Wednesday May 2

Here we are in the middle of the week of plenary sessions at General Conference!

I had a surprise last evening when the secretary of the General Conference announced the 20th anniversary of my marriage to Birney Kellogg.  We spent part of our honeymoon at the 1992 General Conference in Louisville, KY, where Sister Spirit was one of the musical groups!!  It hardly seems like it has been 20 years since then!

Yesterday, I spent the lunch time listening to five of UMPH and Cokesbury authors speak about their latest writings.  Bishop Schnase offered some especially profound words as he reminded us that the median age in the UMC (US, I think) is 59, and the median age in US society is 33.  That means that the leaders making decisions for our church are almost two generations removed from those with whom the church needs to be relevant.  At General Conference, he reminded us, we work on matters within the church, rather than sharing the gospel with the world.  We are too often focused on blaming and gaming, rather than on using the nuances of our organization to change the world for Christ, as we employ scripture and Wesleyan theology.  We need to pray for a leadership initiative which breaks from the deadlock that tradition has placed upon us. Rather than building on our tradition, we are sometimes held captive by it, and those who work to preserve what has always been.

Today's deliberations were quite discouraging to me.  We were expected to take action on major items of denominational restructuring without having the necessary details before us.  The request was made for accurate numbers (members of boards, etc...) and financial implications.  But those would not be provided to us.  I was seeking not to know the advantages of any group or geographical region, but rather the implications for the denomination as a whole.

While my angst is growing, my hope is Christ is still very much alive and vibrant.  Please continue to pray for the United Methodist Church as this work continues!