Day 11: Remembering Love

Tonight I would like to have prayers for all the people the church continues to hurt. I would specifically like to mention the folks of the LGBTQ community. Because there was legislation today that did not pass, The United Methodist Church continues to be non-inclusive to that part of our church family. This legislation not passing did great harm to them and it hurts as a supporter of them as people. So, as you read this please pray for them and their hurt.

Before I report on my connecting and the young people’s actions I would like to bring up something that really bothered me today. Please don’t get me wrong I am a major supporter of GLBT I believe that every person is of sacred worth and has a right like any other person to be in our churches, ordained as clergy, and married as they so choose. I understand the need to make a statement, to have witness, I understand also that people have right to protest their position. However, there are two things that happened that upset me. The first thing that has bothered me is that in protest/witness communion was served. The point of this happening was to remind everyone that EVERBODY is part of the body of Christ. I agree with that statement, the part that bothers me is using communion as a political play. Communion is a sacred time to be in connection with Christ, not something that can be thrown out there to prove a point. The next thing that bothered me was that the people protesting were not willing to move after the break. I feel that we are here to do gods work of holy conferencing for his church. I feel that people should allow that to happen. If we cannot do the work god called us here to do then how are we a church at all? I believe for the need of awareness but not in a way that causes us to lose 45 minutes of time to do some of the important work we are here for. I am grateful that there was no violence and no arrests. I am happy that there was a compromise made by the bishops and the people in protest to bring some order back to the floor. The bishops showed love of the people there and they showed enough love to comply. With that being said, I feel like there was a better way for the protest to happen. We should all remember that in love comes the best in all us.

Now I have a confession to make. I am writing everything from here forward at about 12:30 p.m. on the day after it should have been. Last night I fell asleep on my computer and was not able to finish it till now.

So onto the reports of young people and connecting, I did make some connections yesterday at lunch. I went to a Drew Theological School luncheon. I went primarily for the free food but was able to hear a lot of information about the school and see some of those attending and some of the alumni. If I were interested at all in seminary I have to say that the luncheon yesterday was very good at convincing me that drew would be the place to do it.

For dinner I tagged along with the young people meeting together from the South Central Jurisdiction. It was nice, many of these young people I had already come to know and a couple I had not. It was a fun time we went to taco bus and then all the way back to the other side of town to get gelato. Sometimes it is nice to have a get together where there is no arguing or lobbying. We made jokes talked and about home life. It was a wonderful time of fun and fellowship and a loving connection.

Finally the young people group; as I said in my last post the young people were supposed to meet with Bishop Minerva Carcaño to discuss what to do about the injustices done to us throughout this general conference. We did meet with her and she gave us some insight on how to go about writing and presenting a point of personal privilege. So we gathered as a group and started word crafting a speech to give so that we could have the most effect with our words. Some of us were up late into the night working on it. I made it back to the houses our delegation is staying in after a nice hour walk at about 3:00 to 3:15 a.m. When I left, there were still 3 people working on it. I believe that it worked out well.
That is all I really have to report. There is love in the air, it is always around us sometimes it is hard to remember that, and sometimes even harder to see. I feel as though there is more to say, but I want to leave my feelings on the overall for my final post. So, in the words of a dearly loved childhood icon; “TTFN! (that means for Ta Ta For Now)”.