United Church of God, an International Association
Council of Elders Meeting Report
May 17, 2011

Attendance:  
Melvin Rhodes, Scott Ashley, Bill Bradford, Mario Seiglie, Bob Berendt, Robin Webber, Darris McNeely, Roc Corbett, Victor Kubik, Aaron Dean, Denny Luker, John Elliott, Gary Antion, Bill Eddington, Gerald Seelig, Peter Eddington, Don Ward, Roy Holladay and Larry Darden, plus 15 elders and wives in the gallery.

The quarterly meeting was called to order at 9:00 a.m. by Council Chairman Melvin Rhodes. Bill Eddington gave the opening prayer for God's blessing on the morning's session. Roy Holladay suggested adding two items to the agenda. Since the Administration reports had already been given to the GCE, Aaron Dean suggested that each member of the Administration just answer any questions that the Council members might have.  The revised agenda was passed.

Administration Questions and Answers:
Treasurer Aaron Dean answered several questions, commenting that the regular income of the Church is holding reasonably steady. He also commented on the economics of replacing necessary pastors in the field which relies very much on the involvement of the non-salaried elders and other local leaders in smaller, distant congregations. Ministerial and Member Services (MMS) operations manager Victor Kubik reported that we have 2.5 salaried positions currently held in reserve for this fiscal year.

Mr. Dean responded to another question about his budgetary policy. He answered that his job is to report income trend lines to the Council so that they can make wise decisions. He stressed our historic philosophy of very much looking to God in faith to provide what we need when we need it. President Dennis Luker reminded the Council that we have budgeted for a 40 percent reduction in income from last year while maintaining reasonable reserves. Mr. Kubik stated the desire is for everyone to economize on expenses wherever possible, and that the Church has decided to cut some benefits to employees in order to keep salaries in tact for now.

Mr. Dean talked about the effort to collect accurate financial data from both the U.S. and international areas to see where inequities might have existed in the past years so that we can more fairly, wisely and honestly steward the resources that Christ provides. He mentioned that we are still fairly early in the process of data collection.

Council Committee Reports

Doctrinal Committee:  Committee chairman Bob Berendt reported that the committee was hit hard at the end of 2010 leaving him as the only member, joined later by Mr. Kubik and Roy Holladay. After the passage of Bylaws amendments 9.1 and 9.2 during the GCE, Mr. Kubik as an operation manager had to step down from the Council and the committee. The committee will be reformed and its work will move ahead.  He mentioned that "human nature" is a significant topic needing to be addressed.

Ethics Committee:  Chairman Mario Seiglie delivered his report on behalf of the committee. He presented to the Council their draft of the Council of Elders' Code of Ethics for its review and conducted the review process which garnered several effective edits. Approval of the final draft is expected by or before the August meeting.

Executive Committee:  Council Chairman Rhodes also chairs this committee. There was nothing to report except the need to fill the two spots on the committee just vacated by operation managers Aaron Dean and Victor Kubik due to the recent of that passage of the amendments to Bylaws 9.1 and 9.2.

Roles & Rules Committee:  Chairman Bill Eddington reported on the progress of the review of our governing documents (Constitution and Bylaws) for the purpose of clarifying and harmonizing the two. He also reported on various other items like the Council Retreat, formation of a new Employment Committee, Council assessments of management team members (President, Treasurer, etc.).

Strategic Planning and Finance Committee: Chairman Robin Webber reminded the Council that strategically we are investing a larger-than-ever percentage (31%) of the Church's annual budget in the public proclamation of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God. The committee has the goal of defining and thoroughly promoting United's mission statement going forward.  He mentioned that Mr. Luker had assisted further defining its content with his sermon on the Sabbath.  He encouraged all in the eldership to completely read to understand the Strategic Plan, Operation Plan and Budget each year so as to know exactly what they are balloting for on any given item.

John Elliott noted that each year a few elders vote "no" on these three parts of the annual GCE ballot and the Council has no means of knowing what their concerns are, so he asked if the Council might actively seek to learn those concerns. Mr. Webber stated he was pleased that GCE members would vote their convictions whether pro or con, but would consider a responsible method of inquiry, so as to allow the Council of Elders to understand and possibly integrate their concerns as we move forward.

A question was asked about why the reserves have been tapped and on what authority.  Treasurer Aaron Dean pointed out that the reserves are based on 10 weeks of operating expenses based on the budget. If the income drops (as it did) then the amount needed for 10 weeks of reserves drops. Mr. Luker asked "what is the purpose of the reserves?" Mr. Dean answered that it is for use in an emergency like we've been going through this year. Committee chairman Robin Webber confirmed that point. 

Roy Holladay also explained that the Council can resolve to tap the reserves when needed. He pointed out that a previous Council had tapped the reserves to purchase the Texas property in 2007, and the Church has been struggling ever since to replace the funds to the 10-week level. Mr. Dean commented that he thinks that God led the cash reserves policy ahead of time to provide for us during this recent crisis.

Darris McNeely suggested that the committee generate a comprehensive definition of the purpose of the cash reserves.  Mr. Webber stated that would be the priority of the committee to work on and report at the next Council meeting.

Discussion items

Senior Pastors from the U.S. who oversee an international area: The question is whether international Senior Pastors who live and also serve in the U.S. are eligible to be nominated as international members of the COE. The discussion focused on what a Senior Pastor's primary work responsibilities are by considering his U.S. pastorate, writing, special projects, Senior Pastoring an international area, etc. Consensus was to leave it with the Roles and Rules Committee for their next report on the governing documents.

