Ruling raises awareness about pastors’ role

A recent Judicial Council ruling has brought to the forefront the questions of who decides which people can join a United Methodist church and what are the requirements for membership. (Consult the UMC Web site, www. umc.org.)
In The United Methodist Church, the pastor-in-charge is the caretaker. That is to say, the pastor has the responsibility of preparing people for membership. If people join on profession of faith, they should sincerely and knowledgeably answer the questions asked of them as prelude to baptism or confirmation. If they are joining by transfer of membership from another Christian denomination, they should be knowledgeable of United Methodist beliefs and expectations of membership. (Exceptions are made for those with disabilities.)
The hymnal and Book of Discipline set forth the questions in several similar forms for use in reception. I know of no other criteria for membership in the UMC. However, the pastor is the one who is charged with the responsibility of preparing people to join and deciding when people are ready to enter into membership. This responsibility is profoundly humbling.
In my experience, we United Methodist pastors have been rather lax in our caretaking role. Better said, we have not been as diligent and careful as we should be about preparing people for reception into membership. When we seem to require almost nothing of those who join, it should not surprise us when members do not follow through on their responsibilities. In our eagerness to receive new members, we are tempted to dodge our caretaking role.
If we pastors do have this role of preparing and receiving members, how much more important it is that we are clear about the criteria for membership. We do have discretionary powers. In pastoral conversations, we are sometimes called upon to confront prospective members with the news that we cannot in good conscience receive them into membership. These occasions are, I hope, rare. If we begin making decisions regarding a person’s fitness for membership based upon our perception of what we consider immoral behavior, we are opening a Pandora’s box. As a common practice, I would rather see us receive sincere but frail members (all of us) and allow God to change us into the people God wants us to be.
I would be interested in a conversation involving clergy as well as lay members on the preparation and reception of people into membership. If pastors have this awesome responsibility according to the Discipline, surely we need to take another look at the principles that guide our decisions. In the absence of some clarity on this issue, we pastors may turn our prejudices into criteria or simply take all comers without any preparation or discernment at all. I welcome your comments.