Settling Into Conference

Today was our first full day of Conference, in which we did not (yet) vote on Rule 44. But we did get our legislative committees organized, so tomorrow will be a full work day.

There is some serious natural beauty here in Portland!

I got up early to attend the Good News breakfast. I've never attended a Good News event, but was curious to give it a try. From the Good News website:

Since 1967, Good News has been the leading evangelical advocate, a voice for repentance, an agent for reform, and a catalyst for renewal within The United Methodist Church. Our mission is to lead all people within The United Methodist Church to the faithful and vibrant practice of orthodox Wesleyan Christianity.

The organization is not an "official" UMC organization, but they have a significant voice at General Conference. Breakfast meetings, which are open to any who care to attend, are opportunities for Good News members to organize to strengthen their voice and vote at GC.

I have absolutely no idea why the Good News organizers needed a suitcase full of scissors.

The experience was enlightening for me. Similar to the Women's Briefing, we sat at tables according to our legislative committee. I joined a group of strangers at the Judicial Administration committee. Only one face was familiar, and I realized that he had been the one man who sat at the JA table at the Women's Briefing. I naively thought he was sympathetic to women's issues. But it turns out that he attended for the purpose of scouting out what "the progressives" were planning regarding electing officers for the JA committee.

Judicial Administration Committee members discuss strategies for getting
Good News members in officer positions on the Committee.

Each legislative committee has a Chair, a Vice-Chair, a Secretary, and Sub-Chairs. If you are an officer, your voice is limited, because you have a leadership role to fulfill. The Secretary, particularly, is busy recording what is going on, and has a very limited voice. The strategy discussed this morning included getting a Good News Chair elected (the Chair has strong control over the direction of the committee). But the gentleman from the women's committee advocated for getting "the progressive's" choice for Secretary elected, so her voice would be diminished, and NOT electing the woman who had previously been lifted up as a Good News choice for secretary, Dionne Hammond, so she would be able to have more influence as a voice in committee.

As a first-time Good News observer, I have to say that the tone of the meeting was very "us against them" and "we must get our people in position so we can win." This divisive tone is pervasive at Conference, though it is often more subtle than what I experienced this morning.

The highlight of the morning was the Episcopal Address of Bishop Gregory V. Palmer (also here) of the West Ohio Conference. I don't think anyone could have done a better job of verbally setting a tone for us to turn to each other and not on each other at this Conference, and encourage you to take a moment to watch it.

After lunch, the legislative committees met to engage in intentional Christian Conferencing. This is new for GC2016, and seems like a good addition. Spending this time to get to know others in your legislative committee and practice having relaxed conversations about issues that face the church will hopefully be beneficial in the days to come.

Our last order of the day was to elect officers in our committees. Things played out exactly as planned at the Good News breakfast in the Judicial Administration committee, with Kimberly Reisman elected as Chair and Christopher Marshall from Liberia as Vice-Chair. Dionne Hammond did not opt out when nominated, but Rebekah Sweet, who was lifted up at the women's briefing, was elected for this position. [Words in italics represent a correction from the original posting. My apologies - I was too tired last night!]

The two committee sub-chairs elected are Amy Lippoldt (yay!) and Tim Rogers.

Translator booths are installed in each of the 12 committee rooms.

This is not to say that things went smoothly in legislative committee. Far from it. Each committee has a Bishop who oversees the original election. Our Bishop was Sudarshana Devadhar of the New England Conference, who did an excellent and patient job of reminding us to remain in a spirit of Christian Conferencing (i.e. "Do not tell your neighbor how to vote.") Votes in committee are taken on paper ballots and counted by hand. The global diversity of our denomination is more evident in committee, as the group is relatively small (about 60 in our committee), and more people have an opportunity to come to the microphone to speak. The first time a French-speaking gentleman came to the microphone, there was an awkward pause after his speech. Delegates had to find their headsets and put them on and have the gentleman repeat his speech. In past Conferences, these headsets have been worn only by non-English speaking delegates. This year, all delegates are asked to wear them, so they can hear the translation if a non-English speaker has the floor. If we've learned anything in our short time together, it is that we are not good at change. It confuses us and catches us off guard. It also slows things down and takes a lot of time.

