The Utrecht SessionActually, it is the business ses-sions which are the most important! “The...

The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht Sessioncreate a structure better suited to di-rect the rapidly expanding church.”(Bulletin #1, p. 8; Myron Widmer)

Thus, you can see that the cri-sis we are here discussing is veryreal.

“All the proposed governingchanges come from the work of acommission appointed by the Gen-eral Conference in 1991 to see howwe might better govern our church.”(Ibid.)

Unfortunately, Widmer was mis-informed. According to SusanStickler, a member of that Gover-nance Commission, the commis-sion was presented with those rec-ommendations, which were devisedin the topmost levels of the GeneralConference building in Maryland.The commission could not acceptthe ones which would transfer im-mense power to the General Con-ference and division presidents,—so the commission never approvedthem.

But those items were thenfalsely presented by Folkenberg tothe 1994 Annual Council for theirapproval, as having been “ap-proved” by that commission!

The total number of changeswhich will presented to the 1995Session for their approval is some-what astounding: 50 ChurchManual changes (#1, p. 8), and 72Constitution and Bylaws changes(#6, p. 28).

Here is a brief overview of someother important changes:

“Elections at the GC Session.Under this proposal, elections at theGC session would be limited to GCofficers, departmental and associa-tion directors, the Auditing Servicedirector, and the three executive of-ficers of the 11 divisions. All associ-ates and a few others traditionally

elected at the session would be ap-pointed by the respective executivecommittees within several months.This would reduce the numberelected at the sessions from about200 to about 70—three for each di-vision and about 35 to the GC.

“[Reorganization of GC Commit-tee.] . . The proposal would alsodownsize the [GC] Committee fromabout 362 to 240 members, plusinvitees . .

“Church Manual Changes. Morethan 50 proposed changes rangefrom counsels on courtship to disci-pline.” (Ibid.)

Let us now turn our attentionto the first of these business meet-ings.

On Thursday afternoon, June29, at 3 p.m., the 56th General Con-ference Session began. About12,000 people were in attendanceat the second meeting, that evening.Since a number of visitors werepresent, the low count indicates thatmany of the delegates had not yetarrived. According to the Constitu-tion, 2,650 might be attending thisSession. Actually, only 1,609 del-egates were present that first night.(A complete list of delegates isprinted in GC Bulletin, #1, pp. 21-31.)

In an earlier study (The Omi-nous Utrecht Agenda, Part 1, pp.2-3), we discussed the complexitiesof attendance at this Session, andin a companion study (Journey toUtrecht, to be released soon) we willprovide you with eye-witness re-ports by historic believers who didattend.

It is now time to discuss theimportant business discussion andactions which occurred at thismemorable Session in the Nether-

PART ONE OF FIVE

Throughout the world field,there were leaders and workersin our church who had anxiousforbodings about the forthcom-ing 1995 General ConferenceSession, which was slated to beheld in Utrecht, Holland on June29 to July 9.

This brief report will provideyou with the key issues whichwere discussed, and the deci-sions made regarding them.

It will provide you with anoverview of the entire businesspart of the Session. Key pointswill be highlighted.

THURSDAY - JUNE 29

As discussed in earlier studies,the Utrecht Session would be cru-cially important: Would the del-egates protect our church against amajor revamping of church struc-ture, which would effectually wipeout the changes made—at EllenWhite’s direction—in the 1901 Ses-sion, or would the 1995 delegatesyield to pressure and approve allor most of what was placed beforethem? This would be the question.

In this present study, you willlearn the answer. Please understandthat this present, five-part reportonly deals with the business meet-ings, not with the other activities atthe Session. In a later report (Jour-ney to Utrecht) we will provide youwith insights on such matters.

Actually, it is the business ses-sions which are the most important!

“The Utrecht session’s businessagenda is full! Not since 1901 haveso many substantial changes in howwe govern ourselves come to a ses-sion. In 1901 the session devisedcritical changes in the church’s struc-ture to decentralize authority and

22222 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarkslands. In doing so, we will pass overthe great mass of lesser items.

After approving the daily pro-gram, the agenda was approved.With this done, the pathway the Ses-sion would take had been deter-mined.

Generally, voice votes wereused. In this way, the officers couldtell how each of their workers voted,since all delegates were required tosit in their own special areas. Stand-ing committees were then ap-proved.

As usual, Bert Beverly Beach, in-troduced several non-Adventist dig-nitaries. He it was who brought,among other religious leaders, aCatholic bishop to Indianapolis fiveyears ago, who then uttered hisblessing upon the congregation.

Robert Folkenberg spoke next,and, well-aware of the fears of manydelegates that, unfortunately, it washis intention to push constitutionalchanges through at this Sessionwhich would give him immense con-trol at world headquarters, he said,

“We come as more than 2,600 del-egates. We have no king. We have nosmall group of men who rule overus.” (Bulletin #2, p. 27)

That statement ran contrary tothe objectives of certain of thoseconstitutional changes.

“I pledge to you tonight that thissession will be open and fair.” (Ibid.)

At this point, Folkenberg, whorelies heavily on constitutionalchanges, computers, and videos tohelp him maintain controls,launched into his sermon. But itwas no traditional preaching, suchas a president traditionally deliverson the first Thursday of each Ses-sion. Instead, it was a dramaticvideo presentation, with overvoicenarration by him. Scenes of suffer-ing children and happy faces of newChristians tugged at the hearts ofthe viewing delegates. The next daythose delegates would be decidingwhether to retain Robert Folken-berg in office or look for a differentpresident.

There were those present, thatevening, who feared his inordinatedesire to grasp for power and hisdetermination to enact changes inthe church’s basic constitution inorder to obtain his objectives.

FRIDAY - JUNE 30

The next morning, June 30, thenext business meeting was called toorder at 8:30 a.m. It primarily con-sisted of several lengthy reportsread to the delegates: one by thesecretary, another by the treasurer,and a third by an outside auditor.

That same morning, the nomi-nating committee met for the firsttime. As was its custom, the firstitem of business was slated to bethe election of the General Confer-ence president. Five years earlier,that decision was not made until 5p.m.

After lunch, the business meet-ing again convened at 12 noon. Im-mediately the chairman of the nomi-nating committee, Benjamin Reaves(president of Oakwood College) toldthe delegates that the secretary ofthe nominating committee, B. LynBehrens (president of Loma LindaUniversity) had a report to present.

She said that the nominatingcommittee recommended the nameof Robert Folkenberg. The motionwas seconded and approved by thedelegates.

