Before anyone could get a second cup of coffee down, Bishop Mande Muyombo emphasized to members of the Connectional Table the importance of their work.
“The Connectional Table must watch out and put the poor, the widows, the immigrants, the homeless, minorities, the sick, the disabled, the rejected, those affected by wars, violence, hurricanes, natural disasters and health pandemics … as their priorities,” he said on the first day of the meeting at First United Methodist Church, Dallas.
“Or else Christ Jesus will have no choice than to overturn the table.”
It is a leadership body that coordinates denomination-wide mission, resources and ministries. About 80% of the current board members are new.
Your support of The General Administration Fund apportionment implements trustworthy administrative oversight like the General Conference sessions and The Connectional Table.
A major emphasis of the orientation of Connectional Table members was to reject colonial attitudes that assume other cultures are inferior.
“(Being on the Connectional Table) is all new to (most of) this group of people,” said Judi Kenaston, the Connectional Table’s chief connectional officer. “So we really wanted them to understand the Connectional Table history. … I think where we’ve been is really important to know where we need to go.”
The group works with the General Council on Finance and Administration board in approving annual agency spending plans and developing the four-year denominational budget that goes before General Conference delegates.
Among the immediate responsibilities of the Connectional Table is looking at the next steps that will be needed if a regionalization plan is passed by a two-thirds total vote of annual conference lay and clergy voters next year. That would include figuring out what legislation should be offered to General Conference in 2028 that would make the process of putting regionalization into effect easier.
The Connectional Table also needs to deliver a visioning statement for the church to offer to the Council of Bishops.
The tendency to act as the moral authority for what people of other cultures should believe or do, based on a supposition of superiority, needs to be discarded, David Scott, senior director of mission theology and strategic planning at the United Methodist Board of Global Ministries, said. They are symptoms of the colonial thinking espoused by empires.
The regionalization plan passed at General Conference aims to give The United Methodist Church’s different geographic regions equal standing in decision-making.
To come to fruition, regionalization requires amending The United Methodist Church’s constitution. The Council of Bishops expects all annual conferences to vote on the amendments by the end of 2025. The bishops plan to tally the votes when they hold their spring meeting in 2026.
“All regional conferences share the same constitution, doctrinal standards and Social Principles enacted by General Conference,” Scott said. “These are not adaptable by regional conferences. The Council of Bishops, Judicial Council, general agencies and General Conference are fully maintained.”
Members of the Connectional Table said the information they received at the meetings was valuable.
“There’s various opinions, but I sense that people really want to be a part of a solution of moving forward,” said Bishop David Graves of the Alabama-West Florida Conference. “I don’t see pushback or resistance, just a great spirit.”
Bishop Delores J. Williamston of the Louisiana Conference said she is optimistic about the future.
excerpt from a story by Jim Patterson, UM News reporter, Nashville, Tennessee
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