By: Christa Meland

At a virtual North Central Jurisdictional (NCJ) Conference this week, delegates elected by their respective annual conferences created and overwhelmingly approved a covenant naming their commitment to anti-racism work and LGBTQIA+ inclusion (access covenant).
 
Approximately 250 delegates and alternates participated in an official Zoom meeting Wednesday and Thursday, and others from across the 10-conference jurisdiction watched it live online. Those present spent the majority of the time on three big topics of conversation—dismantling racism, the future of episcopal leadership, and the future of The United Methodist Church.
 
On Thursday morning, by a vote of 135-32, delegates approved a “Covenant to Build Beloved Community” developed by a six-person writing team determined by the heads of the NCJ delegations. The covenant, written using United Methodist baptismal vows as a framework, calls on the jurisdiction to work to end racism and to create a culture that welcomes and affirms LGBTQIA+ people.
 

Specifically, the covenant calls on the NCJ bishops of color to convene all BIPOC delegates to discuss how to begin to address trauma in communities of color, requests the Mission Council to report on how their budget incorporates anti-racism work, urges all members of the NCJ to avoid pursuing charges for LGBTQIA+ clergy, and requests that episcopal leaders dismiss charges related to LGBTQIA+ identity or officiating same-gender weddings. The covenant also stipulates that the Mission Council must designate NCJ funds to work with conference anti-racism teams to create a racial analysis at the local church and conference levels—and to align annual conference budgets with antiracism work and intentional efforts geared toward people and communities of color.
 
Members of the Minnesota delegation were pleased by the adoption of the covenant, and Rev. Carol Zaagsma noted that the Minnesota Conference’s aspirational vision has made its rounds in the NCJ and thus provided some groundwork to help shape the values articulated in the NCJ covenant.
 
“The shaping of our covenant was based on our baptismal covenant, and baptism isn’t an ending; it’s a beginning,” said Zaagsma, a member of the NCJ writing team who serves Good Samaritan UMC in Edina. “This covenant represents a new beginning for our North Central Jurisdiction, and I think it shows that grace and love are stronger than the challenges we face.”
 
Becky Boland, a lay delegate and certified lay minister who attends Hamline Church in St. Paul, echoed that sentiment.
 
“The passing of the covenant today gives me hope,” she said. “It allows me to know without question we can and will be the church God has called us to be—the church that affirms every single person as being made in God’s beautiful image.”
 
There was affirmation for the document across the jurisdiction as well.

“For the last two-and-a-half years, The United Methodist Church has been defined largely by the voices of those preparing to leave,” said Rev. Andy Call, a clergy delegate from the East Ohio Conference. “The North Central Jurisdiction took steps this week to articulate the values of the jurisdiction going forward that I hope will inspire those who have been left out or left behind.”

Rev. Duane Carlisle, a clergy delegate from the Indiana Conference, said he's grateful to have left the gathering with a vision to bring back to local churches as they dream and look to the future.

“My hope is that what we have borne in these two days will offer United Methodists across our connection a vision for ministry and a place where everyone can see their own unique gifts and callings reflected in its affirmations,” he said. “What the NCJ has accomplished in these last two days is evidence that we can be that place of radical love with a resolute posture leaning into justice and care for creation.”

The covenant requests the Mission Council, in conjunction with the NCJ College of Bishops, “develop an exercise for NCJ delegates to engage in conversation to understand the impact of homophobia, transphobia and heterosexism within United Methodist Churches during the next meeting of the jurisdiction.”
 
The writing team that developed the covenant waded through 54 pages of comments from delegates in order to find out was particularly important to them. The five key priorities identified from those discussions, which shaped the document, were: anti-racism, inclusion, amicable separation, regionalism, and connectionalism.
 

Nitza Dovenspike, a lay member of the Iowa Conference who was also on the covenant writing team, said the team kept coming back to baptismal vows as they approached the document and reflected on how to renounce some of the forces of evil in our midst. “It gave us the power to do the work of anti-racism in the spirit of building beloved community,” she said. “We all have baptism in common.”
 
She personally is grateful that the delegates lifted up anti-racism work as a priority and as a call to action. “We recognized the importance of actionable recommendations to continue the journey on eliminating racism,” she said after the covenant was adopted.
 
Regarding amicable separation, the document encourages conferences and local churches to strive for reconciliation and understanding. But for churches that “may feel called to a different future in the faith,” it stipulates that annual conferences should “use existing disciplinary and conference provisions to accommodate local congregations seeking disaffiliation.”
 
Delegates spent more than two hours discussing and refining the covenant before approving it. NCJ bishops were formally asked to officially rule on whether some of the specific language about LGBTQIA+ individuals and same-gender weddings—namely, the call to avoid and dismiss charges related to them—restricts the rights of bishops or other leaders from upholding the Book of Discipline and thus is null and void. The bishops have 30 days to respond.
 
In addition to approving the covenant itself, delegates also voted 131-31 to affirm the recent Council of Bishops document called “A Narrative for the Continuing United Methodist Church” and 128-31 to affirm “A Call to Grace,” a grassroots open letter that all United Methodists were invited to sign.
 
“Covenanting to Build the Beloved Community, we look to 2024 with promise,” the covenant stated at the end. “We pledge ourselves to God’s call upon our lives, to each other, and to the future of The United Methodist Church.”

Christa Meland is director of communications for the Minnesota Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church.