Council of Elders Meeting

United Church of God, an International Association

Milford, Ohio

Monday, February 24, 2014

Chairman Robin Webber called the quarterly meeting to order just after 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time with all Council members physically present except for Carmelo Anastasi from Italy, who participated in the meetings via a Web video connection. Throughout the open sessions of the meetings, small groups of Ambassador Bible Center (ABC) students took turns to watch the Council in action.

In his opening comments Mr. Webber cited Philippians 2:1-4 as a tone-setter for the quarterly meeting:

“Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.”

He encouraged the Council to reflect on this passage as they deliberate through the week and to actively think in terms of the vision and mission statement of the Church.

Finally, He called for the approval of the minutes of the last meeting, which were approved as recorded. The proposed meeting agenda was also approved. After that he introduced Church president Victor Kubik to begin the administration reports.

President’s report—Victor Kubik

Mr. Kubik welcomed the Council to the home office and reported that Ministerial and Member Services (MMS) operation manager Roy Holladay is now moved into his office. He commented on the new role of Aaron Dean as international adviser. He helps oversee the areas the Church subsidizes financially. The Church provides about 1.4 million dollars in subsidy for international areas in addition to providing much of the stock of The Good News and literature sent from the overseas offices.

He also outlined the work of the Content Committee, which has both a philosophical and an administrative aspect to its work. The committee is comprised of Council, administration, MMS and media personnel. As part of the committee’s efforts, the next issue of The Good News will focus on the theme of transformation to coincide with the Passover season. The following May/June issue will focus on the transforming power of the Holy Spirit.

He described the new coworker and donor letter soon to go out with a return card for requesting Tools for Spiritual Growth and Transforming Your Life: The Process of Conversion. This is a part of increasingly engaging our readers and viewers to participate in the work of the Church.

Mr. Kubik also commented on the successful Women’s Weekends in Trinidad, Missouri and elsewhere that have taken place recently. He concluded by thanking Council member John Elliott for extending his recent East Africa trip to include teaching leadership training classes in Zambia and South Africa.

Treasurer’s Report—Rick Shabi

Rick Shabi reported that the budget has been completed for presentation to the Council. He then reviewed the financial results for January and thus far through February, reporting that what we have budgeted is what we have been receiving. Legal counsel Larry Darden asked that when the Denton, Texas, property sells, whether the funds would be used for operations or reserves. Mr. Shabi indicated that although that will be up to the Council, the initial plan is for it to go into reserves.

Ministerial and Member Services Report—Roy Holladay

Mr. Holladay shared details about their move to the Cincinnati area. He said they found it was as cheap to buy as it would have been to rent. Thus they purchased a condominium in the Batavia area.

Teamwork is one of the key themes that he plans to build into the functioning of MMS. That will include twice-a-month phone or Web meetings with the three regional pastors in the U.S. to monitor trends and needs of the congregation and field ministers. Through that and other processes he hopes to tap the input of the ministry at large.

He reported that total U.S. Sabbath attendance last October was 7,675, which is about 250 over the October 2012 highest total. He expects that the January attendance will be less this year due to the severe cold weather. As of today we have 359 elders total with 279 serving in the U.S. and 80 in international areas.

One interesting aspect of the first area conference in Cincinnati was a discussion about how to improve our church services, which brought much excellent feedback. He is looking forward to gathering that input from the rest of the field ministry on the topic as the other area conferences take place.

At the Cincinnati conference church member psychologist Dr. Roy Fouch talked about how to help people deal with pornography and other addictions. Whatever negative trend rises in society will make its way into the Church, and we need to warn against it and help brethren combat it in their own lives.

Atlanta, Pittsburgh and Big Sandy are the three areas slated for area conferences the next fiscal year, so the current conference program will take over a year and half to reach all of the U.S. ministry.

He reflected on how many decades ago Herbert Armstrong recognized the critical need to train new and faithful pastors to care for the church congregations that God called—which was one of the key reasons for founding Ambassador College. Likewise, we seek today to fulfill the two “critical success factors” in our Strategic Plan:

1. Sufficient number of elders and pastors

2. Qualified candidates for the ministry

To that end MMS continues to pursue the key strategy also identified in the Strategic Plan: “Develop a comprehensive training program for ministerial candidates to meet our current needs to ensure that there are pastors and elders to care for each congregation.”

Our view of pastoring is somewhat different than that of our past in that we now have some part-time and some volunteer pastors. But to accomplish these goals in the Strategic Plan, we must have effective educational programs. Therefore, we are encouraged with the progress and effectiveness of the online pastoral care classes.

