In the Mail

The whole thing seems so ridiculous.

To register as a conscientious objector in the Free Methodist Church, you have to get three copies of a form notarized. One copy is sent to the secretary of the General Conference, one copy is sent to the secretary of the local Annual Conference, and one is for your personal records.

I went to the FM website, and there's no physical address or even a name given for the secretary of the General Conference. The Board of Administration secretary often fills this function I believe. But that person is not identified (but then, the list of Bishops was out of date, too). So I just addressed my "Affidavit of Conscientious Objection" to my Conference Superintendent and to the FM headquarters address. It's in the mail!

Since Pastor Matt also serves on the Board of Administration, he'll see this gets to the right person.

It's a bit shocking that I may be the only member locally to avail themselves of the opportunity. Why should it be this difficult? I'm curious about the process, and even more curious about why people working with our young people are not aware of it.

A new Bee in my bonnet

I recently discovered that my denomination, the Free Methodist Church, requires those who object to war to "register."

Yeah. Seems to me like people who follow Jesus and think war is just fine -- they should be the ones who have to register with the denomination.

A quick survey in Seattle and Greenville (both towns host Free Methodist universities) tells me that no one really is paying attention to this topic.

My intent with this blog is to start a discussion, get the proper "affidavit of objection" into play, and see what might happen.

I'll have to experiment to see how to post the form.