Item One of the crucial issueshad been settled: Folkenberg wasback in for another five-yearterm; his second.

In view of the fact that he is try-ing to gain so much control over theworld headquarters through consti-tutional changes (read The Omi-nous Utrecht Agenda—Part 1-3[WM–620-622]), it is surprisingthat, in the acceptance speechwhich followed, Folkenberg saidthis:

“During these past five years, Ilearned that nobody is smart enoughto lead this church. Nobody is wiseenough to reach out and grasp theincredibly complex and diverse pres-sures that tend to fragment.

“This is truly God’s church, andit can be led successfully only by ourLord Jesus Christ. All I can do isconfess that I don’t have infallibility,and pledge that these feet of clay willwalk that best if they can work witha group of wise, dedicated leaders.”(#2, p. 31)

On at least two occasions ear-lier, Folkenberg had admitted thathe frequently made mistakes. Intwo written letters he had apolo-gized for serious blunders (see ourbook, Collision Course). He hasmade errors which a man of ma-turer years would not make, yet hecame to Utrecht, determined to cur-tail the authority of other churchleaders, in order to enhance hisown. Our tract set, The OminousUtrecht Agenda–Part 1-3, explainsthis in detail.

At 2 p.m. on Friday, June 30,the next business meeting wascalled into session. It was at thismeeting that the subject of consti-tutional and bylaw changes was firstintroduced.

It should be noted that CalvinRock, chairman of that meeting,mentioned, in passing, the name ofthe man who wrote the actualchanges in the Constitutional andBylaws:

“Athal Tolhurst is the man whohas crafted most of this language.”(#3, p. 12)

Keep that name in mind, for wehave been hearing more and moreabout Tolhurst lately. Apparently, heworks closely with Folkenberg inpreparing written materials for him.As some of you may know, theTolhursts come from Australia, andcan be expected to be solidly newtheology.

“A.H. Tolhurst: There are twokinds of recommended changes tothe constitution and bylaws. The firsttype of change or recommendedchange are those changes that clarifythe meaning but do not change sub-stantively the intent of the constitu-tion or the bylaws. Scond, there arethose changes that do make a sub-stantive change to the meaning of the

33333The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht Sessionconstitution or the bylaws.” (#3, p.12)

In addition to 50 ChurchManual changes (#1, p. 8), an as-tounding number of constitu-tional changes would be pre-sented to this General ConferenceSession! One delegate later madethe following astonishing com-ment about the immense numberof those changes: changes in thebasic constitution and bylaws ofthe denomination!

“Alvin Kibble: There are some72 amendments to our presentconstitution. I cannot imagine aconstitutional revision of some 72items being suggested to the Con-stitution of the United States ofAmerica! That would represent arewriting of the Constitution!” (#6,p. 28)

In order to simplify the work(and perhaps keep visitors fromunderstanding what was takingplace), the following motion wasrecommended to the delegates, andthen passed:

“Voted, To waive the reading ofitems presented to the floor, exclud-ing Constitution and Bylaw items,unless determined as being neces-sary.” (#3, p. 30)

It is an interesting fact that, eachtime a crucial point in the proposedchanges had to be definitely de-fended, the chairman insisted onwaiting until Folkenberg was calledin from running the nominatingcommittee—to make that defense tothe delegates!

It is clear that this whole massof modifications was Folkenberg’saffair, and that he alone was incharge of pushing them through.

At this point in this Friday af-ternoon business meeting, Folk-enberg steps forward and intro-duces a key point: eliminating allauthority from many of his asso-ciates at the General Conference:

“[Folkenberg:] There is anotherstrange dynamic. For many years theGeneral Conference committee metevery Thursday morning. It was fairlycommon for the General Conferenceofficers who were presenting the

agenda to feel themselves on trialbefore the other members, who werealmost entirely departmental staffwithin the General Conference.There was a dynamic that was reallyunhealthy. It certainly was not ac-countability to the world church. Soa series of motivational issuesneeded to be addressed.” (#3, p. 13)

That was a dynamite state-ment! In it, Folkenberg stated theunderlying problem, revealed hisenmities, and disclosed his objec-tives.

For the context of this, pleaseunderstand that Folkenberg hascome to the podium to introduce hisplan, changes in the denomination’sConstitution, to strip all GeneralConference (GC) departmentalstaff members of their votingrights on the GC Committee, andalso strip those same workers ofany protection from his domina-tion and control—by henceforthmaking their employment subjectto his hiring and firing whims, in-stead of being elected at quinquen-nial (five-year) General ConferenceSessions.

But here, near the beginningof his introduction to this aspectof his proposed changes, he isunable to hide his intense dislikeof anyone horning in when he istrying to get the GC Committeeto do as he wishes. The delegatesheard it and remembered it untilMonday morning.

Here is an additional analysisof the above-quoted statement: TheGC Committee is composed of ap-proximately 360 men. (Folken-berg’s plan is to have that numberreduced to about 260, later in theUtrecht Session.) The total mem-bership—the 360—only meets oncea year at the Annual Council. Asmaller number of them normallymeet at the yearly Spring Council.The members of the committee arethe top GC, division, union, and in-stitutional leaders around the worldfield.

However, there is a built-in flaw:When the Annual and Spring

Councils are not in session, whichis the remainder of the 50 weeksof the year, a small group of menat world headquarters runs theshow—and makes the major de-cisions affecting the entire worldchurch! Only a few men makethose decisions. But, constitu-tional rules permit the depart-mental staff within the worldheadquarters to also come tothose meetings, deliberate, andvote. This, of course, increasessomewhat the number of mindsdealing with the problems andrecommendations.

Folkenberg clearly does notlike that arrangement. He wantsto deeply cut the number ofpeople who will attend those com-mittee meetings. In fact, he is ut-terly disgusted that some men in theGC dare to openly resist his rail-roading, and suggest his ideasmight not be the best.

The man who, at 12 noon onFriday, told the delegates he hadfeet of clay and made many mis-takes, on Sunday at about 2:30p.m., tells those same delegatesthat he will be more accountableto the world field if he has lessmen around him to help him theright decisions!

In the above quotation, he saidthat the “GC officers” felt them-selves “on trial” before the depart-mental associates. This must meanthat someone there is not agreeingwith everything the officers want todo! Wonderful; some people therestill think for themselves! It is un-likely that anyone there feels “ontrial” except Folkenberg. People whovalue the counsel of many thought-ful minds do not express their en-mity against counsel. But Folken-berg’s feelings are so deep that heexpressed it before more than20,000 people.

