Can the UUA “recognize ordinations”?
Obijuan (Returning . . . .) wrote about the Service of the Living Tradition and then threw this out
What an absolutely boneheaded thing to say in that context as: (1) Many of us already are ordained, and (2) [WARNING: POLITY GEEKING AHEAD] congregational polity means the UUA doesn’t recognize ordinations. Period. That is the job of the congregations. You can welcome us into fellowship, which you’ve just done. Leave it there.
Oh dear, time to say something. I started writing this as a comment, but I believe long, long, long comments by other bloggers are kinda rude, so I brought it home. Here goes, all cut-n-pasted.
I’ll see your geek and raise you a wonk. In short, your take on the polity is wrong and I will demonstrate why. You’re confusing independency with congregationalism. In both, a congregation has sole power to ordain. Why? Because, in the church does not exist in some nebulous sense apart from the explicit covenanted community, or as the Cambridge Platform calls them, “visible saints by calling.” There just isn’t any body, apart from the congregation, that exists to ordain. For independent churches, the matter stops there. Unitarians, Universalist and others who practice congregational polity recognize that there is a communion between the churches which does not undermine their autonomy. Congregational polity means something different for different bodies that hold it: even Unitarian and Universalists meant different things from each other, and the UUA practices something between the two. (Which is why I bristle when some people say “we’re becoming Presbyterian” when it seems to me that we’re following some historically-valid Universalist polity choices.) The main difference of application in congregational polity between the Unitarians and Universalists, historically, was whether or not a standing body could exist that could judge whether the basis of communion was being kept for all of the churches which share this mutual communion. Unitarians, no; Universalists, yes. Viscinage councils — still used in some congregational fellowships, with the practice just surviving among some Unitarians — for the Unitarians and state and the central fellowship committees for the Universalists. On this point current practice favors the Universalists, though with consolidation the authority became far, far more centralized. Fellowship, however it is couched or explain, is more than a fitness vetting, though it certainly includes this; it is also a representation on behalf of all the congregations in fellowship. Though your fellowship standing, the member congregations of the UUA are represented in your ordination; upon this lines of mutual responsibilty follows. Very mutual and meta, to use the current slang. So I’ll cut Bill Sinkford some slack. By the UUA, I read how he’s increasing using the identity not as the administrative secretariat, but as the fellowship of churches. And if that’s the case: yes, it can recognize some ordinations — those ordained under fellowship of the UUA — and not recognize those who aren’t.
23 June 2007 at 7:46 pm
My fellowship and my ordination are two separate things. I was not ordained when I attained preliminary fellowship. The bylaws of the UUA say nothing about ordination other than denoting that the power belongs to the congregations. The rules of the MFC say nothing about ordination, either. The MFC holds a copy of my certificate of ordination in my file, but it is signed by the president of my congregation. Fellowship (arbited by the MFC) is my associational recognition (our Universalist heritage). My ordination by my congregation is legitimate with or without the association’s blessing (our Unitarian heritage). There is a definite distinction, and most members of our congregations aren’t aware or don’t understand it. Sinkford’s statement only serves to muddy the issue.
24 June 2007 at 3:01 pm
From my point of view, the UUA can recognize or not recognize ordinations. But what they can not do at the associational level, is dictate to the local congregations who they must or must not ordain. The power of ordination is held exclusively by the local congregation, which is the natural context for discerning if somebody has or has not manifested gifts for ministry.
The issue is muddy because of the Frankenstein mish-mashing of Unitarian and Universalist practices. The benefit of this system, is that it allows for some quality control, while still honoring the congregation as a full manifestation of the Church (especially in its role discerning gifts for ministry), and allows freedom for congregations to dissent from the association within certain boundaries. A minister who is ordained by their church but not fellowshipped, is recognized as a minister by their ordaining church, and all other congregations are free to either recognize or not recoginize as they discern is best. Nobody is coerced.