The Evangelical Covenant Church recently held its Annual Meeting (in June), a gathering where delegates from member churches around the country vote on all kinds of business – from departmental budgets to resolutions on various issues. Two groups that I am a part of crafted resolutions that were both voted on and accepted by the church at this year’s meeting – one on Creation Care from the Young Pietists, and one on Pornography from the Christian Action Comission. I realized that for all the time I have spent reading (and sometimes helping write) these resolutions, I haven’t yet shared them with too many other readers.
I’ve also been asked questions about the purpose and work of each of these groups – and why resolutions do anything at all anyway! So here is the short answer. The Young Pietists are a loosely organized bunch of Covenant people (in their 20’s and into all ages) who want to help renew the church through justice, encourage emerging leadership, and support holistic discipleship. The Covenant Action Commission (CAC) is the delegated body within the ECC whose constitutional task is to write resolutions on various social and congregational topics that represent the larger church’s understanding of that topic.
And why do these resolutions from these two groups matter, you may wonder? The short answer is that resolutions provide part of a theological conversation on a topic, in a fiercely communal setting. So when delegates gather at the Annual Meeting, resolutions provide the process for a gathered portion of the church to consider and discuss and be challenged by a topic of concern within their own body. Submitted resolutions are read outloud, discussed or debated if there is interest, and the larger church at least is exposed to an issue that is from a certain perspective and framed in a certain way. If it passes, the resolution goes on record as being what this gathering of the church affirmed as part of the conversation/answer for this topic. Other churches can look to the resolution for how to frame an issue, for the biblical background of an issue, and for resources and prayer/liturgical practices to use. A resolution is NOT binding ‘creedal’ information on what the church believes in all times and all places on a topic, however. It’s offered to further inform, encourage, guide, and resource the larger church. Resolutions from the CAC do carry a great deal of importance in the sense that they are offered from the ‘official’ body within the ECC. The CAC is intentionally a theologically diverse group who works to represent the diversity and unity of the wider church, while using the Covenant’s history and developing narrative to shape future resolutions. CAC resolutions are also presented to several bodies for editing and consideration before they are voted on at the Annual Meeting each year as well – the Board of Administrators, the Executive Board, and the ministerium (I think?) all vote on resolutions before the delegate do.
Sometimes the wisdom and resources in various resolutions are slow to make it on the radar of local churches. So here is a little shout-out to encourage anyone interested to check out the language and theology that was carefully crafted in both of these resolutions, and to further the conversation (or have your own) in your congregation/context. Also, the Christian Century wrote an article about the Creation Care resolution, which has proven to be a very timely issue of interest lately (Sojourner’s whole June isssue was on this topic, and ESA and others have recently been in the news on creation issue as well). While of course we make mistakes, I am very proud that the Covenant, in these various forms, intentionally contributes to the theological conversation through resolutions on various topics because I believe that we as the church have a lot to offer to the conversation. Jump in!     Â