And the Review printed it. Butthey will not be doing that muchmore, since henceforth he will ap-point the magazine’s leadership, in-stead of their being elected at the

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Session.But, in the above quotation, a

mystery is presented, somethingabout “accountability.” This is oneof Folkenberg’s magic words. Theother two are “linkage” and “fair-ness.” Just above, Folkenberg saysthat, if those other men were per-mitted to be voting counselors onthat committe—it would somehownot be as accountable to the churchfor its actions! According to hiswords, the GC Committee wouldmysteriously be more account-able with only a little clique ofpresident, treasure, and secretary,and field secretaries—and almostno one else—on it!

So, Folkenberg concluded thatparagraph by saying, it was an “un-healthy” “dynamic,” and that “a se-ries of motivational issues neededto be addressed.”

With this background, you canbetter see through one of the para-graphs Folkenberg next stated:

“We came back to the fundamen-tal philosophy that was driving the[governance] commission—fairnessand accountability. These were thetwo principles. We came to the con-clusion that we needed to restructurethe General Conference Committeeso that there was a signficant in-crease of accountability of those do-ing the serving to those being served.”(#3, p. 14)

(That which Folkenberg doesnot mention is that the GovernanceCommittee refused to okay his con-stitutional changes. So he later pre-sented them to the 1994 AnnualCouncil with the statement that theGovernance Committee had ap-proved them! More on that in ourearlier study, The Ominous UtrechtAgenda.)

It is clear that, in Folkenberg’sthinking, his little group is all thatis serving the church—and the de-partmental associates are not “serv-ing”; they are just hirelings, paid todo what they are told and keep theirrecommendations to themselves.Does that sound like too strong aninterpretation of his thinking? Lis-

ten to this!“Now there is another element,

and I am going to be compassionatebut clear. It is really not accountabil-ity when you are accountable to your-self. When a large proportion of thoseat the meeting are employees of theGeneral Conference, you really don’thave accountability. It is accountabil-ity only when those doing the serv-ing are accountable to those beingserved.” (Ibid)

This is obvious gobbledygook!Folkenberg takes the English lan-guage and changes the meaning ofwords! Read the above paragraphagain, and see if you can figure itout.

In the subsequent four para-graphs, he specifically states whathe wants: to oust departmentalworkers from the meetings which,week by week, determine majordecisions throughout the worldfield—and to reduce them to hiredflunkies, instead of elected officialswho can hold their heads up andoppose wrongdoing. If you think weare out of context here, read it foryourself (#3, p. 14).

Tolhurst then made the motion,it was seconded, and, after N.C. Wil-son said he liked the idea but notedthat it was a subtle negative thrustagainst fellow workers, the del-egates arose and began to speak.They wanted to know why on earththe departmental workers could notbe on the committee, have votingrights, and be elected by the Ses-sion instead of appointed by Folken-berg’s little clique?

Finally, it was time for that meet-ing to adjourn for supper, so Kloos-terhuis asked that somone table themotion till later. This was done.

“After a very lengthy discussion,it was

“Voted, To table this item until thenext business session.” (#3, p. 30)

With sunset, came the sacredhours of the Bible Sabbath. In acompanion study, Journey toUtrecht, to be released soon, we willdescribe some of what happened onthe two Sabbaths at that Session.

To our knowledge every one ofFriday’s items was approved.

SUNDAY - JULY 2

The next business meeting be-gan at 8:30 a.m. on Sunday, July 2.Within a short time, the question ofappointing or electing departmen-tal workers was again brought to thefloor for discussion. The ensuingdiscussion continued throughoutthe morning until it came time forlunch break! People were upset!(#4, 23-28) Here are some insightsinto what occurred that morning:

The discussion on this beganwhen a ruse was attempted—andimmediately exposed. Instead oftaking up the tabled motion, anapparently new one was pre-sented—which would eliminate thetabled one!

“P.S. Follett: Now we have a con-stitutional item concerning depart-mental directors and their associatesthat we would like to place on thefloor for your discussion.

“Dr. Harold Butler: If we vote this,the departmental associates will beappointed and not elected any longer.If we come back to the other agendaitem and vote that down, it says justthe opposite of this. So how can wevote on this particular item when itis in direct contradiction to the otherthat we have tabled?

“A.H. Tolhurst: There are two orthree actions here that are so inter-linked with each other that it’s diffi-cult to deal with one without impact-ing the others . .” (#4, p. 23)

The plan had been to sidestepthe elect/appoint issue of GC de-partmental workers, which thedelegates increasingly opposed.In its place a different motion wasintroduced, which would affect alldepartmental workers in thechurch—including those in theGeneral Conference. Clever, but itdid not succeed.

At this point, Calvin Rock stoodup and agreed with Butler’s point.

Throughout the Session, peoplewere impressed that Rock fre-quently appeared to be fair and notdissembling.

“C.B. Rock: I think Dr. Butler, asElder Tolhurst has commented, hasa very valid point. If someone movesto table this item, we can go right atthe appointment versus electionprinciple.” (Ibid.)

“Voted: To table the proposedamendments to Bylaws Article X, De-partments—Directors/Secretaries,Associates and Assistants, so the is-sue of appointment versus electioncan be decided first.” (#4, p. 30)

So the tabled item—which hadso embarrassed Folkenberg—wasquickly resurrected instead of be-ing bypassed.

During the discussion, MaxMitchell, a church auditor, stoodup and objected to trying to makeauditors appointed by those theyaudit, instead of elected by theSession.

“Our world church has on a num-ber of occasions had problems withlarge financial matters. These couldhave been addressed [solved beforea crisis occurred] if people had takennotice of the auditors, or even if theauditors had been involved [insteadof refusing to permit them to auditthose particular books; see CollisionCourse for details]. Once auditorsare appointed, rather than elected,they become tame. They become au-ditors who will not stand up and telladministrators what to do, becausethey fear for their jobs. You cannotdo this. Industry as a whole does notdo this. Shareholders elect auditors;administration does not appointthem.” (#4, p. 24)

Then Don Crane stood up andnoted that the proposed changeswould, in reality, be reversing the

changes made at the 1901 Session.“Some of these recommendations,

I feel, may bring weakness to the de-partmental structure. We rememberthat in 1901 the General Conferencein session brought in the auxiliarydepartments, the independent orga-nizations, the institutions, and theorganizations that became the de-partments of the church. This [pre-sent] session has an opportunity toreaffirm this historic stand and sup-port the departments of the church ..

