instead, a substitute motion was offered, with four separate
provisions: that Cote d’Ivoire be added to the West Africa Central
Conference and the conference be authorized to elect a bishop to serve a
new Cote d’Ivoire Episcopal Area; that Cote d'Ivoire set up and fully
fund its own episcopal fund during the 2005-2008 quadrennium with no
funding from either the General Council for Finance and Administration
or the Episcopal Fund of The United Methodist Church; that Cote d’Ivoire
be represented at 2008 General Conference with two delegates (one lay
and one clergy); and that the Commission on Central Conference Affairs
bring enabling legislation to the 2008 General Conference to include
Cote d'Ivoire in the Episcopal Fund of The United Methodist Church.
Delegates approved the substitute motion.
In Decision 1051, the Judicial Council chided the General Conference
for not following proper procedure for admitting a new annual conference
into The United Methodist Church.
"The substitute (motion) adopted anticipates that the 2008 General
Conference will consider further legislative action to include Cote
d’Ivoire into the Episcopal Fund," the council’s ruling stated. "The
remaining formalities of affiliation or admission should be completed by
the agencies to whom the responsibility is assigned in time for
presentation to and perfection by the 2008 General Conference. Once the
process of joining The United Methodist Church is fully achieved, Cote
d’Ivoire would have the right to full representation in its delegations
to the 2012 and succeeding General Conference sessions."
About 14,000 worshippers crowd the Palais de Sports
in Abidjan to close the Cote d'Ivoire Annual Conference meeting. A UMNS
photo by Eleanor Colvin.
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The reaffirmation of Decision 1051 is Memorandum 1071. Council
members James W. Holsinger, Mary A. Daffin and Keith D. Boyette signed
the decision as dissenters, simply referencing the original dissent
filed with Decision 1051.
At the fall 2006 session, a majority of the seven Judicial Council
members present voted to hold the action of the 2004 General Conference
regarding Cote d'Ivoire unconstitutional. However, Paragraph 2608 of the
2004 Book of Discipline requires that "(a)n affirmative vote of
at least six members of the council shall be necessary to declare any
act of the General Conference unconstitutional," and the decision failed
to garner the six votes needed. The council has a total of nine
members.
The Methodist Church in Cote d’Ivoire has been in existence since
1924. In 1985, it left the British Methodist Church to become
autonomous. The Rev. Benjamin Boni was elected the first bishop of the
new conference March 12, 2005, by the West Africa Central Conference.
The Cote d’Ivoire Conference filed a report with the General Council of
Finance and Administration that, as of June 26, 2006, it had 123
full-time clergy and 591,142 professing members.
Philippines items
Two of the docket items before the Judicial Council related to the
Philippines Central Conference. The council ruled that it did not have
jurisdiction to review a decision of law issued in response to a
question asked during a meeting of the Coordinating Council of the
Philippines Central Conference because the council was not one of the
bodies stipulated in Paragraph 2609.6 of the Book of Discipline.
In the second case, votes taken by annual conferences in the Manila
Area on ratification of a petition for the annual conference to be in an
affiliated autonomous relationship to General Conference was ruled void
and of no effect. In that annual conference action, only clergy members
in full connection and lay members were allowed to vote. The Judicial
Council said that because the petition was not a constitutional
amendment, elders and deacons in full connection, local pastors,
probationary clergy members and associate clergy members all should have
had the right to vote. In the annual conferences in the Baguio Area,
all nine petitions were approved in one single vote instead of nine
individual votes as needed. The Judicial Council ruled that the votes in
both annual conferences must be recast.
Additional rulings
In other action, the council:
- Ruled it did not have jurisdiction to act on a request from the
Commission on Religion and Race on the merger of the National United
Methodist Native American Center with the Native American Comprehensive
Plan for the purpose of funding because the matter was a budgetary
matter and not an act of legislation.
- Said Paragraph 2548.7 of the Discipline invests each
annual conference with the authority to define what constitutes the
term "urban center" in the context of ministry within that annual
conference.
- Affirmed a bishop’s decision of law in the Detroit Annual
Conference that a question did not relate to the business before the
annual conference session.
- Affirmed a bishop’s decision of law in the Pacific
Northwest Annual Conference that a question did not relate to the
business before the annual conference session and because questions
involving the supervisory function of a district superintendent are
improper.
- Ruled in an item from the Rocky Mountains Annual Conference
that a presiding bishop has no authority to make rulings on judicial or
administrative matters by way of a question of law because they are the
purview of judicial or administrative bodies.
- Affirmed as modified a bishop’s decision of law in the New
York Conference that a question related to the clergy session of the
annual conference was improper because the person involved was not a
clergy member of the annual conference.
- Denied a petition for reconsideration of Decision 1055,
which dealt with a bishop’s decision of law in the North Carolina
Conference and ruled that clergy "withdrawal whether under complaint or
voluntary is effective at the time it is received."
- Deferred a question on the Baltimore-Washington Conference
plan of organization to its fall meeting pending the receipt of a copy
of the plan.
Judicial Council member Rodolfo Beltran, a Filipino attorney and a
lay member of the church, acted as host for the council’s week in
Manila. The meeting was held at the historic Manila Hotel, built in 1912
and headquarters to U.S. Army Gen. Douglas McArthur in the years
leading up to World War II.
Judicial Council members were welcomed during a session of the Manila
Annual Conference, which was being held at Central Methodist Church in
downtown Manila, and visited Wesleyan University-Philippines, a United
Methodist-related school in Cabanatuan City in north Luzon with an
enrollment of 7,000. The group had a tour by university President
Guillermo Maglaya and members of the school’s board of trustees.
The council’s daily devotions were led by the Philippines’ Supreme
Court chief justice, Reynato S. Puno, a member of Puno United Methodist
Church in Quezon City, Bishop Solito K. Toquero of the Manila Area, and
retired Bishop Emerito P. Nacpil. (See related story, "Judicial Council
hears about violence in Philippines.")
Of the nine Judicial Council members, only one was absent. The Rev.
Shamwange P. Kyungu missed the meeting due to his governmental duties in
the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The Judicial Council will hold its fall meeting Oct. 24-27 in San Francisco.
*Caldwell covers the Judicial Council for United Methodist News Service and is editor of the Virginia United Methodist Advocate of the Virginia Annual Conference in Richmond.
News media contact: Tim Tanton, Nashville, Tenn., (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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Resources
Judicial Council spring docket
Judicial Council decisions
Cote d'Ivoire
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