by Bishop Elaine Stanovsky

Let me take you back to 1971, when I was a 17-year-old high school senior at Bellevue High School (go Wolverines!). It was two years after the Stonewall Uprising which protested a police raid at a gay bar in Greenwich Village and marked the beginning of the gay liberation movement in America. But I didn’t know anything about that. It was a year before the General Conference of The United Methodist Church would adopt language stating that it considers the “practice of homosexuality incompatible with Christian teaching.” I would attend that conference as a young adult observer. But that’s a story for another time.

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by Rev. Austin L. Adkinson

Now that I am back home from the For Everyone Born convocation of the Love Your Neighbor Coalition (LYNC) in St. Louis, my eyes are set on returning to St. Louis in February for the 2019 special session of General Conference (GC2019), where the United Methodist Queer Clergy Caucus’ (UMQCC) Simple Plan legislation has the power to influence the elimination or reduction of discriminatory policies against LGBTQIA+ people. In additions to its own merits, the Simple Plan sets the tone for debate around the Council of Bishops’ recommended One Church Plan. The Simple Plan lays bare the misrepresentation of the One Church Plan as a progressive plan.

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By Rev. Jeremy Smith

One of the major plans for General Conference 2019 (and arguably one of the top two) is the Traditionalist Plan, which strengthens language against LGBTQ inclusion and continues The United Methodist Church on the same course it has been on. But there’s a disturbing novelty in the legislation that bears scrutiny because of the incredible impact it will have if passed…

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