“I believe that appointing the as-sociates at the Annual Council wouldlead to a weakening of the depart-ments of the church.” (#4, p. 24)

Ellen White returned from Aus-tralia in the year 1900, with a spe-cial assignment, by the Lord, tochange the structure of the denomi-nation. That was done at her urg-ing in 1901; the organization wasdecentralized. Folkenberg wants tocentralize it again.

To our knowledge, not onetime throughout this $15 millionSession was a Spirit of Prophecyquotation cited in one of its busi-ness meetings.

That is what we have come to.The wisdom of man is thought tobe greater than the wisdom of God.

Then Ronald Appenzeller stoodand told the delegates that only 12departmental heads were involved.Why should they be eliminated fromthe GC Committee? Then he wenton to make this valid point:

“[Voting this recommenda-tion] will weaken the depart-ments. General Conference asso-ciates travel the world field, andthey’re supposed to be familiarwith what’s happening in the fieldand at the General Conferenceheadquarters. And that informa-

tion cannot be given fully andcompletely through minutes orthrough a briefing by someone.”(#4, p. 24)

How very true! If at the GC,and elsewhere in the world field,departmental leaders are barredfrom the executive meetings, howcan the leaders know what is go-ing on? Are departmental menonly to take orders and never giveinformation or think for them-selves?

We obtain here an insight intothe mind of Robert Folkenberg. Heis not an ignorant man (even thoughsome of his comments seem thatway). He apparently wants a churchfull of robots who obey orders, anddo not think or devise ways to im-prove or correct situations. Why notjust put in a bunch of chimpanzeesinto subordinate positions; theycost a lot less to feed than do de-partmental leaders?

For that matter, why have Gen-eral Conference Sessions, since allcertain leaders want is rubber-stamping?

Rudi Henning next asked whysuch a foolish proposal was beingrequested. But Chairman Rock re-plied: “I would prefer waiting untilElder Folkenberg arrives.” (#4, p.24)

This happened on other daysalso, and each time the delegateswere told that they would have towait till Folkenberg arrived backfrom the nominating committee sohe could explain the proposed con-stitutional changes. One gets theidea that either these changeswere solely his, or that no one elsecould explain what good theywere, or both.

Later, Folkenberg arrived and

The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionContinued from the preceding tract in this series

PART TWO OF FIVE

66666 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksonce again summarized why hewanted it passed. You can read it inBulletin #4, pp. 26-27. Once againthe delegates are told about theimportance of “fairness” and “ac-countability.”

“The two points are fairness andaccountability . . It is the desire tosee the ratio of accountability dra-matically increased.” (#4, p. 26)

Eventually, it would be ruledthat no delegate could speak morethan two minutes. Since most of thedelegates who arose were protest-ing the high-handed objectives, thatlimitation helped ease the situation.But when Folkenberg stood up, hewent on for nearly two pages of theBulletin. Eventually he admitted,in passing, that only three menwill really be running the GeneralConference—if he gets his way:

“When the three officers in thisproposal are elected, they areelected as officers with backing ofthe entire world church. Those of-ficers—the president, the secre-tary, and the treasurer—sit to-gether and develop world churchpolicy.” (#4, p. 27)

Folkenberg applies this triadleadership thinking to all divi-sions as well: Three men are torun every division, and no oneelse is to give a peep nor a mut-ter.

“Therefore, it stands to reason, thecommission and Annual Councilconcurred, that whether it is thepresident or the secretary or theteasurer, all of those officers from allthe world divisions should standaccountable, not just to the delega-tion of their division, but in fact tothe whole world church . . [but] thedivision departmental directors areaccountable primarily to the unionswithin the divisions that they serve,not to the world church.” (Ibid.)

Can a man with such strangereasoning be trusted with suchpower? Yet he is the man who willmanage the General Conferencefor the next five years, and he willdo it, having won a bagful of rulechanges.

Folkenberg claims that he is

only expressing the views held bythe three-year governance com-mittee and the 1994 AnnualCouncil. The truth is (as we re-cently disclosed) that the commit-tee never approved most of Folk-enberg’s wild ideas! Susan Sickler,who was on the commission andalso attended and spoke at the1994 Annual Council, let the cat outof the bag on this. From start to fin-ish, this power-grabbing attempt isthe work of Robert Folkenberg.

He then goes on to extend thishands-off attitude toward everyother GC worker, even those whoare not in the departments. Theyare hired merely to be told whatto do:

“The others who are affected un-der this proposal are the associatesof the General Conference. In orderto be consistent, both levels—that isto say, the division department di-rectors and the General Conferenceassociate directors—needed to bedealt with in the same fashion. It iscritical that we distinguish between‘informed’ and ‘decided.’ what do Imean? [Yes, what do you mean?] Thesteps are in place and have been inuse for some time, and these can allbe improved, in which the GeneralConference associate departmentaldirectors are informed.” (#4, p. 27)

The underlings “need to be dealtwith,” that is, put in their place.They are to be informed as to theirduties. It is reserved alone for thethree leaders to do the deciding asto what is to be done.

So there. Put the whip in myhand, Robert says, and I will takecare of the rest. This is what I meanby fairness and accountability.

Ron Mataya rises, and the in-ference of what he says is a ques-tion as to why it is the presidentwho is urging that this be done,since he is the one who will getthe added power if it passes. (#4,p. 27)

Then Tom Miller, one of theGC associate auditors stands.

“It is our unhappy lot to write un-pleasant reports sometimes. Some

of our administrators adopt the cus-tom of the Roman emperors of kill-ing the messenger, killing off thosewho bring bad news. At the mo-ment, we have a degree of protec-tion in that we are elected. I be-lieve the action before us will stripus of that protection, and the Au-diting Service will be gutted. It willbe emasculated.” (#4, pp. 27-28)

To that shocking statement,Follett, who was chairing at the time,said that the plan was to set up an“auditing board” which would ap-point the auditors, and only thechief auditor would be elected atSessions. (#4, p. 28)

Well, with only thirty men incharge of the entire church, guesswho will be in charge of the audit-ing board?

Oh, you do not think thatthirty men will run the church—if the constitutional changes aremade? Well, the GC and each ofthe divisions will primarily bemanaged by three men each. Ac-cording to #4, p. 31, there cur-rently are nine divisions. Accord-ing to the new Folkenberg math,we will have 9x3+3=30; thirtymen running the denomination.

