I have written more than a little history and I find that that experience, along with the temperament, gifting and theology give me the ability to imitate how a historian of the future might see the things that are and are not taking place in the CGGC body today.
Here is one of the most important impressions I have formed:
Ed Rosenberry, for better or worse, ranks among the most powerful and influential people in the history of the CGGC. (I have detailed some of the reasons I believe that in earlier posts.)
I believe that is important to note that the year 2010 was extremely significant in forming the manner in which Ed would lead the body in the years that followed.
It seems to me that that was the time when he lost his idealism, some naiveté and a belief that his own way would easily prevail in the body simply by the exercise of his whim. His response to those things, I believe, has been disastrous for the CGGC community.
As I see it, 2010 was the year that Ed attempted to fashion the future of the CGGC in a way that would impact a generation and would assure his place among the great names in CGGC history.
In that year, Ed shepherded into existence a revision of We Believe as well as a new plan for credentialing members of the CGGC clergy.
His attitude and approach in 2010 was open and confident. He scheduled numerous meetings in which the people of all CGGC regions were invited to come together to comment on both documents. In the end, with that feedback, Ed presented both documents to the General Conference Administrative Council.
It was in that Ad Council meeting Ed's momentum began to change. The proposed revision of We Believe was not even passed on for approval by General Conference in session in 2010.
Then, at General Conference, response to the credentials proposal was so cool that, after much spirited discussion and some outright opposition, the delegates voted to table it.
Ed, then, took the proposal off the table the very next day, tweaked it on his own authority and succeeded in achieving its approval, yet only after much more discussion and as the result of a far from unanimous vote and only with the understanding that a new proposal must be presented in 2013.
From that moment on, the tone of General Conference leadership has changed markedly.
This change is best observed in the fact that there was no open discussion among the CGGC community, of We Believe and the credentials proposal in anticipation of General Conference in 2013. General Conference staff kept tight control of the process of the development of the documents and the process by which they would be presented for approval.
I was not a delegate to General Conference in 2013. All accounts that I have received of it suggest that discussion of the two documents was, again, spirited and lengthy and approval was reluctant and far from unanimous.-----------------------------
There was a time, when Brian Miller's blog was operating and hosting lively conversation, that there was talk of the breaking down of leadership hierarchy, of openness, of collegiality and of egalitarianism in leadership and the diminishing of the clergy-laity divide in the CGGC.
The result, in the wake of 2010 and 2013 developments, is that, under Ed Rosenberry's leadership, the CGGC body has gone in the opposite direction on each of those issues AND that the leadership core is, as I understand our history, more insulated and isolated from the rest of the body--and less accountable to it--than it has ever been.
This is not a good thing and it certainly is not consistent with "the New Testament plan."
In my opinion, we lost the opportunity to form a hopeful future with the revision of We Believe and with the creation of this credentials document, both of which are tradition-bound and out of step with the world we need to reach.
If we choose poorly in determining who will lead us and how leadership will function now that Ed has resigned, we may very well be signing the CGGC's execution warrant.
We must repent. And this is a crucial moment to do it.
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