Judicial Council reaffirms decision on Cote d'Ivoire

By Neill Caldwell*

MANILA, Philippines (UMNS)--The United Methodist's Church's Judicial Council has upheld its earlier ruling that the Methodist Church of Cote d'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) has not been fully admitted to the denomination and may be limited to two delegates at the next General Conference.

Meeting for the first time outside the United States, in the capital city of the Philippines, the denomination's top court reaffirmed the decision it made last October that the 2004 General Conference was within its authority to award Cote d'Ivoire two delegates - one clergy and one lay - at the 2008 General Conference in Fort Worth, Texas.

In Decision 1051, the council made it clear that the action by the 2004 General Conference "was not a final act of admission" of Cote d'Ivoire into the larger church, and that additional legislation is expected to give that West African area full rights and representation. General Conference, which meets every four years, is The United Methodist Church's top lawmaking assembly.

On the last day of the 2004 General Conference, the Commission on Central Conference Affairs proposed the addition of Cote d'Ivoire to the West Africa Central Conference. The committee's recommendation was that the West Africa Central Conference, the Commission on Central Conference Affairs and the church's Board of Global Ministries work together on the entry of Cote d'Ivoire into the denomination in the upcoming quadrennium.

Instead, a substitute motion was offered, with four separate provisions: that Cote d'Ivoire be added to the West Africa Central Conference and the conference be authorized to elect a bishop to serve a new Cote d'Ivoire Episcopal Area; that Cote d'Ivoire set up and fully fund its own episcopal fund during the 2005-2008 quadrennium with no funding from either the General Council for Finance and Administration or the Episcopal Fund of The United Methodist Church; that Cote d'Ivoire be represented at 2008 General Conference with two delegates (one lay and one clergy); and that the Commission on Central Conference Affairs bring enabling legislation to the 2008 General Conference to include Cote d'Ivoire in the Episcopal Fund of The United Methodist Church. Delegates approved the substitute motion.

In Decision 1051, the Judicial Council chided the General Conference for not following proper procedure for admitting a new annual conference into The United Methodist Church.

"The substitute (motion) adopted anticipates that the 2008 General Conference will consider further legislative action to include Cote d'Ivoire into the Episcopal Fund," the council's ruling stated. "The remaining formalities of affiliation or admission should be completed by the agencies to whom the responsibility is assigned in time for presentation to and perfection by the 2008 General Conference. Once the process of joining The United Methodist Church is fully achieved, Cote d'Ivoire would have the right to full representation in its delegations to the 2012 and succeeding General Conference sessions."

The reaffirmation of Decision 1051 is Memorandum 1071. Council members James W. Holsinger, Mary A. Daffin and Keith D. Boyette signed the decision as dissenters, simply referencing the original dissent filed with Decision 1051.

At the fall 2006 session, a majority of the seven Judicial Council members present voted to hold the action of the 2004 General Conference regarding Cote d'Ivoire unconstitutional. However, Paragraph 2608 of the 2004 Book of Discipline requires that "(a)n affirmative vote of at least six members of the council shall be necessary to declare any act of the General Conference unconstitutional," and the decision failed to garner the six votes needed. The council has a total of nine members.

The Methodist Church in Cote d'Ivoire has been in existence since 1924. In 1985, it left the British Methodist Church to become autonomous. The Rev. Benjamin Boni was elected the first bishop of the new conference March 12, 2005, by the West Africa Central Conference. The Cote d'Ivoire Conference filed a report with the General Council of Finance and Administration that, as of June 26, 2006, it had 123 full-time clergy and 591,142 professing members.

Philippines items
Two of the docket items before the Judicial Council related to the Philippines Central Conference. The council ruled that it did not have jurisdiction to review a decision of law issued in response to a question asked during a meeting of the Coordinating Council of the Philippines Central Conference because the council was not one of the bodies stipulated in Paragraph 2609.6 of the Book of Discipline.

In the second case, votes taken by annual conferences in the Manila Area on ratification of a petition for the annual conference to be in an affiliated autonomous relationship to General Conference was ruled void and of no effect. In that annual conference action, only clergy members in full connection and lay members were allowed to vote. The Judicial Council said that because the petition was not a constitutional amendment, elders and deacons in full connection, local pastors, probationary clergy members and associate clergy members all should have had the right to vote. In the annual conferences in the Baguio Area, all nine petitions were approved in one single vote instead of nine individual votes as needed. The Judicial Council ruled that the votes in both annual conferences must be recast.

Additional rulings

In other action, the council:
.Ruled it did not have jurisdiction to act on a request from the Commission on Religion and Race on the merger of the National United Methodist Native American Center with the Native American Comprehensive Plan for the purpose of funding because the matter was a budgetary matter and not an act of legislation.

.Said Paragraph 2548.7 of the Discipline invests each annual conference with the authority to define what constitutes the term "urban center" in the context of ministry within that annual conference.

.Affirmed a bishop's decision of law in the Detroit Annual Conference that a question did not relate to the business before the annual conference session.

.Affirmed a bishop's decision of law in the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference that a question did not relate to the business before the annual conference session and because questions involving the supervisory function of a district superintendent are improper.

.Ruled in an item from the Rocky Mountains Annual Conference that a presiding bishop has no authority to make rulings on judicial or administrative matters by way of a question of law because they are the purview of judicial or administrative bodies.

.Affirmed as modified a bishop's decision of law in the New York Conference that a question related to the clergy session of the annual conference was improper because the person involved was not a clergy member of the annual conference.

.Denied a petition for reconsideration of Decision 1055, which dealt with a bishop's decision of law in the North Carolina Conference and ruled that clergy "withdrawal whether under complaint or voluntary is effective at the time it is received."

.Deferred a question on the Baltimore-Washington Conference plan of organization to its fall meeting pending the receipt of a copy of the plan.

Judicial Council member Rodolfo Beltran, a Filipino attorney and a lay member of the church, acted as host for the council's week in Manila. The meeting was held at the historic Manila Hotel, built in 1912 and headquarters to U.S. Army Gen. Douglas McArthur in the years leading up to World War II.

Judicial Council members were welcomed during a session of the Manila Annual Conference, which was being held at Central Methodist Church in downtown Manila, and visited Wesleyan University-Philippines, a United Methodist-related school in Cabanatuan City in north Luzon with an enrollment of 7,000. The group had a tour by university President Guillermo Maglaya and members of the school's board of trustees.

The council's daily devotions were led by the Philippines' Supreme Court chief justice, Reynato S. Puno, a member of Puno United Methodist Church in Quezon City, Bishop Solito K. Toquero of the Manila Area, and retired Bishop Emerito P. Nacpil. (See related story, "Judicial Council hears about violence in Philippines.")

Of the nine Judicial Council members, only one was absent. The Rev. Shamwange P. Kyungu missed the meeting due to his governmental duties in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The Judicial Council will hold its fall meeting Oct. 24-27 in San Francisco.

*Caldwell covers the Judicial Council for United Methodist News Service and is editor of the Virginia United Methodist Advocate of the Virginia Annual Conference in Richmond.