When it was time for lunchbreak, a motion was made, sec-onded, and voted to send the itemback to the Constitution and BylawsCommittee (C&B Committee).

Although it was not mentionedon page 28 of Bulletin #4, therewere so many delegates upset aboutthe matter, that the announcementwas made that some could speakto a back-room committee about it.

“Voted: To refer the proposedamendments to Constitution ArticleVI, Election to the standing Consti-tution and Bylaws Committee for fur-ther study, with the request that allof those now standing to address thisitem refer their concerns directly tothe Constitution and Bylaws Com-mittee which will meet immediately.”(#4, p. 31)

The delegates had spent mostof Friday afternoon and all of Sun-day morning objecting to one

77777The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht Sessionlittle aspect of what, many werecoming to believe, was a takeoverplan by Folkenberg. —Yet that wasonly one of the 72 proposed Con-stitution and Bylaw changes!

But the problem was thatnearly all the delegates (about 92percent) were church employees.How far could they go in resist-ing the president’s demands?

That same Sunday afternoon, at2 p.m., when the business sessionreconvened, several items were dis-cussed. (#4, p. 28) Not only werechanges planned for the Constitu-tion and bylaws of the church, butalso for the Church Manual as well.

(Sometimes in this study, we callit “bylaw” and sometimes “by-laws;” which is right? The set ofrules of an organization, supple-mentary to its constitution, is calledits bylaw. So we here speak of theGC bylaw. But Folkenberg’s plan isto change the bylaws of each divi-sion as well. That is why we some-times use the word in the plural,when referring to all of those by-laws.)

One Church Manual changewas intended to weaken the au-thority of leaders of organizedcompanies. (#4, p. 29) It was ap-proved.

Another change which wouldhelp the liberals succeed in thechurch, would permit localchurches to elect their church of-ficers for two years, instead ofonly one. This would enable toofficers to have less accountabil-ity (yes, that special word, buthere used in its true sense) to thechurch members. In spite of anumber of clear-cut objections,the change was voted (approved).(#4, pp. 29-30) Here was one ofthe delegates’ pleas:

“Charles Ferguson: I am pleadingwith you folks. If ever an extremelyliberal or extremely conservative,imbalanced element gets hold of yourboard of elders, you’ll have to livewith that a year longer than you willright now. I plead with you not to votefor this motion.” (#4, p. 30).

The problem was that, afterhaving fought the battle over oneitem (the election vs. appoint-ment of departmental leaders),and still not having defeated it,the delegates were beginning togrow weary. We find that, with twoexceptions (the Monday vote onthat issue, and the Wednesdayvote on women’s ordination), thedelegates were wearing down. Wefind that, more and more, theywere just passing whatever wasoffered them.

Indeed it gradually becameobvious to delegates and visitorsthat, when efforts were made toeliminate a problem item, thechair generally had deft ways ofignoring or sidestepping it, so theproposed change was kept ontrack until it was approved. In afew instances, items were sentback to committee to work over,but that generally only postponedthe fateful final vote.

If you want to see changes in theGeneral Conference Sessions, re-quire that 50 percent of the del-egates be laymen or laywomen.Then the rubberstamping willcease.

By Tuesday, the delegates hadbecome so tame and lifeless in re-sisting constitutional changes, thatthe present writer suspects that di-vision officers were told to speakwith them in the hotels at night—and warn them to be more coop-erative.

The Sunday afternoon businessmeeting finally concluded.

The controversy over appoint-ments vs. election was still un-settled. It was to carry over to Mon-day morning.

According to one person’scount, there were 72 changes whichtop leadership wanted changed inthe Constitution, Bylaws, andChurch Manual.

Yet there were only five days leftin which to make them. What thedelegates should have done was toreject many of those changes as out-

of-hand. But, as is also frequentlydone at local conference constitu-ency meetings, the delegates werepressured into feeling that “timeis short, and we must hurry aloneor we won’t get through theagenda.” So decisions were madewhich should never have beenmade. Large chunks of powerwere handed over to a relativelyyoung General Conference presi-dent.

“On the gates of houses and inpublic places, placards were posted. . On one of these were writtenmerely the significant words of thewise man: ‘Woe to thee, O land,when thy king is a child.’ ” (GreatControversy, 165)

But, just now, let us turn ourattention to what happened in thatback room, where the C&B Com-mittee was meeting with those ob-jecting to the appoint/elect ruling:

“After hours of spirited debate onthis matter Friday and Sunday, withdepartmental personnel voicingstrong opposition, the item wastabled yesterday [Sunday, July 2].Those with concerns were invited tomake their case before the Constitu-tion and Bylaws standing committee.More than 50 people appeared, andthe committee sat for seven hourslate into Sunday night.” (#4, p. 5,later comment by W.G. Johnsson)

We learn from other sourcesthat 75 delegates went to the backroom, and that 70 were opposedto the proposed amendment. Thatspecial meeting not only lastedwell into the night, but continuedon the next morning after break-fast! However, although that tallywas made, not all of them spokethat day, some spoke the next morn-ing. The following sentence prob-ably applies this Sunday afternoonin that committee:

“One day the committee heard 56delegates speak after items were sentback from the floor for more consid-eration.” (#7, p. 4)

In another statement, elsewherein the Bulletins, we are told this:

“For seven hours we listened to




those who came on Sunday. We lis-tened for another two hours yester-day [Monday morning].” (#6, p. 25)

In still another statement, whichis probably a summary statementof Friday to Tuesday, we are told:

“That [C&B] committee has metfor 20 hours and heard from 75 in-dividuals.” (#7, p. 19)

To our knowledge, every one ofSunday’s items was approved,with one exception, which was notconcluded until Monday.

MONDAY - JULY 3

We will now continue withJohnsson’s statement:

“This morning (Monday), the com-mittee has been meeting to considerhow it should respond to the vari-ous suggestions it heard on Sunday.”(#4, p. 5; Johnsson)

How should the committee re-spond? The answer was obvious.The problem of the committeewas to try and make the delegatessatisfied enough to approve theamendment, while retaining asmuch as possible of the presi-dent’s objective in recommendingit. His objective was to gather asmuch power as possible into hisown hands.

Finally, the committee came upwith a compromise that mightwork: give both sides part of whatthey wanted. The plan worked. Hereis the compromise which was ap-proved by the delegates:

“The recommendation is a com-promise: General Conference asso-ciate department leaders will beelected at GC sessions, but will notbe members of the General Confer-ence Committee.” (#4, p. 5;Johnsson)

What did the compromise giveto the church worldwide? It meantthat, henceforth, GC departmentalleaders would continue to beelected, not appointed.

