Moving Towards the Margins at GC

It was just like any other early May morning in Tampa, hot and muggy. The General Conference of The United Methodist Church, the main decision-making body of The UMC, would soon be coming to a close. We knew that it was the big day, the day that whether or not The UMC would agree to disagree on human sexuality would be on the table.

No legislation had made it out of committee to be passed on to the main body, but in one last-ditch attempt to salvage the dignity of queer folks, a replacement was proposed. While effectively stating that The UMC agrees to disagree on human sexuality, the compromise offered was less than satisfactory in some regards, but the legislative strategists among us knew that it was likely our only chance to remove the statement that “The United Methodist Church does not condone the practice of homosexuality and considers it incompatible with Christian teaching.”

You Can’t Stop the Beat: Bringing Change to The UMC

This was originally posted at In Our Words, a blog a friend of mine from DePaul started. As it is part of my reflections on General Conference, I have decided to re-post it here with a few edits so those who do not follow IOW or who didn’t see my facebook posts of this article could know a little more about my activities at and reflections on General Conference.

Dancers from the flash mob
Photo from UMCOM GC Photostream

For the last week of April and the first week of May, I spent my time in Tampa, FL. No, it wasn’t some sort of Girls Gone Wild-esque Spring Break misadventure. Instead, it was a misadventure of much more epic proportions, or so it felt at times. It was the General Conference of The United Methodist Church, or, more simply, a conference of 1,000 United Methodists from across the world coming together to talk about the structure, management, and social stances of The UMC for the next four years.

Martyrs for Love

For me right now, Valentine’s Day could have easily passed by without my batting an eyelash. Colombia (thank goodness) has not caved to the consumerism of the holiday. When I saw the notifications that all of my friends were talking about Valentine’s Day on Facebook for the past few days, I decided to not let it bring me down; I would reclaim the day. I began by reclaiming the day as Singles’ Self-Empowerment Day, because I’m not fond of the idea of Singles’ Awareness Day; that just seems depressing and like it continues placing coupled people on some sort of pedestal. Of course, it’s also the birthday of Anna Howard Shaw, so it is already reclaimed as a feminist holiday. But this morning, I saw that a friend had posted the following, a history of St. Valentine:

…es porque pareces muy extranjera…

This is what my pastor told me my first Sunday here, commenting on my blue eyes and my fair complexion (the statement means “it’s because you look really foreign”, more or less). He was warning that people might try to take advantage of me, because, well, I look like the gringa (this term isn’t always used derisively) that I am. And, in fact, it happens from time to time. I don’t receive the change that I should for my buseta fare, taxi drivers try to charge me too much (as of late, I haven’t put up much of a fuss about it; it’s always been less than one US dollar to this point, which I acknowledge would be a much bigger deal if I weren’t such a fortunate and privileged gringa).

Time to Ruffle Some Feathers…?

Of course, as basically everyone in the US knows, abortion is a hot-button issue, especially among people of faith. Our United Methodist Social Principles (of which, of course, I almost always have a copy on hand, just in case I stumble upon an occasion like this) say a whole lot on abortion; here are some excerpts: