Home / Response / Responsively Yours

Responsively Yours: Justice Work Flows from Baptismal Waters

Harriett Jane Olson Nominated to Lead Women’s Division

Every one of us has a sacramental calling. In this season of the liturgical year, we retell the story of Jesus’ baptism by John and move into a time of reflecting on the in-breaking of God during Epiphany. We reflect on our own baptisms, and we are thankful and newly charged to “live as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ” (Baptismal Covenant IV, The United Methodist Hymnal).

As inheritors of the Wesleys, our discipleship includes acts of justice and acts of mercy that rise out of our response to our baptism. In the current United Methodist baptismal covenant, we commit “to resist evil, injustice and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves.” A prior formulation charged us to “live a life that becomes the Gospel.”

That’s what the work of National Seminar was about — helping United Methodist Women explore what it means to live as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ.

Jesus and John both cast their ministries in the light of the prophetic call to the true worship of God and the charge to create a community in which justice reigns and through which all the world is blessed. In Luke 4, Jesus points to the words of Isaiah to introduce his life and work. We might point to the criterion established for the community as long ago as Moses’ delivery of the law to the people of Israel—to care for the widow, the orphan and the stranger because of the love of God for Israel. (Deut. 10) We are responsible for carrying out works of justice in this world because of the character and loving action of God—the God who created this world to be good.

Jesus took his message one step “too far” in Nazareth while elaborating on some of the epiphanies from the lives of the prophets. Jesus noted when Elijah provided food for himself and the widow of Zarephath in a time of famine, and when Elisha healed Naaman of leprosy, both prophets blessed foreigners — persons not from the community — even though there were almost certainly hungry widows in Israel during that famine and people in Israel with leprosy while the prophet was healing the commander of an enemy army. This incited the ire of Jesus’ Nazarene audience. It may also confound us today as we think about what it means to live justly and consider what issues close at hand and around the world are in our care as we seek to live as faithful disciples of Jesus Christ.

National Seminar is an exercise in reflecting on that huge justice of God that we join through baptism and finding our way to contribute to the lives of women, children and youth. You will see articles in the pages that follow about various programs participants experienced. Their next step is to ask how they might see where God is calling them to act in their own conferences, and what it would take for their conference mission teams to be the seedbed for response.

This sort of open-ended reflection has often taken United Methodist Women into areas that roiled the waters. However, we are drawn to action by the overflowing love of God that demands justice for all and our special call to address the needs of women, children and youth. For our foremothers this meant standing against foot-binding in Asia, lynchings in the United States and starting schools and hospitals that served women overseas. For United Methodist Women today this includes:

  • Providing gender justice training and micro-credit loans that empower women to reject traditions that harm them, such as the female genital mutilation still practiced in parts of Africa today;
  • Raising questions when nooses reminiscent of lynchings are hung on public school property;
  • Speaking out against domestic abuse;
  • Supporting dialogs that make for peace.

The work of United Methodist Women in justice ministries is a way to live out our baptism. Where would this work stand if it needed the approval of a committee of your local church? Requiring this sort of approval is one of several proposals that will be made to the 2008 General Conference to create new levels of review of United Methodist Women spending and activity.

Come to www.umwmission.org to see our responses. There are always reasons not to engage in acts of justice—but avoiding risk is not our calling.

Where is your baptism calling you this year? It may cause consternation among some of the folk who are already in the community, but it might also be the occasion of an epiphany. Is it worth the risk?

HJO sign

Harriett Jane Olson
Women’s Division
Deputy General Secretary

Date posted : Jan. 31, 2008