On November 3, 2009, the Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church
issued a pastoral letter to the church, “God’s Renewed Creation: Call to Hope
and Action” (See United
Methodist News Service story).
The bishops recommend that the pastoral letter be shared during the season
of Advent in each of 42,600 congregations worldwide. Additionally, a liturgical
setting for the letter offers responsive elements for congregational
participation. These are a “lament for God’s people and God’s planet,”
confession of “failure to embody the image of God,” and call to action inviting
people to join the bishops in their own nine pledges for urgent, effective
action.
The full text of the pastoral letter is below. A PDF of this document, and a liturgical setting are
available at http://hopeandaction.org
God’s Renewed Creation: Call to Hope and
Action
A Pastoral Letter from the Council of
Bishops of The United Methodist Church
God’s creation is in crisis. We, the Bishops of The United Methodist Church,
cannot remain silent while God’s people and God’s planet suffer. This beautiful
natural world is a loving gift from God, the Creator of all things seen and
unseen. God has entrusted its care to all of us, but we have turned our backs
on God and on our responsibilities. Our neglect, selfishness, and pride have
fostered:
- pandemic poverty and disease;
- environmental degradation, and
- the proliferation of weapons and violence.[i]
Despite these interconnected threats to life and hope, God’s creative work
continues. Despite the ways we all contribute to these problems, God still
invites each one of us to participate in the work of renewal. We must begin the
work of renewing creation by being renewed in our own hearts and minds. We
cannot help the world until we change our way of being in it.
We all feel saddened by the state of the world, overwhelmed by the scope of
these problems, and anxious about the future, but God calls us and equips us
to respond. No matter how bad things are, God’s creative work continues.
Christ’s resurrection assures us that death and destruction do not have the
last word. Paul taught that through Jesus Christ, God offers redemption to all
of creation and reconciles all things, “whether on earth or in heaven.”(Col
1:20[ii])
God’s Spirit is always and everywhere at work in the world fighting poverty,
restoring health, renewing creation, and reconciling peoples.
Aware of God’s vision for creation, we no longer see a list of isolated
problems affecting disconnected people, plants, and animals. Rather, we see one
interconnected system that “groans in travail.”(Romans 8:22) The threats to
peace, people, and planet earth are related to one another, and God’s vision
encompasses complete well-being. We, your bishops, join with many global
religious leaders to call for a comprehensive response to these interrelated
issues. We urge all United Methodists and people of goodwill to offer
themselves as instruments of God’s renewing Spirit in the world.
First, let us orient our lives toward God’s holy vision. This vision of the
future calls us to hope and to action. “For I know the plans I have for you,
says the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a
hope.”(Jer 29:11) Christ’s resurrection assures us that this vision is indeed a
promise of renewal and reconciliation. As disciples of Christ, we take
God’s promise as the purpose for our lives. Let us, then, rededicate ourselves
to God’s holy vision, living each day with awareness of the future God extends
to us and of the Spirit that leads us onward.
Second, let us practice social and environmental holiness. We believe
personal holiness and social holiness must never be separated. John Wesley
preached: “The gospel of Christ knows of no religion, but social. No holiness
but social holiness.”[iii] Through
social holiness we make ourselves a channel of God’s blessing in the world.
Because God’s blessing, care, and promise of renewal extend to all of creation,
we can speak today of “environmental holiness” as well. We practice social and
environmental holiness by caring for God’s people and God’s planet and by
challenging those whose policies and practices neglect the poor, exploit the
weak, hasten global warming, and produce more weapons.
Third, let us live and act in hope. As people in the tradition of
John Wesley, we understand reconciliation and renewal to be part of the process
of salvation that is already underway. We are not hemmed into a fallen
world. Rather we are part of a divine unfolding process to which we must
contribute. As we faithfully respond to God’s grace and call to action, the
Holy Spirit guides us in this renewal. With a resurrection spirit, we look
forward to the renewal of the whole creation and commit ourselves to that
vision. We pray that God will accept and use our lives and resources that we
re-dedicate to a ministry of peace, justice and hope to overcome poverty and
disease, environmental degradation, and the proliferation of weapons and
violence.
With God’s help and with you as our witnesses…
1. We as your bishops pledge to answer God’s call to deepen our spiritual
consciousness as just stewards of creation. We commit ourselves to faithful
and effective leadership on these issues, in our denomination, and in our
communities and nations.
