What are Constituency Meetings For?
Consider a typical statement of the purpose of a constituency meeting:
The purpose of the _____ Session is to consider the growth and advancement of the gospel in _____ during the past _____ years, and to establish plans and policies for the advancement of God’s work in the future. This includes the election of Conference Officers (President, Secretary, and Treasurer), Departmental Directors, Executive Committee members, and Constitution and Bylaws Committee members. The Session will also consider proposed changes in the bylaws and conduct other necessary business as noted in the agenda.
Every four or every five years your conference holds a constituency meeting in which it elects officers and makes other decisions concerning how God’s people will attempt to carry forward His work in your territory. Some have treated these meetings with indifference. They are actually especially important because of their infrequency. At these times workers in the conference office especially remember those to whom they are accountable. All the conference membership is encouraged to attend but only delegates can vote.
A constituency meeting is member voice being spoken (as discussed in Resisting Church Authority Abuse 4: Member Voice). In the constituency meeting it is member voice indirectly, through elected representatives and other delegates. Leaders selected by the delegates will have enormous say over the course God’s work takes in that conference. We treat elections in our local congregations seriously because we know that those chosen to serve will hold office for one or at most two years, and each officer’s individual approach will impact how faithfully the work is carried forward. At other levels hundreds of congregations can be affected.
What Can One Person Do?
Once I was in a constituency meeting and an important change in its Constitution & Bylaws was being considered. It required a two-thirds vote in favor to pass. The vote was taken and the chair announced the result declaring that the motion had passed. But a member and delegate from my church leaned over and said to me, “That is less than two-thirds.” I said, “Well, you might want to bring a point of order, because if no one says anything, even if the chair’s announcement was wrong, it will be considered as passed.” He made the point of order, they checked, and my member was correct. The chair had to announce to the constituency meeting that actually the item had not passed. One alert layman did his duty.
Who are the Delegates?
There are two kinds of delegates: (1) regular delegates, and (2) delegates at large. Regular delegates are usually laypeople elected by the local church congregations in the conference. Delegates at large are credentialed conference employees—pastors and conference leadership—along with some union officers and a small number of other delegates from associated institutions.
At the previous constituency session of my conference there were 348 regular delegates when the meeting came to order, and 170 delegates at large. After three new churches were voted in, their delegates, along with some who arrived late added an additional 28 delegates for a total of 546. Regular delegates outnumbered conference employees by more than three to one.
Some delegates are also designated organizing committee delegates. These delegates may meet together before the main meeting begins. They have a twofold task: (1) to nominate persons to serve on the nominating committee, and (2) persons to serve on the constitution and bylaws committee. Like all other delegates they have voting rights but they may miss part of the meeting because they are in committee at the same time engaged in providing names to the constituency meeting to vote on for officers, department leaders, and others.
What are the Roles?
In the main meeting the work of the delegates is directed by the chairperson, or “the chair.” At different times during the meeting it will be chaired by the conference president or secretary or the union president. The chairperson helps the meeting process agenda items and also rules on points of order. If the assembly disagrees with such rulings, it can overrule the chairperson by moving the authority out of his hands to the body directly.(I’ll tell how in part 8)
Another person who will be seated in the front is the parliamentarian. When a question arises over a matter of order or procedure, the chair may ask the parliamentarian for counsel. The chair usually follows such counsel but is not necessarily required to.
Nothing of a Political Nature
Every system of representation is innately, inherently political, in that it involves people and governance. Anyone simply looking up the definitions of these words must recognize this. And yet, every Manual ever published by the Church has carried a warning like the current one: “Nothing of a political nature should be allowed to come into this work.”(2022 Church Manual, p. 120) How can we do “nothing political” in an endeavor which is entirely political?
As Christians, our outlook includes the spiritual aspect. We seek God’s intervention in constituency sessions because we, presumably all delegates, desire that we would discover and act on His will. We want that in a special way He will influence us all in the meeting. So, because Christians are in the meeting, because His holy angels and Holy Spirit are sought for and at work to influence us, a constituency meeting is not purely political. Actually, the meeting should be regarded as spiritual, even as a meeting of worship. Board and business meetings can and should be spiritual, and a constituency meeting is like a church business meeting but at conference scale.
Heaven makes no guarantee hearts will respond positively to God’s leading. But we trust Him, gather in faith, and accept the limitations of the process. In our fallen world, everything that is human is imperfect. Humans are definitely involved in a constituency meeting.
It is not difficult to infer why we shun activities having an overt political nature. First, the warning in the Manual is offered in the context of delegate selection. Since delegates represent the voice of the membership, the selection of our delegates should not involve manipulation; the process should be fair. The wording of the very first Church Manual in 1932 helps us understand the intention: “Nothing that savors of a political convention should be allowed to come into this work,” p. 11).
