26 April 2008
Reports from GC - Day 4: Apr 26
26 April 2008
Began the day with worship music by the Candler singers and other UM seminarians. Worship is a good way to begin the day, but it was frustrating to many that committee work did not resume until 2:30 pm. The entire morning was filled with special presentations, videos, and reports to the general plenary session. Important, perhaps, but the deadline for committees’ recommendations on legislation with financial implications was 5 pm, so the committees were eager to get back to work.
I observed two committees today and both decided to refer the hard work to another quadrennial study commission: the Worldwide Nature of the UMC and the Ministry Study. This is not to say that decisions won’t be made, but delegates simply do not have time here to hash through the difficult detail of major changes in polity. In addition, they are suspicious of detailed recommendations made by study commissions. They seem to want to have it both ways—sayso in the results but a study commission to do the work. True democracy (and this is only an approximation thereof) is very time consuming and excruciating to watch.
On a positive note, one of my petitions is on the first consent calendar, meaning that it is all but assured to be approved. This petition requires that central conferences (those outside the US) provide copies of all of their translations and adaptations of the Discipline to the archives and GCFA. Presently, these materials are not gathered in one location, which makes it difficult to do research on them.