What did the compromise giveto Folkenberg personally? (1) Itgave him control of the GC Com-mittee. He could now make deci-sions affecting the entire churchfrom headquarters in Maryland,

without any opposition from de-partmental men. Remember that,in his opening remarks on the sub-ject Friday, he said that it was thedepartmental men who were oppos-ing him; apparently no one elsedared do so. They had already beensilenced.

(2) The compromise only af-fected GC departmental leaders;it did not include division lead-ers. No vote had yet been takenon Folkenberg’s plan to also stripthem of election and committeeparticipation rights.

The compromise was not pre-sented to the delegates for their voteuntil after lunch on Monday, July4. It took the C&B committee halfthe night and all morning the nextday to be willing to accede to halfthe demands of the delegates.

At 2 p.m. the compromise waspresented, but the delegates wereupset when they learned the elec-tion of departmental leaders onlyincluded GC personnel, and it didnot include departmental member-ship on the GC Committee. It wasdisheartening to protest that muchand accomplish so little.

“C.B. Rock: . . We ran into elec-tions versus appointments. We be-came aware of the fact that thisprinciple is one that needs to besettled before we can move into anumber of the vital recommenda-tions coming from Annual Councilby way of the Constitution and By-laws Committee.” (#6, p. 20)

After two days of withering ob-jections from the floor, the com-mittee finally decided it wouldhave to give the delegates some-thing they were asking for.

Ultimately, this compromisedposition was approved by the del-egates:

“A.H. Tolhurst: The main motionis that the Constitution and BylawsCommittee be empowered to modifythe constitution in harmony with thefollowing recommendation: that as-sociate directors of General Confer-ence departments be elected at Gen-eral Conference sessions but that

they not be members ex officio [offi-cial, voting members] of the GeneralConference Executive Committee.”(#6, p. 20)

At this point a highly significantrequest was made. It was becom-ing quite obvious that massivechanges were being placed beforethe delegates to enact—which woulddramatically change the way thechurch was governed! What wouldall these cumulative changes pro-duce? some kind of monster king-ship? Surely, the delegates neededto know what the end-productwould look like.

Alvin Kibble now stood to hisfeet and stated an underlyingproblem: The delegates were be-ing asked to enact dozens ofchanges, but what would be theoverall effect of them all?

“There is a concern that the bodyhave the opportunity to address thelarger issues in the total scope asthey are coming to us. It is possiblefor us to take action on individualrecommendations without seeing thelarge picture . . Some have looked atthe proposals carefully, and it hasbeen observed that many of thoserecommendations have to do withthe diminishing of the authority ofthis body to make decisions that arethe proper and appropriate. I wouldhope at some point that we couldeven get an opinion from the legalcounsel of our church in regard tothe impact that these revisionsmight make upon the integrity ofthis session of the world church.”(#6, p. 20)

No time could have been betterfor Kibble to arise with such a re-quest. Sizeable portions of Friday,Sunday, and Monday had beenpreoccupied with discussion ofone unfair constitutional pro-posal; literally dozens more werestanding in the wings, waiting tobe brought on stage. What kindof gargantuan monster was allthis going to produce?

No agenda item or other busi-ness was on the floor. Now was thetime for the legal statement. Butleadership recognized that such astatement would be the death knellof the railroad company in the backrooms. Folkenberg had issued theorders: Get those proposalspassed! And no one dared opposehim. While he was off in the nomi-nating committee, determining whowould be reelected, his trusted sub-ordinates were standing before thedelegates, stonewalling opposition,and the Constitution Committeewas behind them, fending off effortsby faithful delegates to protect thebalanced Constitution bequeathedus at the 1901 Session.

M.A. Bediako was chair at thetime that Kibble made that re-quest, and he carefully ignored it.Although it was a valid request,made at the proper time, it wassidestepped.

“M.A. Bediako: Thank you foryour comments. I would like to saythat we decided that those who wereinterested should meet with the Con-stitution and Bylaws Committee. Wereferred several issues to Constitu-tion and Bylaws for consideration.Right now we would like to continuewith the Church Manual issues un-til such time as the Constitution andBylaws Committee reports to us.”(#6, p. 20)

As we will later note, this re-quest was repeated later in Ses-sion, and similar ones were made.Each time, the request wassnubbed. Leadership was deter-mined to ramrod through its objec-tives. —And why? All those menwere doing was forging their ownfetters. Changes were being made

which would provide Folkenbergwith far greater power to hire andfire, than any Adventist presidentbefore him had ever had!

But there is another issue im-plicit in the above quoted statement.Many of our readers will recall ourin-depth analysis of General Con-ference Sessions (Captive Ses-sions—Part 1-3 [WM–114-116]). Inthat study (now in section two of ourOrganization Tractbook), we dis-cussed a variety of factors whichneed improvement.

Yet there are always new discov-eries to be made. One of them is tobe found in the minutes of thispresent Utrecht Session.

When Kibble requested legaladvice on the whole picture, hemade the request at the right timefor such a legal opinion to begiven! There was no business ofany kind on the floor, and thedelegates had a right to makesuch a request.

But there is more, because thedelegates were becoming con-cerned about one set of rulechanges, their attention was di-verted to something else.

Instead, Bediako said that theC&B committee was not yet readyto send more constitutional changesto the delegates to discuss (#6, p.20). This is ridiculous. There wasno need to wait for the committeeto finish discussing current itemsreferred back to it; the delegatescould deal with others. The changeshad all been in hand over a year be-fore Utrecht began. As we reportedearlier, the changes were given tothe governance committee to ap-prove, but they refused to do so. Sothe changes were then presented tothe 1994 Annual Council as

changes approved by the gover-nance committee! But that was anuntrue representation.

From the Annual Council, thechanges were sent to Utrecht for fi-nal approval by its delegates

With over two dozen constitu-tional changes yet to be made overthe next two-and-a-half days,Bediako said the C&B committeedid not have any more changesready.

The plan was to divert the at-tention of the delegates to a to-tally different matter, and thusconfuse minds, at that momentprepared to seriously object to theconstitutional railroad.

It is something like viewers ata tennis match: Look here andlook there. Keep the mind mixedup and then, as the end of the Ses-sion nears, get everyone in afrenzy of concern to get the restof the agenda passed, for the timeis nearly gone.

At this point, we ourselves willdo some diverting. We thought itbest to carry on through to the endof the GC departmental elect/ap-point debate. But, now that that hasbeen completed, we should returnto the Monday morning businesssession, which we skipped over.Then we will return to the Mondayafternoon business meeting.