The Manual contains further guidance as to potentially political activities:
It is not permissible for church or conference delegations to organize or attempt to direct their votes as a unit. Nor is it permissible for the delegates from a large church, or the conference to claim preeminence and directing affairs in a conference session. Each delegate should be susceptible to the direction of the Holy Spirit and vote according to personal convictions. Any church or conference officer, or leader, attempting to control the votes of a group of delegates, would be considered disqualified for holding office.(2022 Church Manual, p. 121)
Block voting and party-line voting, that is, organized parties within the Church, are disallowed. The delegates are expected to vote according to their individual thought and conscience. They are not to be bullied or to combine in groups or power blocks.
To summarize, participants should seek to avoid anything like the development of a party spirit or any illegitimate attempt to manipulate or control outcomes. Instead of cleverness we exercise faith and trust; instead of bribery or influence peddling, we conduct ourselves with integrity. Faith does not make vigilance unnecessary but it does make integrity necessary. And integrity means we follow Church Manual guidance on officer and delegate elections to the letter. (I’m planning to devote one item in this series entirely to the church election.)
Accusations and name-calling have come into prominent use in manipulating others in the secular setting. We should be clear-minded so that such methods do not become accepted in the Church to manipulate us. Being interested and engaged in the work of the Church is not “being political”; it is being spiritual.
Participation in a Time of Internal Conflict
A combination of factors has led to where at present there are in the Church mutually exclusive theological positions and differing views concerning church governance and the relationship between world church and localized authority. On the internal conflict scale, we have advanced to level three:
1 Disagreement but toleration
2 Strong disagreement but a pragmatic toleration
3 Active suppression
Some are attempting to preserve denominational distinctives and a unified authority for the world church with authority in the membership and global consensus upheld by the General Conference, while others are attempting to fragment and decentralize authority and to change our system of church governance so that authority in the Church is exerted from the middle—from unions and conferences downward upon the membership, with doctrinal unity fragmented and tailored to individual union or conference preferences.
How do we do a constituency meeting in this situation? We operate within the principles of the organization. We seek to elect faithful, theologically sound workers who adhere to the Adventist church governance plan. And, we do this trusting God and acting within the boundaries of integrity. We take a long approach all while knowing that It will take many years to improve the situation. Unless God intervenes there will be no instant fixes.
Communicating with Other Delegates Before a Constituency Meeting
Conferences do nothing to encourage delegates to communicate with each other. Most of the membership in the conference will know few delegates other than those from their own congregation. I will be a delegate at large in the constituency meeting I will soon attend. The packet the conference sent me did not include a list of delegates or any particular means to contact them.
Do Credentialed Conference Employees Feel Pressure to Vote for their Supervisors?
Some have assumed that credentialed workers will automatically vote to support whatever the conference president says or whatever the union or the division wants to do. But most votes are secret. Church employees are responsible to the conference executive committee, not to an individual. Working up close with someone who has turned out to tend toward authoritarianism will often mean the opposite—that in-the-know workers may be staunchly determined to vote their supervisor out of office!
Conference leaders are already at least informally networked together. But opportunity to network does not guarantee networking, and potential for coercion does not guarantee coercion. In God’s Church we do not operate based on suspicion.
In the worst case scenario, God has a clear view of the facts and can overrule. We should not despair because their could be collusion and corruption. We should heed the inspired counsel: “He will do His part when we in faith do ours.”(Christian Service, p. 110) Too often, if we will be honest, we have not done our part.
A Thought: More Frequent Constituency Meetings?
In the earliest years of the world church, General Conference Sessions were held every year. This was changed to every two years. Today in many conferences the constituency meetings are five years apart. I believe that leaders will behave more accountably if they are up for reelection every two or three years. There is a case to be made for holding a conference constituency meeting every second or every third year. We don’t elect officers for our local congregations every five years; why do we elect officers at the conference to serve that long?
Conclusion
Constituency meeting is judgment day. Conference leadership is hired or dismissed. Member voice is spoken through representative delegates and others. The church membership should take constituency meeting very seriously, for such meetings occur only every four or five years.
In part eight I will equip you with a better understanding of voting, parliamentary procedure, and arm you with certain motions you can make that give God’s people potential to correct a meeting which is sliding in the wring direction!
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Larry Kirkpatrick serves as pastor of the Muskegon and Fremont MI Seventh-day Adventist churches. His website is GreatControversy.org and YouTube channel is “Larry the guy from Michigan.” Every morning Larry publishes a new devotional video.