We’d like to upgrade the educational process by producing teaching modules to cover the whole Bible, and even then it will take considerable time to teach the whole Bible to the all the elders. Current planning includes better video and audio recordings for viewing the classes coupled with Web-based interaction between the instructors and students. We do have qualified instructors since, Don Ward has taught nearly every book in the Bible at Ambassador University over the years, Gary Antion teaches counseling and comparative religion classes, and we have numerous other experienced pastors with expertise in many subjects.

Our U.S. pastoral demographic presently includes 23 pastors (full-time, part-time and volunteer) out in the field who are 70 years old or older, even more when home office assigned men are counted. Then we have 26 pastors between the ages of 62 and 69. Next we have 32 pastors between the ages of 40 and 61—and five of them will turn 62 this year. We must urgently begin to replace our aging pastors with younger ones coming along.

When a pastor reaches age 62 we begin to discuss active retirement planning. That process is presently underway for 49 of our 81 pastors. Retirement and replacement will be a major project for MMS in the near future. A considerable benefit still remains for the Church in that after retirement pastors will be able to continue serving by helping with some visiting, counseling and speaking, but on a much less hectic schedule.

All of this will be budget-driven. We hope and pray that God will bless the work and provide those funds. In the next fiscal year we hope to hire one ministerial trainee and perhaps three elders who could be mentored to pastor churches. Another possibility is to select elders who presently have good jobs in their local areas and provide each with an expense stipend while they are trained and mentored in the pastoral skills of visiting, counseling and preaching. Thus the equivalent of a single pastoral salary could fund five or six pastors-in-training to ultimately pastor their home congregations or be transferred to other church areas.

Media and Communications Services Report—Peter Eddington

Peter Eddington began by explaining that the media staff track everything sent out (each letter or other piece of literature has its own source code), so we can monitor its progress. From that tracking process here are some current results:

• United News circulation is the highest it has been in three years as coworkers are increasingly subscribing to it.
• After a declining trend the past year, coworker count is now the highest it has been in 34 months.
• After a declining trend the past 12 months, donor count is now the highest it has been in 12 months.
• The total “members, youth or associated with UCG” on our database is the highest it’s been in six months.
• 2013 was a five-year record for the number of personal correspondence (PC) answers sent out.
• Magazine insert cards processed for 2013 was the highest in five years.
• The response to our subscriber development letter offering Tools for Spiritual Growth is running at 19 percent, which is one of our highest responses to any subscriber offer (especially as compared to the typically more popular prophecy booklets).

Hopefully, these positive trends can be partly attributed to the recent temporary boost to the proclamation budget, and that it will portend at some point increased member growth and income.

He also cited the top 10 Beyond Today programs for 2013 through thus far in 2014 with their responses and cost per response numbers:

Program Title

Aired Week of

Program Host

 Total  Response

 Cost per Response

The Four Horsemen of Revelation

Sep 1-7, 2013

Darris McNeely

2249

6.65

Seven Prophetic Signs Before Jesus Returns

Feb 2-8, 2014

Darris McNeely

3306

8.39

The Next World Superpower

Jan 5-11, 2014

Steve Myers

1710

8.77

Regifting Jesus (repeat)

Dec 22-28, 2013

Gary Petty

1105

13.57

Change Your Life Story (repeat)

July 7-13, 2013

Gary Petty

963

15.52

A Thief in the Night (repeat)

Dec 29, 13-Jan 4, 14

Gary Petty

964

15.56

How to Stop a Porn Addiction

Sep 8-14, 2013

Steve Myers

922

16.21

The Rapture: Hoax or Hope? (repeat)

Aug 19-31, 2013

Steve Myers

871

17.16

The Sabbath in History and prophecy (repeat)

Nov 17-23, 2013

Darris McNeely

782

17.39

Dabbling With Demons

Oct 27-Nov 2, 2013

Gary Petty

838

17.84

He explained that he thinks that the temporary December 2013 increase in our proclamation budget has helped accomplish these increases.

The test of ION and WGN America television networks is coming to its end. Although the response results are running close to each other, the decision will come very soon about which one to select as our main telecast outlet.

Our ongoing distribution of the online versions of our booklets continues to serve our purpose via iTunes and Barnes & Noble. The “Six Steps to Passover” Bible study series is going well with often up to 1,000 attending in person and online combined.

Council Committee Reports—Chairman Webber

Mr. Webber next introduced the Council committee reports, explaining to the ABC students what was the function and importance of each committee’s work.

Strategic Planning and Finance Committee Report—Bill Bradford, Chairman

Bill Bradford elaborated on the scope of the committee in maintaining oversight of the Church’s finances and strategic planning. Part of their job is to help make sure that tithes and offerings of God’s faithful members are put to their highest and best use within the work that Christ is doing through us. He also thanked all those whose kind and generous contributions make doing the work possible.

