Mic Thurber – Denver, Colorado … After our constituency vote to send the names of both men and women to the Mid-America Union for ordination, a few questions are left over. We might uncover additional questions as we live longer with it but for now I thought I’d share a few thoughts with you. Here is a short list of things I will mention:
As has already been reported in NewsNuggets, the Executive Committee may develop a policy on how conference workers will relate to the action we took, but in the meantime your Rocky Mountain Conference administration has put forward a set of assurances that includes that no pastor will lose his or her position in ministry because of their personal views on women’s ordination; nor will their potential for advancement within the conference be limited because of it.
As pastoral openings become available, for churches that are willing to entertain the possibility of a female pastor serving their congregation, administration will provide names of qualified and gifted women whom they can consider. Since we always work with a leadership group in the local church when placing a pastor, we would not attempt to place a female pastor in a church whose leadership would not support it.
The Executive Committee voted for Pastor Lisa Cardinal, who was commissioned a few years ago, to receive an ordination credential for this new term. This action was taken when the credentials were voted for the rest of RMC’s workers. After learning of the vote, Pastor Cardinal relayed a short story that illustrates one small aspect of how this simple change will further enhance her ability to be a pastor in her community. She said that at that time she was approached by her local police department to serve as a chaplain to female police officers. However, the requirement for doing so was ordination, which meant she could not serve her community in this way. “This is the kind of ministry opportunity among many others that I, as well as the other female pastors will be able to step into.” As I said, this is just one small impact.
In reaction to our vote on women’s ordination, concerns were raised because the word “variance” was used in the introduction of the issue by Union leadership. This is also the word used to describe an organization granting a “variance” of its policies for a group. Clearly, neither the General Conference Executive Committee nor the General Conference in Session voted a variance of its policy on women’s ordination for any organization including the MAUC and the Rocky Mountain Conference. By our vote, the Rocky Mountain Conference was voting to do something different than the GC/NAD Policies provide regarding women’s ordination, which was legal to do at a duly called constituency meeting, even though it was not in accordance with church policies or General Conference actions. The Union leadership, who introduced this subject to the constituents, recognizes how this might have caused confusion to some at the meeting and apologizes for inadvertent use of a word. There was never any intent to be misleading and the Union hopes the RMC delegates will understand it was a mistake of the mind, not the heart.
When the word “variance” was used, it was intended in the context of an exception to our own by-laws language about being linked to and following the policies of the Mid-America Union, North American Division, and General Conference. The word “exception” would have been a better word. However, there was no intention on the part of the Union or RMC leadership to infer that the General Conference had granted us a variance. We also all realized that our vote would do nothing to change GC policy, or the action voted at the 2015 GC Session but resulted only to change the position in the Rocky Mountain Conference based on the action of the Mid-America Union which was also not in accordance with church policies or the General Conference Session actions.
–Mic Thurber, RMC president