At 8:30 a.m. on July 3, the meet-ing began. You can read the con-densed text of the meeting on #5,12-15. One point stood out:

Previously, members could bedisciplined by the local churchbody, sitting in a constituencymeeting. Henceforth, the churchboard must first review the case,and then a meeting where thepastor or conference president


PART THREE OF FIVE

1010101010 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarkspresides must be held. (#5, p. 14)

In this way, the pastor or con-ference president can help guide thedirection of every disciplining ses-sion.

Let us now return to where weleft off at the Monday afternoonmeeting. (#6, p. 21)

Several Church Manual issueswere discussed.

First a change was presentedwhich would make it easier to re-instate church members who hadbeen disfellowshiped. If you willlook at the comments made bydelegates, they were generally ig-nored. The chair would, instead,immediately turn to the next del-egate who wished to speak and lis-ten to him. You will find that pat-tern in local conference constitu-ency meetings also. The idea is tolet everyone talk and “get it outof their system,” then when theyare becoming wearied with it all,vote through most or all of theoriginal leadership recommenda-tions.

After that item was approved, aneven more serious matter was dis-cussed: disbanding or expellingchurches. The objective was tostrengthen ways in which localchurches, which were considereddoctrinally deviant, or classifiedas in rebellion against duly autho-rized authority—could be disci-plined or expelled more easily.

The problem here is that, if alocal congregation puts up toomuch argument about not likingthe new theology pastor sent bythe conference, the changed con-stitution will permit the confer-ence to more easily expel that lo-cal group.

Here is the proposed new posi-tion:

“Mario Veloso: . . ‘Churches maybe dissolved or expelled from the sis-terhood of churches’ for reasons thatare classified into two groups. Thefirst is loss of membership [notenough members in that congrega-tion]. In that case the church is dis-solved. There is no discipline in-

volved. The second is discipline. Achurch could be expelled for apos-tasy, refusal to operate in harmonywith the Church Manual, or rebel-lion against the conference/mission.If that is the case, then expulsioncould be initiated.” (#6, p. 21)

The complete text of the changeis lengthy, and is printed on #6, pp.22-23).

Lorena Bidwell then spoke upand said:

“All that needs to happen is asuitable recording about an act[perceived wrong by the confer-ence]; there is no apparent time toexplain what is going on, and it iscompletely within the hands of theexecutive committee.” (#6, p. 21)

The proposed change was ap-proved by the delegates.

Not mentioned in the Bulletinminutes of that business meeting isanother action pushed through,which is noted only in the “Actions”section for that meeting:

If a church member is cen-sured by his local church (per-haps because he is defending his-toric Adventism), he will not beable to go to another local con-gregation—but will carry thestigma of that censure with him!Henceforth, he will be a markedman. This was an entirely new sec-tion added to the Constitution. Itwas approved. (#6, p. 22)

Except for partial modifica-tions, to our knowledge every oneof Monday’s items was approved.

TUESDAY - JULY 4

At 8:30 a.m. on Tuesday morn-ing, July 4, the business meetingreconvened.

During the Friday to Mondaydebate over GC departmental elec-tion/appointment, a question hadarisen as to exactly what leadershiphad in mind for the departmentalstructure of the church, and, sec-ond, who would have membershipon GC committee.

Athol Tolhurst told the delegatesthat the plan, regarding departmen-tal identity was as follows:

“Adventist chaplaincy, Commun-

ication, Education, Family Minis-tries, Health and Temperance, Min-isterial Association, Personal Minis-tries and Sabbath School (incorpo-rating Community Services), PublicAffairs and Religious Liberty, Pub-lishing, Stewardship, Trust Services,Women’s Ministries, and Youth.” (#6,p. 23)

Regarding the second point, theplan was to have 260 members onthe GC Committee, composed ofcertain leaders (their offices werelisted on #6, p. 23).

If you take time to read that list,you will find that nearly everyone isoutside of Maryland! Therefore,from day to day—for 50 out of the52 weeks of the year—only a verysmall group of men will decideworld church interrelations andactivities. These men would be theGC president, treasurer, secretary;GC field secretaries, and a few oth-ers of lesser importance (the headof Adventist World Relief, AdventistDevelopment and Relief Associa-tion, and Adventist Risk Manage-ment, Archives and Statistics, andpast GC presidents, when in town.The very much-needed counsel ofthe departmental personnelwould be barred.

(Essentially the same person-nel reduction will occur on the di-vision level.)

So the triad—the president,treasurer, and secretary—wouldprimarily operate the church. Yet,in point of fact, the present writerwas assured by a high-placedworker that only the president—Robert Folkenberg—actuallymakes the decisions. He has donea remarkable job of gaining the as-cendancy over everyone else at Gen-eral Conference headquarters.

The chair next directed the at-tention of the delegates to theagenda item of reducing the ap-proximately 360 members of theGeneral Conference Committee toabout 260 members.

The plan would save money inAnnual Council attendance, but re-quire increase costs for the Spring

1111111111The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionCouncils, since an included require-ment would be for the General Con-ference to pay the entire 260 to at-tend Spring Councils as well.

Folkenberg urgently wanted thisGC Committee reduction passed,and we are not exactly certain why.We suspect that, in some way, thereshuffling and reductions in com-mittee membership aided his over-all rise to greater power in the worldchurch. That seemed to be the pat-tern most everything else fitted into.

The action was approved. (#6,p. 25)

That afternoon, at 2 p.m., thenext business meeting convened.

Interestingly enough, N.C. Wil-son arose to speak. He noted thathe had been hearing from manydelegates a strong sense of pessi-mism. Many felt that the Sessionwas, frankly, useless. They wererecognizing the fact that it wasmerely a rubberstamp operation.Wilson caught this, and decided totry to encourage the delegates thatthe situation was far different.

That which he said was re-markable—and very correct. Hetold them that, legally, they werethe most powerful body in the de-nomination—and that all othercommittees were subservient totheir jurisdiction. Thank you, El-der Wilson.