But what about Rule 44? Well, it did make an appearance today. There continues to be a great deal of confusion, suspicion, and general uneasiness about this Rule. And there continues to be a great deal of confusion regarding how to vote on this Rule using our current parliamentary procedure. Early on in the discussion, the body voted to table Rule 44. The margin on this majority rule was only 8 votes. We attempted to then move on with our business, but it was brought to the Chair's attention that many of those who were voting did not understand what they were voting on. It turns out that "to table a motion" has a different meaning inside the U.S. than out of it (i.e. "Lay on the table" vs. "Bring to the table for discussion.") The Chair agreed to take another vote (after explaining clearly what we were doing), and the motion was lifted off the table (430-400). A number of amendments were proposed for the Rule, and it was sent back to the Rules Committee for revision before we (finally) vote on it tomorrow.

Whew! In many ways, it feels like we accomplished very little today. But hopefully, once we have our process up and running, we will be productive!

My favorite picture so far! Delegation members Jason Valendy, Jim Connor,
Marianne Brown and Kylie Campbell stike a pose on Broadway Avenue.

Rock Climbing, Industrial Safety, Rescue...and Ukuleles?! Brilliant!

The Rules!

After Opening Worship and a presentation on Christian Conferencing, we had some training on using the electronic voting devices and also training on how to use an iPad (located at each table) to request to speak on the floor. This is new for us, and, frankly, seems a bit dicey, as the Wifi in the Convention Center is not good. But in a gathering this large, the ability of the Chair to see and address fairly all of those who are waiting at microphones to speak is very difficult. I'm hopeful that the electronic system will work. Much practice occurred. Overall, I'd say we did much better than in 2012!

Then, the first major act of General Conference took place: voting upon the Standing Rules. These are the rules by which our time together is governed.

Lately, our denomination has not been good at this task. If you missed General Conference 2012, you can read a recap of how this moment played out here. And you can get the rest of the story here.

There has been a great deal of apprehension about The Rules this go-round, partly because of our experience in Tampa, and partly because of the controversial Rule 44. So named because it has been added as the last rule, which was previously Rule 43, Rule 44 allows for us to take some legislative petitions out of committee and process them differently. Others have already done an excellent job of explaining Rule 44, so I'll commend this article, by Rev. Jeremy Smith, to you for clarification.

I doubt many of us came to The Rules vote in a a state of optimism. There was a pervasive expectation that Rule 44 would be a sticking point. Ironically, it turns out that everything besides Rule 44 was a sticking point!

Here's the rundown:

6:00 Chair (Bishop Warner H. Brown, Jr.) makes a motion that we vote on the Rules in stages, taking sections of The Rules at a time.
6:02 Rev. Sam Powers of Oklahoma makes an amendment to the motion to say that we vote on ALL of The Rules EXCEPT Rule 44 at one time. This sounds good to me, as it is likely to help us cut to the chase and allow more time to focus on Rule 44. We also don't have to throw out all of The Rules if Rule 44 isn't going to pass. [It should be noted that one of The Rules (Rule #1, in fact) states that we will conclude business at 6:30 p.m. each day. So, if we pass Rules 1-43, we will be hard pressed to get a vote in on Rule 44 before the end of the business day.]

Here's Sam on the floor. It took him less than a minute to offer an amendment.
It took us over two hours to accept it.

Following this, a lot of confusion ensued. There were questions about whether or not the Bishop could make the motion that he made (which Sam amended) in the first place. There were concerns about whether or not we could use the new electronic method of requesting to speak on the floor, since this method hadn't been approved, yet (Rule 6 & 10). A concern was raised about Rule 18, which prohibits "non-verbal distractions," and a request was made to amend the amendment to include Rules 44 and 18. This request was deemed against The Rules and therefore not allowed.
6:25 The question is called. We then voted on whether or not we would vote to accept what has now been lifted up as a substitute motion - essentially, Sam's original request.
6:30 Yes! We agree to move ahead!
6:34 No! Chair admits to making a mistake. We agreed to substitute the motion. We did not, in fact, vote on the motion.
6:35 More questions on meaning of non-verbal distractions. Chair says they are whatever the Chair says they are.
6:42 More concern about how we are operating using rules that aren't yet in place. Chair agrees and points out that the old rules say we will work until 9:30 p.m. Calls for a recess.
8:00 Session resumes. Chair recommends that we delay a vote on Rule 44 until tomorrow.
8:32 We vote to approve Substitute Motion!

