Ken Dobson's Queer Ruminations from Thailand
Search this site
  • Life in Thailand
  • Queer Issues in Thailand
  • Queer Christian Issues
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Stories

Jeffrey Preached

3/3/2019

3 Comments

 
Picture
​Jeffrey Warren of northern New York State was the only speaker at the special General Conference of the United Methodist Church (February 23-26, 2019) who anybody heard outside the convention center in St Louis.  His 3 minutes of microphone time was replete with passion, hope, and irony.  He got a sustained standing ovation which even brought the bishops to their feet (in defiance of conference procedures).  He was an instant on-line hit. [You may find him on YouTube.] As I type this about 3 days after Jeffrey spoke to the assembly, far more than half a million viewers have viewed his plea for unity and justice.  End to end, 25,000 hours have been spent paying attention to what he said.  No other speech at the conference received any substantial air-time on social or mass media.

​Jeffrey was a lay delegate among 800 at the conference.  He is a student at Sarah Lawrence College, and therefore one of the youngest delegates.  And he announced he is gay and hopes to become a Methodist pastor.  If he makes it he has already preached to more people than he is likely to do throughout all the rest of his life.  But we can’t know that, because he has what it takes to get noticed.

His message in three minutes was simple and contained three memorable sentences.  “We desire a church that seeks the justice of God,” he said in behalf of people his age as well as all LGBT people.  He talked about his successful campus witness, saying, “They (fellow students who came to Christ through his efforts) didn’t know God could love them because their churches said God didn’t!”  Score!  Finally, in full voice to be heard above the cheering mob, he shouted, “We are the church.  We are God’s children.”  His appeal was for unity and acceptance.

Ironically, (and irony abounds) his speech was on a procedural matter.  Who would have guessed a bit of parliamentary maneuvering would steal everybody’s heart?  He was supporting a move to send the conference’s consideration to a judicial council for review.  Even more ironic is the fact that he represented a point of view that was going down in flaming defeat, and yet his short speech was the one everybody is going to remember.  Most ironic of all is that he was speaking as one of the generation who will be sitting in the pews, standing in the pulpits, and residing in bishops’ chanceries in the next 20 years if the United Methodist Church in North America lasts that long.
​
There is a lesson to be remembered from this and other remarkable incidents in the past several months, including the Parkland, Florida high school mass murder survivors.  The future generation is arriving now.  They share the present, but they represent the values that will preserve the future.  Without them now, at this very minute, the future could be as dystopian as “Mad Max” and “Clockwork Orange” showed us.      
3 Comments
Iain Baxter link
3/3/2019 09:04:35 am

The link to the video via HuffPost. Worth watching!

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/jj-warrens-umc-speech-lqbtq_n_5c756102e4b03a10c232660e

Reply
Kenneth Dobson
3/3/2019 02:37:50 pm

Thanks Iain.

Reply
Roy DeBolt
3/8/2019 10:08:37 am

Here is Jeffery's speech from YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7dMVbmHMpk

He is a very moving speaker, especially considering his age. If the church is to survive, change is coming. If it is not, the church won't survive.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Rev. Dr. Kenneth Dobson posts his weekly reflections on this blog. 

    Archives

    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Copyright © 2023 Rev. Dr. Kenneth Dobson