Guaranteed Appointment

     This week at General Conference, the UMC voted to get rid of Guaranteed Appointment. For those in denominations that don't have this rule, it was started when women became active as pastors in increasing numbers, in order to protect them from not being appointed to churches. Essentially it states that if you are ordained you will be appointed to a church.
    I've heard this legislation to dissolve guaranteed appointment for two years prior to general conference, because of YASN. I've heard some of those who drafted it discuss it. I've heard it presented by GBHEM to seminary students. And I agreed with it. I thought it was important to articulate a way to stress clergy effectiveness. However, from the beginning I've been asking, "What is clergy effectiveness? How are we going to measure it? And what about churches that have a long history of not being vital (i.e. churches that suck clergy dry)?" No one ever had an answered.
    Now the legislation has passed and we still don't have answers. And because of that my attitude towards dissolving guaranteed appointment has changed. Once again, we've put the cart before the horse - something the church is doing more and more of. Instead of thinking through the ramifications of the legislation we voted it through on a 'we'll deal with it later' attitude.
    When the legislation was still being discussed a seminary colleague posted a question about what we thought about it. This is what I wrote:
 I am glad that there are more checks and balances then when the proposal first was submitted. My concerns are three fold. First, guaranteed appointment was established to protect those who were not white men. I'm glad that an annual conference committee will examine appointments based on statistical markers, but let's be honest, we aren't in a pro-women, post-racial world in the church, so I'm not sure a small committee can protect those who aren't white-men, fully. Second, what happens if a church doesn't like a pastor. They could be a wonderful pastor but not a good fit. Who should be held accountable for that? In other words should a pastor be appointed to a non-vital congregation and then examine a pastor in that situation for appoint ability. Lastly, who is going to protect pastors who have theological differences from the cabinet and/or the bishop?
     The more I thought about it, I also worry about our relationships with other clergy. For those who aren't interacting with clergy a lot, you may be surprised to know that we are a completive bunch. I've heard horror stories of how clergy have treated each other over appointments. This seems like its just going to make our relationships with each other worse - as we worry if someone else is going to be deemed effective over us or take our job.
    What I loved about the original idea of dissolving guaranteed appointment was that it would allow appointments to be made on gifts and graces, even across conferences. That idea has seemed to totally go to the way side. Further, a bishop, in an interview leading up the General Conference, stated that this legislation really isn't about the 3% of ineffective clergy in our denomination, its about simply not having enough full time appointments.
    We all must learn to live into a new reality, that is full of questions that haven't even been thought through for answers yet, in our haste to pass legislation. My hope and prayer is that this will be a turning point in the denomination, and not an excuse to not think through the implications of appointments in the name of itinerancy.