Prophecy Advisory Committee: Scott Ashley reviewed the history of this special committee and recommended that it and the doctrinal advisory committee be shifted from the oversight of MMS, where it was placed several years ago, and be placed under the review of the Doctrine Committee of the Council of Elders. Advisory committees can be populated by both Council members and members of the General Conference and their purpose is to assist the main Council committees.

John Elliott reviewed the current Advisory Committee process which presently allows for a submitted paper to be dismissed before the Doctrinal Committee should see it. The Council chairman directed that all doctrinal and prophecy papers should be sent directly to Bob Berendt as chairman of the Doctrinal Committee for processing and review.

Media Committee:  Chairman Darris McNeely led the latest discussion in an ongoing, longer consideration of merging World News and Prophecy into The Good News magazine and then possibly changing the name of The Good News to Beyond Today magazine. This would include increasing the number of pages in the magazine. To print the 32 pages of current size of The Good News costs just over $56,000 per issue and to increase the size to 64 pages would cost about $91,000—which is defrayed significantly by discounting the cost that would have been incurred by printing World News and Prophecy separately. United States postage would not be seriously increased, but international shipping would increase somewhat. The key advantage is to provide all readers of The Good News with more articles about God's way and prophecy without a large increase in cost.

The name change for the magazine from The Good News to Beyond Today would allow the television program to work synergistically with the magazine. Feedback on the name change of the magazine has been mixed. Mr. McNeely suggested maintaining The Good News as a magazine name due to its heritage for us—possibly as a member magazine. Discussion went back and forth as to the advisability and/or the process of the name change for the expanded magazine. Generally most were favorable to the merging of World News and Prophecy with The Good News while retaining The Good News as the magazine name for the foreseeable future.

Mr. McNeely discussed the strategic implications of the magazine merger. He stressed that we are in transition and need to develop more good writers to support the plans for expansion. He emphasized that this was simply an important discussion, but that no formal proposal was placed before the Council, therefore no immediate changes in our current publication stable are set to happen. The Council Media Committee and the home office Media and Communications Services department are still in an active input gathering stage, but the Council agrees in principle on the amalgamation of the two magazines.

Next Mr. McNeely led a discussion about the critical essence concept and presentation made at the GCE meeting. Mr. Luker mentioned that a number of elders had expressed concern about the term "meaningful relationships," and he repeatedly stressed that the Council needed to clearly address this important issue. General agreement was expressed for the concept of the critical essence with caution expressed with the two specific words. Mr. Kubik expressed that the value was in the process of distilling our key thinking in the way we proclaim the gospel and God's way to the public and on the Sabbath by connecting to God first and our neighbor next.

The Council took a short break.

Council Reporter
Randy Stiver

The afternoon session reconvened at 3:15pm:

Critical Essence:

The Council concluded a very informative and spirited discussion regarding our critical essence based on the research provided by the Northlich company. Based on a desire to be crystal clear with how the Council sees the essence of our personality, our way of life and of what our message is about, the Council felt that it would be more precise to add the distinguishing and clarifying word "godly" to the statement of our critical essence.

Mr. McNeely proposed, Mr. Seiglie seconded, and the Council adopted "godly relationships" as our critical essence.

403B Thrift plan:

Council Secretary Gerald Seelig took the floor to submit to the Council the appropriate documentation to empower the President and the Administration to withdraw the 403B thrift matching plan, as per the budget approved at the GCE, with effect of July 1st, until financial conditions in the Church allow it to be re-instated. The documentation was approved.

Council committees:

Bill Eddington led a discussion to review the various committee members in light of the new Council appointments. The Council endorsed the following committee members as listed and noted below by Mr. Eddington:

* Denotes Committee Chairman

Note 1: Melvin Rhodes, as Council chairman is chairman of the Executive Committee and ex-officio on all others.

Note 2: Human Resource Policy 2.17 "Grievance and Termination Review Process" requires UCGIA to have an Employment Committee of no less than three (3) members, with at least one of the members being from the Council of Elders. Scott Ashley is the designated Council member. Other members have not yet been selected.

Note 3: Council members may serve on a maximum of three committees unless they chair a committee, in which case the maximum is two, including the one they chair. The one exception to the last instance is Darris McNeely, who is chairman of the Media Committee and also a member of the Executive and Ethics Committees. This exception is made because of his convenient location should any Executive Committee matters need expeditious attention.

Procedure for GCE members to place an item on the agenda of an authorized meeting:

Mr. Bill Eddington led a discussion to review a proposed procedure to be followed when a member of the GCE wishes to seek support of not less than 25 percent of the members of the GCE to place an item on the agenda of an authorized meeting.

Mr. Eddington submitted a document produced by the Roles and Rules Committee with the suggested draft of the procedure, which would not require any change to the governing documents of UCGIA. The procedure does not involve the Council of Elders, but it does allow the Council to issue either a statement of support or of concern.

The council reviewed the procedure, and gave input to Mr. Eddington, as the chairman of the Role and Rules Committee. Mr. Bill Eddington will submit the final proposed procedure to the president to submit to the GCE.The approval of the procedure will rest entirely with the members of the General Conference.

August and December meetings:

The Council discussed the dates for the August meeting and decided to meet from Monday August 22nd till Thursday the 25th, with committee meetings on Monday morning. 
The Council asked Peter Eddington to investigate the possibility of a video conference for the December meeting conference. The appropriate software is to be loaded into the members PC's during the August meeting.

Gary Antion closed with prayer and the meeting adjourned at 5 p.m.

-End-

Assistant Council Reporter
Jorge de Campos

© 2011 United Church of God, an International Association