Africa Will Remain Committed to the Protocol

Photo by James Wiseman on Unsplash

At least a quarter of those who had crafted the Protocol and appended their signatures on it on behalf of the many conflicting parties in the United Methodist Church have decided officially to disown the said Protocol. According to the United Methodist News Service: 

A much-trumpeted plan for amicable separation unveiled in early 2020 no longer offers a path forward for The United Methodist Church, say more than a quarter of the agreement’s negotiators.

Five of the 16-member mediation team released a statement late June 7 rescinding their support for the agreement.

In the statement, they said, “we can no longer in good faith support the Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace through Separation or work towards its adoption at the next General Conference.” The denomination’s top lawmaking assembly is now delayed to 2024. 

What has changed the calculus, they say, is the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the launch of a theologically conservative breakaway denomination.

Regardless of their stated reasons (the global pandemic and the formation of the Global Methodist Church), the Protocol is still a live option.  Note the response by the bishops who are signatories to the same Protocol wherein they make it clear that this is now the property of the General Conference, and only the delegates can reject or affirm it at this point. This statement by the bishops also notes that the Protocol has been helpful in reducing conflict within the United Methodist Church.

That said, the statement by the liberal signatories who have withdrawn their support cannot go unchallenged. Their stated rationale is unconvincing. We know that African delegates could get visas despite COVID restrictions, and we know that the Global Methodist Church was going to form anyway. Was their intention in signing onto the Protocol genuinely to seek peace? Do we need peace less now than we did before? Have we given up on the idea that separation could be amicable?

It is noteworthy that so many Africans continue in good faith to support the Protocol, despite the fact that we feel that our interests were not sufficiently represented. Yes, an African Bishop was asked to act as a peace broker to bring all the “warring parties” together to agree on a Protocol. Nevertheless important African voices were excluded from the negotiations. There was no representation by the Africa Initiative, which is perhaps the most powerful caucus group in the denomination. Why would this be? Some have suggested it was intentionally to create a rift between U.S. conservatives, who were ready to leave, and members of the Africa initiative, who were not. Regardless, had representatives of the Africa Initiative been invited to the table, the Protocol might have looked rather different at the end of the day.  

Were the American conservatives to leave and the Africans to stay, this would mean that less than a quarter of the denomination would break away leaving 75% of UMC membership intact. Had this scenario played out, with most of the denomination still in place and the U.S. conservative presence weakened, it is likely that the General Conference would not have been endlessly postponed. 

We will likely never know with certainty why the Africa Initiative was excluded from negotiations. Nevertheless, the Protocol negotiations did not break the bond between American traditionalists and African delegates under the Africa Initiative banner. In fact, the bond grew even stronger as some African bishops who were perceived to be anti-Africa Initiative began openly to support this relationship. This led to the application of emergency brakes, stopping the General Conference as it became inevitable that African delegates would side with the traditionalist side of the denominational divide. This would mean the progressive side would shrink into an American and European Protestant denomination while the traditional side would become the truly global denomination.

While the postponement of General Conference may have been a reaction to the strong possibility of the Protocol’s passage, it will not help in the long run. Those who pushed to postpone the General Conference are ignoring three basic principles related to our church governance and politics: 

First, as ably expressed by the bishops cited above, once a piece of legislation is formally accepted as a legitimate petition before the General Conference, it becomes the property of the General Conference and thus cannot be withdrawn even by its authors.

Second, the presenting conflict over homosexual practice still remains. Church law still says that homosexual practice is incompatible with Christian teaching. Anyone practicing it is in violation of our church law. Bishops may ignore this fact, but their doing so does not bring peace, but heightened conflict. 

Third, the so-called abeyance agreement on charges being raised against law-breakers is itself illegal. Those charged with the upholding of church law will be held responsible for presiding over chaos when they could save the church from following a ruinous path of lawlessness.

Africans still believe our differences are irreconcilable. For over fifty years we have failed to agree. It is folly to believe that this will change in the next two years. The only viable option is separation. If we can make separation amicable and fair, so much the better. Hence Africa's support for the Protocol even if some of the authors no longer consider it viable. If there are in fact areas of genuine concern around the the launch of the GMC, for example, these can be dealt with by means of amendments to the Protocol more effectively than by rejecting the Protocol  altogether. None of the obstacles raised is insurmountable. 

My word of caution is that if we refuse to pass the Protocol, more bitter conflict will follow after the General Conference in 2024. The denomination will continue to experience splits and breakaways on top of the general loss of church membership, especially in the USA and Europe, and eventually in other parts of the connection. No one is served by such ongoing conflict, especially not Jesus. 

The proposed alternatives to the Protocol are not broadly supported among African delegates. Nevertheless, there are those who do not tire of repeatedly trying the same thing no matter how many times it fails. The One Church Plan and the Christmas Covenant are one and the same thing, packaged differently, but aimed at achieving the same goals: changing the church’s teaching on homosexual practice and removing the African voice from matters that come to bear on the whole church. We all know it. We shall regard these proposals in the same way in which we regarded their predecessors. 

A final word: until such time as we make a final decision on the Protocol, our episcopal leaders must help the church by upholding the Discipline, even when it is disadvantageous to their political agendas. We recently saw the clear ruling of the Judicial Council in Memorandum 1446: all bishops that had reached mandatory retirement ages must in fact retire. Again I quote from the United Methodist News Service:  “The United Methodist Church’s top court has set Jan. 1, 2023, as the date when U.S. bishops facing mandatory retirement must step down and their newly elected successors take office.” Nevertheless, some bishops in Africa are silent on this when they know it applies to them. They wish to defy the ruling of the Judicial Council. If Jurisdictions elect bishops, all Central Conferences with retired bishops must do the same–period. We cannot have different standards applied in the same denomination to people paid out of the same Episcopal Fund and sitting in the same Council of Bishops. The Council may choose to turn a blind eye to this since some of these bishops appear useful to the progressive agenda, but this kind of leadership will backfire in the long run. Rules are rules. The decision by the entire Council of Bishops to not act on the election of Karen Oliveto to the episcopacy has inflamed this conflict, particularly in the light of the immediate action the Council took to discipline Bishop Mike Lowry. May we learn not to make the same mistake twice. If we wish to have credibility, for once let us observe our own laws. No one will respect people who do not respect their own rules!

In summary, let me repeat again: Africa will support the Protocol. Regardless of whether or not the progressive representatives who initially signed the Protocol withdraw their support, the widely shared opinion among the African delegates is that the Protocol is the best way forward. We do not wish for ongoing conflict. We do not want a denomination that is lawless and chaotic. We want to live in keeping with our church law, and more importantly, the word of God given to us in holy Scripture. It would be best if our bishops would uphold the Discipline until such time as the matter of the Protocol is resolved, but one way or the other, our prayer is that this legislation will pass. May God give us the wisdom to bless one another as we go our separate ways. 

The Rev. Forbes Matonga is a pastor in the Zimbabwe West Annual Conference of The United Methodist Church and a member of the Wesleyan Covenant Association’s Global Leadership Council.