To recap: The first amendment to a motion, which eventually became a substitute motion, took 2 1/2 hours to pass.

Tomorrow, we will tackle Rule 44, which is intended to help us avoid taking this much time to vote on amendments to amendments, etc.

The question is: If we can't trust the Rules Committee to get it right, how are we going to agree to trust a process like Rule 44?

So Glad We Start With Worship!

General Conference opened, as it should, with worship. The worship planning team has literally spent years preparing these worship services, and they are spectacular. Today's service was notable for its emphasis on both the blessing of diversity in our denomination, and the need for unity.

Although familiar hymns were sung, multiple languages were represented.

Worship included Holy Communion, which was offered by our Bishops.

I had the opportunity to receive Communion from Bishop Ben Chamness (retired),
who ordained me in 2005.

With so many different countries represented at GC, it is necessary to have a large number of translators. They have a special "soundproof" section of the Convention Center. And they have an extremely challenging job!

Following worship, we had a session on Christian Conferencing. The emphasis here is on seeking peace. Where we disagree, we are urged to come together to seek, not necessarily agreement, but the path that leads to peace.

We were reminded of John Wesley's own words:

Are you convinced how important and how difficult it is to 'order our conversation right?' Is it 'always in grace? seasoned with salt? meet to minister grace to the hearers?' Do not you converse too long at a time? Is not an hour commonly enough? Would it not be well always to have a determinate end in view, and to pray before and after it?

For our denomination, this is easier said than done. But it is good and fitting to be urged to remember these words as we begin.

Women's Briefing

The Women's Briefing, held the night before GC begins, is not an official meeting of the GC; but it allows women delegates (men are welcome, too!) a valuable opportunity to gather together to prepare for the weeks ahead.

As a first-time delegate in 2012, this gathering was critical in helping me get off on the right foot. The room is organized so that you sit with others from your legislative committee. This gives you a chance to meet others who you will be spending time with in committee, and some of the friendships I have continued to enjoy from GC2012 date back to this meeting. Committees are given time to discuss the petitions they will consider, share their thoughts and concerns, and discuss leadership for the committees.

Legislative committees have a Chair, a Vice-Chair, and a Secretary. Committees typically divide into sub-committees, in order to maximize the time given to petitions, so Sub-Committee Chairs are also needed. One of the purposes of this gathering is to help women, even first-time delegates, feel empowered to seek these leadership positions. In a brief space of time, encouragement is given, mentoring occurs, and plans are made. For delegates who are at the bottom of the learning curve, as I was four years ago, this experience is hugely helpful in allowing delegates to go into committee prepared to nominate and support women and men whose names have been lifted up at this event.

Here's a shout-out to Rev. Amy Lippoldt,
my choice to Chair the Judicial Administration Committee!

Last night's event also featured a reflection on Women Leadership by Rev. Kabamba Kiboko (whose brother was released from prison in the Congo two days ago - praise God!), which focused on the leadership of Esther. In the Hebrew alphabet, the name Esther begins with the first letter of the alphabet - Aleph. The name Elohim for God also begins with an Aleph. Rev. Kiboko encouraged us to find the Aleph within ourselves that encourages us to lead, "for such a time as this." Bishop Debbit Wallace-Padgett also encouraged women to Listen, Speak and Act. General Conference, for voting delegates, is not intended to be a spectator sport!

Finally, we were all encouraged to look carefully at legislation, particularly legislation put forward by the United Methodist Women involving Women and Children, with great care. Critical Questions which are helpful for assessing any petition were shared.

Now, we are ready to begin!