Connectional Table explores church relationships
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A UMNS photo by Elaine Hopkins
Members of the Connectional Table engage in a table discussion during their May 17-19 meeting in Chicago.
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| Inday
Day, the Rev. Chester Jones, Bishop Mary Ann Swenson and the Rev.
Beverly Wilkes engage in a table discussion during the May 17-19 meeting
of the Connectional Table. The table is a group of 60 United Methodists
from across the world responsible for developing and interpreting a
global vision for the 11 million-member United Methodist Church. A UMNS
photo by Elaine Hopkins. Photo #05-385. Accompanies UMNS story #313,
5/23/05. |
May 23, 2005 A UMNS Report
By Linda Green*
The
group responsible for developing and interpreting a global vision for
the United Methodist Church spent its second meeting reviewing its
relationship with bishops, annual conferences and churchwide agencies. The
60-member Connectional Table, meeting May 17-19 in Chicago, affirmed
the collaborative efforts of agencies in programming and ministry in the
2005-08 quadrennium. Churchwide
agencies have been perceived as working in “silos”—apart from one
another—in some ways, said Bishop John Hopkins, chairman of the table
and leader of the denomination’s Ohio East Area. “I think that has had
some merit in the past, but we celebrated that there seems to be a
realization that it takes more than one and that you can’t do it just
from your agency,” he told United Methodist News Service May 20. The
table affirmed the denomination’s global nature and collaboration,
reflected in the church’s response to the Dec. 26 tsunami; the progress
of the Central Conference Pension Initiative; and interagency
collaboration to support church growth in Africa. The
members of the table also discussed the Council of Bishops’ 2005-08
focus, “Making Disciples of Jesus Christ for the Transformation of the
World.” “We
are trying to understand how annual conference and churchwide agencies
work to get results in making disciples for the transformation of the
world,” Hopkins said. General
Conference, the top legislative body of the 11-million member
denomination, created the Connectional Table in 2004. The table
comprises staff executives and officers of denominational agencies, as
well as representatives of ethnic caucuses and jurisdictions around the
world. Delegates to General Conference eliminated the General Council on
Ministries, a Dayton, Ohio, -based agency that had served as the
program-coordinating agency since the Methodist and Evangelical United
Brethren churches merged in 1968. Two
sessions of the table’s gathering focused on developing a state of the
church report, which the table decided at its January meeting to present
to the denomination in 2006. The members discussed the report’s
purpose, audience and format, and how it would help the worldwide
church. “The
members don’t want the report to be something else that people feel
they have to read but (something that) will engage them on significant
issues,” Hopkins said. The
table also heard an update from a bishops’ task force on unity, formed
in response to talk of schism in the denomination. The task force is
seeking to discern “the main thing that we all are so passionate about,”
believing that “if we can move on the main thing, some unity will occur
as we become more intentional in working together,” Hopkins said. Historically,
the church’s unity has been as a Wesleyan group that combines Christian
formation with personal and social holiness, he said. “A
lot of people want to fix the church, repair it, problem-solve,” he
said. “We’ve pointed out that whenever you try to problem-solve, you
impose your idea on the church rather than appreciating what God gives
you.” The table is engaged in a process called “appreciative inquiry,”
which uses phases of discovery, dreaming, designing and destiny to
figure out how the make disciples for the transformation of the world.
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A UMNS photo by Elaine Hopkins
Bishop John Hopkins, chairman of the Connectional Table, leads a discussion.
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| Bishop
John Hopkins, chairman of the Connectional Table of the United
Methodist Church, leads a discussion of the 60-member body on developing
and interpreting a global vision for the United Methodist Church and
understanding how annual conferences and churchwide agencies work to get
results in making disciples for the transformation of the world. The
Connectional Table met May 17-19 in Chicago. A UMNS photo by Elaine
Hopkins. Photo #05-386. Accompanies UMNS story #313, 5/23/05. |
Hopkins said
people often ask what can be done about disunity in the church instead
of try to find signs of unity among people with differences in opinion. “The
Connectional Table is saying rather than us trying to design a way to
unify the church, how can we find a way to call forth that kind of
passionate exuberance and thanksgiving that comes when one has been in a
community of love and acceptance,” Hopkins said. The table wants to
find ways to increase collaboration and broad-based action in the
church, he said. He
wants the table to become a place where “we take things out of the
parking lot and hallways and bring them into the living room, family
room and kitchen of the entire church and talk about it.” In other action, the Connectional Table: - Approved
the disbursement of World Service dollars for agencies and groups to
study ministry and global AIDS, and for the survey from the churchwide
Commission on the Status and Role of Women to study sexual abuse.
- Decided
that its April 2006 meeting will be in Varna, Bulgaria. The church in
Bulgaria was oppressed for years under communism and is now thriving.
- Honored
the Rev. Joe Harris, who leaves the head post of the churchwide
Commission on United Methodist Men, and Irene Howard, who was counsel
for the General Council on Finance and Administration and staffed the
table’s transition team.
*Green is a United Methodist News Service news writer based in Nashville, Tenn. News media contact: Linda Green, (615) 742-5470 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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