Every four years, the United Methodist Church has
up to 1,000 laity and clergy delegates elected from every
annual conference in the world meet to update our Book of
Discipline and the Book of Resolutions. This year they will
meet April 24-May 4, 2012, in Tampa, Florida.

The Book of Discipline contains our church’s
constitution, Articles of Religion (faith statement), Social
Policy, and polity for how we are structured at every level
of the church.

The Book of Resolutions contains statements that
express our official position on everything from spiritual
matters to political matters.

These ten days are intense with the first five
focused on committee meetings that consider all of the
petitions that were sent in suggesting changes and the
second half meeting as a committee of the whole to debate
and vote on the recommendations.

Here is a sampling of a few of the items
that will be considered:

Delegates to the 2012 United
Methodist General Conference will be asked to
affirm a new relationship with the African
Methodist Episcopal, African Methodist
Episcopal Zion, African Union Methodist
Protestant, Christian Methodist Episcopal and
Union American Methodist Episcopal
denominations. A celebration of Pan-Methodist
full communion will be at 4:30 p.m. on May 1, 2012, a
day also set aside for recognition of United
Methodist ecumenical partners.

United Methodist bishops on April 18
heard a challenge to embody the peace of
Christ to the 2012 General Conference, to an
anxious denomination and to the greater
world. Charlotte (N.C.) Area Bishop Larry M.
Goodpaster delivered that call during his final
address to the Council of Bishops as that
body’s president. He said more anxiety
precedes this General Conference than any in
recent history.

For too long, cabinets have had to
struggle to place each clergyperson in a
congregation. All that could change if the
General Conference scraps the guaranteed
appointment system, writes the Rev. Laura Jaquith
Bartlett, a pastor in the Oregon-
Idaho Annual (regional)
conference. “What if we had a
system in place to care for clergy
who were no longer appointed?”

United Methodists and other members of
the Interfaith Working Group on Global Hunger
and Food Security have sent letters to
congressional leaders, asking them to
fundamentally change U.S. food aid policies to
lower costs, deliver disaster aid faster and better
help hungry people break out of poverty and aid
dependence. “Food shipped from the United
States takes longer to arrive than food purchased
regionally,” reads part of the letter. “For people
facing a famine or other crisis, additional waiting
time for a food delivery can be a matter of life or
death.”

From April 23 until May 8, the United Methodist denominational website
will switch to full coverage of the 2012 General Conference. Audiences will be redirected to the
General Conference site. You
can read news in advance at the General
Conference site.

See you Sunday in the place where it is a joy to
worship God!

Yours in Christ,
Bro. David (home: 940-683-1724;
[email protected])

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