annual conference – Salvaged Faith

Competing Goals

Posted on July 10, 2015Leave a comment

One of my goals for this renewal leave was to cook more meals in the evening for myself and my husband.

It is something I love to do, and I use about two more pots or utensils than I need and make a lovely delicious mess every time.

But I love to cook. I love to discover new flavors and adapt recipes and buy fresh ingredients based on one meal and take a few hours in the kitchen.

I can honestly tell you I have made exactly zero of those big fancy meals. Last night, I made a one pot casserole while Brandon was at the hardware store. We’ve had frozen pizza twice this week. Our fridge has never been emptier.

Even though making dinner was my goal, it was connected with the goal to spend more quality time with my husband. And when either of us cook, we get in each others way.

He is also in charge of the dishes (my responsibility is the cats and the garbage), and so my kitchen messes stress him out.

He is a much pickier eater than I am, too.

I realized I had competing goals, so I have ended up cooking very little this past month.

Sometimes churches have competing goals, too.

I was part of a church in Nashville that wanted to both provide excellent child care AND be open to people off the street. We couldn’t do the second effectively because we needed to keep doors locked and building access limited for child safety.

Denominations have such competing goals and priorities as well. My own annual conference is balancing budget reduction/apportionment reduction AND the goals to reach new people/better equip leaders. To be honest, they don’t co-exist very well.

As I thought about my own competing goals, a few questions came to mind that might help churches discern as well:

1) Where do my goals intersect or overlap? Do they mutually benefit each other? Or detract? A simple evaluation can bring to light places of competition or cooperation.

2) Is this goal something I want, or something we need? Especially in churches, it is sometimes hard to let go of goals you are personally excited about. But, if it doesn’t fit with the overall direction or priorities of the church, it is easier to let them go.

3) Who benefits from these goals? Who is harmed? This can be a tricky question, especially if you are dealing with multiple vulnerable populations (like children/homeless, or small churches/campus ministries). Yet, sometimes we make assumptions about who is benefiting from our goals or who becomes more at risk. Taking the time to evaluate in this way clears the waters.

4) Can a different goal, or a different ministry do the work just as well? Can you better equip local homeless

ministry and work there, rather than do it in your building? Can you focus on stewardship and helping churches pay their share instead of reducing the payments for everyone? Can you go out to eat more, instead of cooking g at home? We simply can’t do everything and realizing what our options are helps us shift our goals.

a billion organisms and the Body of Christ #iaumc15

Posted on June 8, 2015Leave a comment

Did you know that soil is incredibly diverse and complex? It might look like simple dirt, but one handful contains more living organisms than there are people on the planet.

And every part of the soil, every organism has a part to play. They affect chemical and physical properties. There are a billion bacteria in one gram of fertile soil that consume what is produced by green plants… there are fungi that decompose materials, there are soil animals that consume and decompose and feed on one another and leave channels in the soil that increases infiltration of minerals and water and oxygen.

And all of these living organisms live off of and feed off of one another. It is their interaction that makes soil healthy and thriving and good.

In his book, The Third Plate, Dan Barber describes the “war” that is going on in the soil we walk upon. It is a class system where:

Jack pointed to the soil. “There’s a war going on in there…”

first-level consumers (microbes), the most abundant and miniscule members of the community, break down large fragments of organic material into smaller residues; secondary consumers (protozoa, for example) feed on the primary consumers or their waste; and then third-level consumers (like centipedes, ants, and beetles) eat the secondaries. The more Jack explained it, the more it started to sound like a fraught, complex community…

Fred Magdoff, likened the process to a system of checks and balances. “To me there is real beauty in how it works,” he said. “When there is sufficient and varied food for the organisms, they do what comes naturally, ‘making a living’ by feeding on the food sources that evolution provided… What you have is a thriving, complex community of organisms.”

I have been thinking about the immense complexity of dirt and what it means for us as the church.

We have been inundated with a move towards “simple church” and we talk so much about unity and yet I wonder what would happen if instead we embraced the incredibly complex, diverse, thriving nature of soil as a metaphor of our life together.

It is actually what we find in the Body of Christ as described by Paul in 1 Corinthians 12. We have feet and hands and eyes and hearts and livers and spleens. We all play a part. We might look at others and think, “I don’t need you,” but Paul says we are wrong.