Roles and Rules Committee Report—Roc Corbett, Chairman

After personally greeting the ABC students present, Roc Corbett explained that the committee is currently made up of himself, Rainer Salomaa from Canada and Carmelo Anastasi from Italy. Their main work over the past few months was to finalize a very large amendment to the Constitution, which carefully updates that important governing document, and will make it both easier to read and more efficient. The Council thoroughly reviewed, discussed and balloted on aspects of that and other projects during an extensive video conference recently (see Council Report dated February 11, 2014).

Another recent project for the committee has been helping the Education Committee to draft a proposed Scope and Responsibilities Statement for the Council’s approval at this meeting.

Education Committee Report—Rex Sexton, Chairman

The committee, aided by the Roles and Rules Committee, has drafted a clearer Scope and Responsibilities Statement for the Council to consider later in this round of meetings.

Ethics Committee Report—Mario Seiglie, Chairman

Recent projects completed by the committee include the Sexual Misconduct Policy, the Council of Elders Code of Ethics and the Ministerial Code of Ethics. The one item currently on the committee’s agenda is a specific point about the Ethics Investigative Policy.

Doctrine Committee Report—John Elliott, Chairman

Doctrine was established by God from the beginning. David said, “O, how I love Your law”—it comes from God directly. The prophets and apostles wrote down the true doctrines directly. Christ was repeatedly and accurately addressed very many times as “Master”—the one who taught. We don’t make doctrine; we don’t change or adjust doctrine based on societal norms. We simply study, learn teach and live by God’s doctrines.

On the docket for this meeting includes question from a member about the baptism ceremony. After review by the Doctrine Advisory Committee and the main Doctrine Committee, the question is ready for the whole Council to review. Another agenda item for the Council is consideration of a paper addressing the Eighth Day or Last Great Day question.

Media Committee Report—Scott Ashley, Chairman

Discussion on the committee has recently included projects that are already underway—like the updating of the local websites. The last project during this round of meetings will be a discussion by the whole Council regarding the theme of the 2014 General Conference of Elders annual meeting.

With the committee reports completed, Mr. Webber explained to the half-dozen ABC students who had just rotated into the room that the Council was actually ahead of schedule and was just about to go out of open session and into executive session. Nonetheless, he explained that the Council appreciated their desire to attend and be involved; therefore he opened up the meetings for the ABC students to introduce themselves and then be introduced to all the participants that comprise a Council meeting. This includes each Council member, the secretary, the legal counsel and the council reporter. A few minutes of interesting and lighthearted discussion followed, which was enjoyed and appreciated by the ABC students.

Shortly after 4:00 p.m. the Council entered executive session to review ordination forms. When they finished, open session resumed.

Liability Insurance Coverage Increase—Larry Darden, Legal Counsel

After discussing changes to our current Sexual Misconduct Policy and Youth Protection Guidelines for working with youth, the Council balloted on a measure to adopt a “Six Month Rule,” which requires a UCG youth activity worker or volunteer to be affiliated with the Church for at least six months before being allowed to work with youth. The resolution read:

WHEREAS our liability insurer, Guide One, requires that those staff members being used in our Church youth programs should be members or affiliates of the United Church of God for at least six months before they are allowed to work with youth (a so-called “six-month rule”), and

WHEREAS this Six Month Rule has already been included in United Youth Camp policies and is already being applied in practice at the Home Office and is recommended for local congregations, but without any formal requirement, and

WHEREAS the Council of Elders desires to formally include this Six Month Rule in our existing (2004) SEXUAL MISCONDUCT POLICY AND YOUTH PROTECTION GUIDLELINES (herein “Guidelines”),

NOW THEREFORE, IT IS HEREBY RESOLVED that the language set forth in red highlights on the attached document from the aforesaid Guidelines be added under part “A” on page 2 adopting the above described “Six Month Rule.”

IT IS FURTHER RESOLVED, that the expanded name for Ministerial Services be changed to “Ministerial and Member Services” in said Guidelines along with the deletion of the “Implementation” section of those Guidelines in the last paragraph of the same be deleted as now moot (again, per the attached document as highlighted).

NOTE: Other than the simple word changes or additions regarding Ministerial and Member Services, the red highlighted wording referred to in the resolution is as follows: “Before any individual is allowed to work with children/youth in United Church of God he or she must have been a member or affiliated with this Church, and in regular attendance, for at least six (6) consecutive months. With regard to United Youth Camps, if non-United Church of God members or attendees are used on staff, it will suffice if the applicable supervising Camp Director can confirm that said non-United staffer has a good reputation with respect to children, based either on previous service with United or similar service with children for another Church or Charity based on reliable references.

The ballot to adopt the Six Month Rule resolution was unanimous.

The Council ended its business for the day at approximately 5:30 p.m. Eastern Time.

-end-

Randy Stiver

Council Reporter

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