I have huge issues with the United Methodist Church. I'll just come out and say that right up front. I grew up in the UMC, and tried, for about one second, to be a pastor in one of their congregations. Today, at a general conference of gathered delegates from all over the world, the UMC's deciding body choose to keep excluding gays, lesbians, and transgender people from their clergy. I've met Beth Stroud personally. She says that it is important for her to stay in this church body. I can't imagine the heartache this church has caused her, yet she chooses to remain because she believes in something bigger. I couldn't do it. I didn't do it. I have to say, though: there are very few people throughout the whole arc of history who can say they've been defrocked.Even fewer who can say they've been defrocked over a justice issue. There's something to be said for that. The United Methodist Church should be ashamed of themselves. They are moving backward, not forward, and in 20 years, where will they be? Beth Stroud served as an ordained United Methodist pastor for six years before losing her clergy credentials in a 2004 church trial. In the trial, Beth was found guilty of “practices declared by the United Methodist Church to be incompatible with Christian teaching” because she acknowledged living in a committed relationship with another woman. The process that led to the trial began in April, 2003, when Beth told her congregation, the First United Methodist Church of Germantown, PA about her relationship with Chris Paige, a consultant to small businesses and nonprofit organizations. The congregation offered nearly universal support to Beth, setting up a legal fund to assist with her defense and hiring her as a lay minister after she lost her credentials. Beth continued to serve as a member of the church staff until 2008, when she decided to pursue an academic career. The trial verdict was overturned on appeal, but the original verdict was reinstated by the Judicial Council of the United Methodist Church in October, 2005. The Judicial Council is the highest judicial body of the United Methodist Church. There is no further avenue of appeal. Beth is the author of You! A Faith That Fits, the official youth curriculum of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches. Beth accepts guest preaching and speaking invitations, and is working on an advanced graduate degree from The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. Beth holds an MDiv from Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York, and a bachelor’s degree from Bryn Mawr College. Before going into professional ministry, she worked as a writer and editor in New York City. Beth and Chris make their home in Philadelphia. They serve their community as foster parents, and are currently blessed to share their life with their daughter, who was born in 2005. She's a cutie! Here's the Washington Post article from the time of the trial:The highest court in the United Methodist Church yesterday defrocked a lesbian minister in Philadelphia and reinstated a Virginia pastor who had been suspended for denying a gay man membership in his congregation. The nine-member Judicial Council also rejected a declaration by Methodists in the Pacific Northwest that there is a "difference of opinion among faithful Christians regarding sexual orientation and practice." The court said the declaration was a "historical statement without prescriptive force" and had no bearing on church laws. The decisions amounted to a clean sweep for conservatives who believe gay sex is a sin and want to strictly enforce a Methodist rule against "self-avowed, practicing homosexuals" in ordained ministry. They were the latest in a series of defeats for liberals in the nation's second-largest Protestant denomination who have sought to be more welcoming toward gay men and lesbians. The court rulings, which are final, put an end to the Rev. Irene "Beth" Stroud's hopes of remaining an ordained Methodist minister. Stroud, 35, said she thought she "was prepared for whatever might happen" but found it impossible to master her emotions yesterday. "It's been tears off and on all morning," she said. Stroud said she will continue working at Philadelphia's First United Methodist Church of Germantown as a lay minister, which means she cannot administer Communion and baptisms. Her case began when she told her congregation in 2003 that she was living in a "covenanted relationship" with another woman. Her message from the pulpit violated the church's "don't ask, don't tell" policy toward gays in the clergy and resulted in a formal charge by her bishop. In December 2004, a jury of 13 ministers convicted Stroud of "practices declared by the United Methodist Church to be incompatible with Christian teaching" and removed her ministerial credentials. But a regional appeals panel overturned the verdict, citing legal errors and an ambiguous clause in the church's constitution that pledges no discrimination on the basis of "status." Yesterday, the Judicial Council reaffirmed the original jury's verdict by a 6 to 2 vote, with one judge absent. Wary of such a decision, Stroud had not resumed ordained ministry since the original trial. "If it's a choice between serving in the ordained ministry with my credentials intact, and serving as an 'out' lesbian person acknowledging the most important relationship in my life and not having those credentials, I'll take being out. I think it's better and more honest, and more healthy in the long run," she said. The Judicial Council's rulings also represented a significant change in fortune for the Rev. Edward Johnson, pastor of South Hill United Methodist Church in South Hill, Va. Johnson, 58, had been on an involuntary, unpaid leave since June, when Methodist ministers in Virginia voted 448 to 114 to discipline him for refusing to allow a gay man to become a member of his congregation. His district superintendent and his bishop had urged Johnson to admit the man. Yesterday, the Judicial Council reinstated Johnson, with back pay, with a 5 to 3 vote. It said local pastors have the discretion to decide on members. Johnson was traveling yesterday and did not return messages. The Rev. Tom Thomas, who served as Johnson's legal counsel, said the decision "salvaged" the career of a good pastor and "preserves the way pastoral ministry has been done in our church for 200 years." The Judicial Counsel viewed the case as a question about a pastor's authority, rather than a question about whether people in same-sex relationships are eligible to join the church. In a dissenting opinion, Judicial Council member Susan T. Henry-Crowe said the decision "compromises the historical understanding that the Church is open to all." Like many other Protestant denominations, the Methodist Church has been struggling with sexual issues for 30 years. Its legislative body, the General Conference, meets every four years and has, in recent sessions, reaffirmed the prohibition on "self-avowed, practicing homosexuals" in the clergy by increasing margins. Because of a changing geographic formula, conservative Methodists from the South have been gaining influence in the General Conference and have helped elect more conservatives to the Judicial Council. In May 2004, delegates also voted to tighten church laws, making it easier to charge, try and convict gay ministers. "A lot of loopholes have been closed, but I believe in risky ways," said the Rev. Thomas E. Frank, director of Methodist Studies at Emory University and a proponent of welcoming gays into the church. "There's a lot of ambiguities in the judicial procedures because the church has never tried that hard to get people out; instead, it's emphasized being a big tent and getting everybody in. It's a sharp reversal when we start heading in the other direction." Mark Tooley, a conservative Methodist at the Institute on Religion and Democracy in Washington, said the rulings show that Methodism "is not moving in the direction of the Episcopal Church and declining liberal Protestantism in the West." Rather, he said, it "is moving in the direction of global Christianity, which is robustly orthodox." It takes an awesome amount of courage to hold your head high after "The Church" tells you that you are 'incompatible with Christian Teaching.' Today's post is dedicated to Beth and all the brave souls who continue to struggle inside an institution that refuses to love each person equally, just as God made us. It is also dedicated to all the people who are no longer with us because they fought the same battle and lost.
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