In our Iowa Annual Conference right now, we are divided. We are different. We don’t read scriptures the same. We feel differently about human sexuality. We aren’t sure what we should do about those folks on the margins, our brothers and sisters, who are gay or lesbian or bisexual or transgender or still discovering. Underneath it all is a different understanding of how we understand the scriptures.

And sometimes, that diversity feels like a war. It feels like the battle Jack described the soil beneath us. We are chewing each other up and spitting each other out. And I hate the way my brothers and sisters are hurt and damaged by comments that cut to the core of their very being. Especially as I watch them walk away from the Body of Christ.

When you focus on the conflict that diversity creates, like Jack did, you want to strip out everything that is different to protect yourself and others. We want simple things. We want unity, which means, we want to all be the same.

But to be healthy, we need diversity. We need difference. We need checks and balances. We need to remind each other of the importance of the bible and scripture and justice and mercy and grace and love. It comes from both sides. We need to listen. We need to hold one another accountable. We also need to challenge one another. We need to say things that are difficult to hear. We need to be willing to speak the truth in love.

And together, the interaction of all of our different parts creates something beautiful and mysterious and powerful.

Friends, we might look like United Methodists, but a little deeper under the cover of our identity, we are incredibly complicated. We are men and women, people of all sorts of shades of skin, languages, eye colors, theological perspectives, ideas, gifts, skills, ages…

I need you. All of you. And together, God wants us to be amazing.

IAUMC13

Posted on June 11, 2013Leave a comment

I am a United Methodist Conference junkie. I love the debate and worship, interaction and holy conferencing. I love getting up to the microphone to speak. I love friendly amendments and the crazy insane process… at its best. I know there are times when it gets out of control and is painful and frustrating. There are times I probably have forced myself to forget because they were too ugly. But I’m a metho-nerd and I’m sticking with it.

This Iowa Annual Conference was very different for me, however. As the coordinator for Imagine No Malaria, I had a booth to run and shirts to sell and a District Giving Challenge to coordinate. I ran back and forth between my seat and the booth and the treasurer’s office. I sometimes forgot to eat. I helped put together a last minute silent auction and touched hundreds of dollar bills and got to stand in front of the body of our Iowa Annual Conference and testify about why I am saving lives… and they should, too.

It was an amazing weekend. We raised over $100, 000 in gifts and pledges. Churches were inspired and energized. Everywhere I looked, I saw green and brown INM shirts dotting the crowd. We had 38 individuals pledge their commitment to save lives… some giving $10 month, some $100!

But I did miss some of what I love about our conference. I “missed” all the debate on resolutions, only to find out most got tabled u til next year. I was present for about 10 minutes of the hours of budget presentation, questions, and debate ( ha… but I did manage to sneak a question in!). I missed three worship services… which I’m hoping to catch via the recordings. Above all, I missed the fellowship of time with colleagues and friends, long lunch breaks and late night conversations. I didn’t have time to go out and I was too exhausted for the after hours camaraderie.

The one legislative discussion I did make sure I was fully present for was our strategic priorities conversations and then legislative perfection. After working for countless hours on listening, reading, writing, responding, revising, we brought a document to the conference and prayed with all of our hearts that God would move us to embrace some clear priorities for our future. And when it finally came time to vote, after a number of friendly amendments, we overwhelmingly approved the vision, mission, and priorities. Now, we need to commit to living them out in every way possible.

IAUMC13

Posted on June 11, 2013Leave a comment

Invitation to Conversation and Discernment

Posted on May 29, 20131 Comment

Hi folks,

This year at our Iowa Annual Conference one of our major topics of discussion will be the vision, mission, and strategic priorities of our Iowa Conference.

As part of getting people across the conference to think/pray/discern where we are heading with this document, I’m hoping YOU might think and write about the document this next week. I want to invite you to prayerfully read the full document and craft your response. If you blog, let me know where and when your post shows up! If you don’t blog, I would love to invite you to be a guest on my blog and will share your responses.

