Truth is never relative, however. Just because we choose to accept and not accept certain things does not make them true or not true.

I am 100% in agreement here. In fact, I think that a unity based on pretending that everything is equally true, or suppressing our actual views, is not good for community, which will ultimately fail when done that way, but is also very bad for the search for truth.

When we agree on what is essential, we are simply finding a consensus on which we can agree. Other elements should be vigorously debated.

Thanks!

Richard H said:

This sounds like a good strategy to me. Our difficulty is that for some what is essential is INCLUSION (being INCUSIVE), which excludes EXCLUSIVENESS. As long as we’re afraid of self-definition, we will, as you suggest, continue to lack community.

By definition when we create a community that includes less than all of humanity we exclude some and include some. Inclusion can’t be an absolute. I favor inclusiveness, by which I mean that I would work toward the maximum inclusiveness consistent with community.

You say: “It is my prayer for the United Methodist church that we’ll reduce confusion by defining what it is that we find essential and learning to live with it.”

This sounds like a good strategy to me. Our difficulty is that for some what is essential is INCLUSION (being INCUSIVE), which excludes EXCLUSIVENESS. As long as we’re afraid of self-definition, we will, as you suggest, continue to lack community.

At least in my experience, the minimal self-definition we tend to chose tends not to be DOCTRINAL but ecclesial-organizational: Connectionalism, The Appointment System, Apportionments, Infant Baptism. When we do hit doctrinal issues, we often do it from a negative point of view – saying what we’re not (and here in Texas we might not knwo what United Methodism stands for, but were SURE we’re NOT baptists!).

NOTE: I think in your second graphic you mean to say that the Doctrinally Focused are impatient with #1 & #3 – NOT #2 (themselves).