2. We pledge to make God’s vision of renewal our goal. With every
evaluation and decision, we will ask: Does this contribute to God’s renewal of
creation? Ever aware of the difference between what is and what must be, we
pledge to practice Wesleyan “holy dissatisfaction.”[iv]
3. We pledge to practice dialogue with those whose life experience
differs dramatically from our own, and we pledge to practice prayerful
self-examination. For example, in the Council of bishops, the fifty active
bishops in the United States are committed to listening and learning with the
nineteen active bishops in Africa, Asia and Europe. And the bishops
representing the United States’ conferences will prayerfully examine the fact
that their nation consumes more than its fair share of the world’s resources,
generates the most waste, and produces the most weapons.
4. We pledge ourselves to make common cause with religious leaders and
people of good will worldwide who share these concerns. We will connect and
collaborate with ecumenical and interreligious partners and with community and
faith organizations so that we may strengthen our common efforts.
5. We pledge to advocate for justice and peace in the halls of power in
our respective nations and international organizations.
6. We pledge to measure the “carbon footprint”[v] of
our episcopal and denominational offices, determine how to reduce it, and
implement those changes. We will urge our congregations, schools and
settings of ministry to do the same.
7. We pledge, to the best of our ability, to provide the resources needed
by our conferences to reduce dramatically our collective exploitation of the
planet, peoples and communities, including technical assistance with buildings
and programs, education and training, young people’s and online networking
resources.
8. We pledge to practice hope as we engage and continue supporting the
many transforming ministries of our denomination. Every day we will thank
God for fruit produced through the work of The United Methodist Church and
through each of you.
9. We pledge more effective use of the church and community webpages to
inspire and share what we learn.[vi] We celebrate the communications efforts
that tell the stories of struggle and transformation within our denomination.
With these pledges, we respond to God’s gracious invitation to join in the
process of renewal. God is already visibly at work in people and groups around
the world. We rededicate ourselves to join these movements, the movements of
the Spirit. Young people are passionately raising funds to provide mosquito
nets for their “siblings” thousands of miles away. Dock workers are refusing to
off-load small weapons being smuggled to armed combatants in civil wars in
their continent. People of faith are demanding land reform on behalf of
landless farm workers. Children and young people have formed church-wide “green
teams” to transform our buildings and ministries into testimonies of stewardship
and sustainability. Ecumenical and interreligious partners persist in demanding
the major nuclear powers to reduce their arsenals, step by verifiable step,
making a way to a more secure world totally disarmed of nuclear weapons. God is
already doing a new thing. With this Letter and the accompanying Foundation
Document, we rededicate ourselves to participate in God’s work, and we urge you
all to rededicate yourselves as well.
We beseech every United Methodist, every congregation and every public leader:
“Will you participate in God’s renewing work?” We are filled with hope for what
God can accomplish through us, and we pray you respond: “We will, with God’s
help!”
May God’s grace purify our reason, strengthen our will, and guide our
action. May the love of God, the peace of Christ, and the power of the Holy
Spirit be among you, everywhere and always, so that you may be a blessing to
all creation and to all the children of God, making peace, nurturing and
practicing hope, choosing life and coming to life eternal. Amen.
[i] In 2002,
Reverend Dr. William Sloane Coffin, referring to a political trio of threats
said, “A more likely and far more dangerous trio would be environmental
degradation, pandemic poverty, and a world awash with weapons.” The
Chautauqua Appeal, with Joan Brown Campbell and Stephen J. Sidorak,
Jr.
[ii] Unless
otherwise noted, all scriptural references are from the New Revised Standard
Version published by the National Council of Churches of Christ in the
USA.
[iii] Hymns
and Sacred Poems, 1739, ¶ 5.
[iv] “When…
Christian perfection becomes the goal, a fundamental hope is aroused that the
future can surpass the present. And a corresponding holy dissatisfaction is
aroused with regard to any present state of affairs—a dissatisfaction that
supplies the critical edge necessary to keep the process of individual
transformation moving. Moreover, this holy dissatisfaction is readily
transferable from the realm of the individual to that of society, where it
provides a persistent motivation for reform in the light of ‘a more perfect way’
that goes beyond any status quo.” Runyon, Theodore, The New Creation: John
Wesley’s Theology Today (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1998), p. 168.
[v] A “carbon
footprint” is an estimate of how much carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas) is
produced to support life activities including travel and home energy use.
Carbon footprints are also applied on a larger scale to companies, businesses,
and nations.
[vi] In
support of the many persons who have followed this project of the Council, an
interactive multimedia website will have resources, educational materials,
downloadable video clips and social networking: www.hopeandaction.org.