In this exercise, some questions we might wrestle with are:

What kind of difference would this make in the Iowa Annual Conference?
What are the obstacles to passing the vision/mission/priorities?
What are the obstacles to living them out?
What are some lingering questions you have or places you feel led to push back?
What excites you? What inspires you? What stirs your soul so that you can’t wait to get started?
What are we missing?

Up front disclosure: I was on the writing team for this project and have spent a lot of time invested in the work. It’s not perfect. It isn’t even really finished… that will happen on the floor of the Annual Conference as we adopt the priorities and then work to perfect the goals as a legislative body… and even then, we are creating a working document. I’m hopeful and prayerful that God truly is leading us outside of our old structures and into a new reality – focused on relationship, mission, discipleship, and life in our community. I’m happy to answer any questions you might have and/or talk about where I’m still struggling!!!

I’m not looking for your approval, but your deep engagement and conversation… and to invite those who respond in your own circles to do the same. I want us to be as informed, prepared, and above all SPIRIT LED as we get to the actual conversations on the floor of annual conference as we can be. And that takes connection and holy conversation.

PLEASE seek out others who are writing and read and interact with their thoughts and responses!

PLEASE invite others to blog also! And if you have friends/colleagues/church members/neighbors who don’t blog, invite them to write a guest post for your blog to broaden the engagement!

All in all… thank you. And let me know when you post next week so I can link your posts and share them broadly.

All Shall Be Well,

Katie Z.

p.s. I hope this might be the start of deeper connection among the bloggers in our conference, as well!

what you may not realize about the loss of guaranteed appointment #gc2012

Posted on May 4, 201215 Comments

Tonight, my heart was stilled from its racing on the guaranteed appointment issue.

I have felt the both/and of a desire for a clear, mission process for appointments AND the deep desire to protect my brothers and sisters who might unfairly be discriminated against in the process where homophobia, sexism, and racism still exist. I was not of one heart on the issue. When asked how I would have voted on the floor had I been seated, I honestly could not answer… perhaps I would have abstained.

But tonight, a colleague of mine – Sean McRoberts – and I dove deep into the legislation to figure out what the actual implications are.

1) this is not a simple power given to the bishop or cabinet to dismiss you to ministry… there are checks and balances all throughout the process. According to the legislation we passed and the BoD, either a lack of missional appointment placement OR an ineffective pastor who is not appointed has to be approved by the Board of Ordained Ministry AND the clergy session. Someone who recieves the status of “transitional leave” must be voted on by the order and so as clergy, if we feel uncomfortable with this process, we need to remember that we have the ability to vote and support one another if the process/boom/cabinet is acting discriminatorily…

2) the appointive cabinet, Board of Ordained Ministry, and Clergy Session all have to agree for a person to move to transitional leave (it is a status change). Transitional leave has a two year maximum according to the discipline. A person cannot simply be returned to transitional leave again and again. If a person is being transitioned out of ministry due to ineffectiveness, that two years gives time for a process of healing, discernment, counseling, and new calling to occur. In Iowa, we currently have a three year process to counsel and support clergy who are ineffective so that they can either grow or discern a new calling.

3) some important work was done in the legislative committee. They added a requirement for accountability that says statistical reporting on the people put on transitional leave and/or appointed to a less than full time position (age, gender, race) has to be sent to the executive committee of the BoOM and the conference and jurisdictional committee on the episcopacy. Committee on Episcopacy should then include those statistics in the annual evaluation of the bishop. (we also approved at this general conference a switch from bi-annual to annual episcopal review).

Prior to this GC, bishops were not evaluated on their appointment making activities, only on the other areas of their ministry. If there were complaints, we could use administrative process to require remedial action and/or bring charges. This is still the case, only this way we have a process of statistical information to help evaluate if their are patterns, intentional or unintentional, that exclude persons from the table. The process already is in place for helping ineffective or discriminatory bishops transition out of ministry (we just never use it!)

4) there is an important addition, also from the legislative committee, that calls for a group of four laity, two clergy, a district superintendent and the bishop of the annual conference to determine annually criteria for missional appointment making. These criteria are then to be used by the cabinet in their process of discernment. This adds the voice of clergy and laity into the process.

So… with these four clarifications/implications… what do you think?

