The 211th session of the New York Annual Conference began Wednesday, June 9, 2010, under the theme of “building up a healthy body of Christ,” with MIND’s witness there to remind all that “the body of Christ needs the gifts of all its members to be healthy,” as one of our banners says.
Even as we were still hanging the banners and putting out flyers, people were stopping at the MIND table to find out who we are, to join MIND, to buy a t-shirt, to connect. MIND volunteers were so busy talking to people they never got away for dinner.
At the official opening of the annual conference in the evening, Bishop Park gave an Episcopal address that focused on the need for the church to “bear fruit” by “producing more disciples.” He began by taking note of the church’s decline in membership. “We keep losing people as they move away or pass away,” he said, and their ranks are not replenished by new members. He neglected to acknowledge that the church also pushes away LGBT members and potential members and that many have chosen to walk away from the UMC because they cannot abide its prejudice against gay and lesbian people.
While the bishop said that “radical change” was needed in order or the church to have a “viable future,” his address did not lay out any proposals for change. The Gospel lesson for the evening was John 15:1-17, in which Jesus commands his followers to “love each other as I have loved you.” Bishop Park missed an opportunity to not only acknowledge how the body of Christ has been maimed by the church’s exclusion of LGBT people, but also to spell out the radically inclusive nature of Jesus’s love that should guide us to take extra efforts to welcome and embrace the poor, the marginalized and the oppressed.
On Thursday, legislative sections will discuss and debate resolutions, including the four resolutions MIND has submitted this year.