Survivor: GC Election Edition

Posted on June 6, 20112 Comments

How many ballots does it take to NOT elect a young adult clergy person as a delegate to General Conference in Iowa?

12.

I shouldn’t start that way. That’s the tired exhaustion of a very long day. I should start with the absolute excitement that our conference, today, on our 12th and final ballot, elected three young adult clergy persons as delegates to jurisdictional conference (and therefore as GC alternates) and has also elected two young adult laity as jurisdictional conference delegates and 1 youth and 1 young adult laity as general conference delegates.

Yes, I’m harping on the young adults. There aren’t so many of us and we are the future of this church. We are the ones who are going to have to figure out a way to be disciples of Jesus Christ in the next 10 – 20 years. And we are ready and willing and able to start figuring this stuff out right now.

For three days now, we have gone through ballots. The laity had a much easier time of it, but with 42 clergy delegates and 7 spots, the journey was a bit slower for us clergy folk.

At one point, a motion was made to eliminate any nominee who had less than 40 votes (will roughly 450 clergy voting, roughly 225 votes were needed for election). Little by little, our options got fewer and fewer, solidifying our vote.

As a nominee, it was a very strange experience.

I think I might have run for one elected position ever in high school. I don’t think I won. I was the president of the Religious Life Council at Simpson, but I can’t remember if that was a peer-elected sort of thing or not.

Photo by: Hawkins

But to be on the ballot for 11 straight votes… and to see every single time your name up there on the projection screens with numbers behind it … was nuts. It felt like some strange, tamed down version of Survivor… 40 votes or less and you just don’t make the cut. *piff* your candle is put out.

The thing that felt the most awkward about the whole thing is that there is no electioneering. No campaigning aside from the bios. We couldn’t throw our support behind other candidates or talk about why people would make excellent choices – except amongst the people you chatted with face to face. No comments about the slate as it came up. No arguments were supposed to be made about the fact that the first three folks we elected were all middle aged white men (although someone slipped that one in… and although they will all be wonderful delegates) or that we elected absolutely no delegates under the age of 50 (at least as I have been told). So I sat there, and people kept coming up and saying – I voted for you because you are a young adult! and I had enough votes most times to just keep pushing on… and by the end, although I felt like withdrawing my name so that we could at least reach a consensus on the final GC delegate, I couldn’t because it felt like I was carrying all of our young clergy hopes and expectations on my shoulders.

At the end of the night, I ended up being elected second as a jurisdictional delegate from Iowa. I think that also means I will have the honor of serving as a general conference delegate and all of my nerdy, conference loving, legislative tweaking, holy conferencing excitement is peaked. But it is also humbling and I feel blessed to have the opportunity to speak and to vote as a delegate from Iowa.

Congratulations to everyone who was elected!!!

traveling light?

Posted on June 4, 20112 Comments

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My family just got back a few days ago from a trip to the Lake of the Ozarks. It was a Christmas/Anniversary/Birthday gift to our parents from all the kids. We rented a huge house on the water and had four glorious days to spend with one another.

Packing for such an adventure was a different story. Sure there was a full kitchen with appliances – but would they have salt and pepper? Tupperware to store leftovers? Parchment paper for under the oven fries? The absolute best price on steak we had seen for months?

We all threw in what we thought was good and necessary… including the whole watermelon I had left over from a youth event the Wednesday before. And that car was PACKED to the BRIM with our stuff.

Of course, then comes my brothers and sister-in-law. A backpack with some clothes and some sneaks =)

I am procrastinating right now, because what I should be doing is finishing my packing for Annual Conference.

I’ve got the prerequisite clothes, but I must admit I packed an extra outfit or two… it is supposed to be in the 90’s two of our days and we are going to be sitting in a60 degree cool airconditioned hall – it makes it hard to predict what to wear.

I cut down on weight by putting all of my annual conference materials on my kindle… but then I found room to pack some notecards and thank you materials. And a journal for taking notes/putting ammendments.

I need to bring two different knitting projects for the long hours spent sitting.

And walking shoes for walking… and flip flops for hanging out in the sun on breaks.

My laptop for the room.

My camera to document the artwork installation and to add pictures to the online conversation.

Try as I might, I never can seem to pack light for Annual Conference.