“Neal C. Wilson: I think that issomething that needs to be clear tothis delegation. There are somepeople who are taking a very pessi-mistic view, feeling that this body is[un]important and can’t really makea decision. And I think they aremisunderstanding at times the pro-cess that is being used to try to dothis the best possible way. All thesecommittees, including the GeneralConference Committee, are the ser-vants of this body. All the subcom-mittees that we have that are operat-ing here are servants of this body.And it is merely a matter of trying tochannel things in a proper and cor-rect way to get the happiest results.Because if this body really wants tohave a commission, they don’t haveto ask the General Conference [head-

quarters in Maryland]. They can sayto the General Conference. Set up acommission that will deal with suchand such a matter.” (#6, p. 28)

At this juncture, one might askwhat really is the problem here?Why is it that the Session del-egates seem to just wander alongin a lockstep pattern; a patternfrom which they seem totally un-able to break loose from? Why arethey, the all-powerful ones, sopowerless—when, indeed, thereare urgent reforms which theyneed to set in operation.

Here are some suggestions:Throughout the Session, when

a delegate wishes to initiate some-thing new or different, he must doit as a motion. It is not sufficient tomerely step to the microphone andsay, “I think we should do this,” or“I recommend that we do that.” Assoon as he is done speaking, thechair will immediately call on thenext person to speak,—and thatwhich the previous person said willbe quickly forgotten.

The speaker must say, “I movethat we do this or that.”

Now, as soon as he says that,the chair will tell him, “You are outof order.” And he is. The problemis that a motion is already on thefloor and being discussed, and an-other one cannot be initiated at thesame time. So what to do?

The delegate must make hisnew motion between agenda items.But that does not seem to happen;why? Well, it is all part of the sew-ing up process which occurredmany months before the Sessionconvened. It is the little word,“agenda.”

You may recall that this waswritten on page one of the reportyou now have in hand:

“After approving the daily pro-gram, the agenda was approved.With this done, the pathway theSession would take had been de-termined.” (The Utrecht Session–Part One, page 1 [WM–634])

At that moment, on the open-ing Thursday afternoon, halfway

through the first business meetingof the Session, the sewing up wascompleted.

Here is the procedure at thatfirst business meeting:

“The next item on the agenda isfor us to vote the daily program. [Themotion to approve the daily programwas made, seconded, and voted.]

“The next item of business is toapprove the agenda. [The motion toapprove the agenda was made, sec-onded, and voted.]

“The next item of business is theelection of the standing committees.[The motion to approve the stand-ing committees was made, seconded,and voted.]” (#2, p. 26)

First, when the preplanneddaily program was approved, thatset in rock the number of hoursthe delegates would meet for busi-ness. In Captive Sessions [WM–114-116], the present writercounted up the number of hoursallocated to business meetings fora typical Session (the 1985 NewOrleans Session), and discoveredthat only about 20 hours was usedfor church business! Yet that Ses-sion was said to have cost thechurch $12 million, and the visitorsanother $10 million.

Second, when the preplannedagenda was approved, that set incement nearly everything the del-egates would do!

Third, when the preplannedstanding committee members wereapproved, that determined someother things we will not discusshere.

Back to that agenda: When theagenda was cast into concrete at thefirst business meeting, the mold ofcoming events was pretty much de-cided. Only predetermined itemswould be discussed and voted on.

Now, with that background, letus return to the delegate on thefloor who would like to introducea new item of business.

He cannot do it when a mo-tion is already on the floor. Okay,then he will try again as soon as thatmotion has been voted up, down,




tabled, or returned to committee“for further study.”

But as soon as that item ofbusiness is completed,—thechairman immediately opens hismouth and either presents an-other preplanned item or quicklygives the floor to someone whointroduces that next preplanneditem.

Am I telling the truth? Howmany NEW items of business werein this Utrecht Session? Gothrough the ten bulletins andcount them. There are hardly any.

Well, that person can stand up,while an item is on the floor, andmake a motion about that pre-planned agenda item: He can makea motion adding, subtracting, modi-fying, tabling, referring back to com-mittee, or closing debate and call-ing for the vote on that motion be-fore the house.

But he will have a difficult timegetting any other item introduced.

Notice that we said that anyother item had to be introducedbetween preplanned agenda items.But where is the delegate at thattime? He probably has been stand-ing in line—and is in the wrongplace in line at the right time. Hemust be right at the microphone.

Now are you able to see why themost powerful committee in thechurch—the General ConferenceSession delegates in a businessmeeting—are nearly toothless? Theteeth were nearly all pulled whenthey approved the preplannedagenda that leadership handedthem at about 4:15 p.m. on thatfirst Thursday afternoon. Inciden-tally, less than half the full quota ofdelegates are present at that firstbusiness meeting. (You may recallthe statistic, gleaned from Bulletin#1 or 2, which we cited in the firsttract in this report: Only 1,609 ofthe 2,650 delegates were present atthe second business meeting, whichmet on Thursday evening.)

Let us now return to the Tues-day, July 4, afternoon business

meeting:Alvin Kibble made a landmark

statement. We quoted part of it ear-lier. Read this, and think about it:

“There are a number of delegateswho have expressed rather extensiveconcern over the weightiness of manyof the new items, not those that havebeen referred back for further reviewand discussion by the Constitutionand Bylaws Committee. I noted yes-terday that there are some 72amendments to our present con-stitution. I cannot imagine a con-stitutional revision of some 72items being suggested to the Con-stitution of the United States ofAmerica! That would represent arewriting of the Constitution! Ibelieve that if [legal] counsel wereoffered to this body, the conclusionwould be the same.” (#6, p. 28)

Well, that takes one’s breathaway. Thank the Lord for BrotherKibble, whoever he is.

But there is more: In the nextparagraph, Brother Kibble makesa motion. Now, you will recall thatwe said the delegate has to be in theright place at the right time—at thatmicrophone just when a motion hasbeen eliminated, one way or theother. Well, that has just happened.A motion about the North AmericanDivision edition of the ChurchManual has just been completed,with these words:

“R.J. Kloosterhuis: . . Now let’s goimmediately to the motion before us.[Motion was voted.]” (#6, p. 28)

Then it was that Brother Kibblespoke, and, immediately after theabove-quoted statement by him,made this motion:

“In the interest of time, given thefact that the chair is now most con-cerned about the time allowed todelete many of these items, I like tomove that legal counsel provide forthis body a summation of the totaleffect of these actions upon the his-torical privileges and powers of thesession when it is seated, as it is onthis occasion.” (#6, p. 28)

Kibble had made a valid mo-tion, requesting legal counsel asto the vast implications of all

these amendments to the Consti-tution and Bylaws. That was notonly a reasonable request; it wasvitally important, in view of themassive number of preplannedchanges which leadership wasurging enactment of.

Yet, in response, Mittleider re-plied that Kibble was “out of or-der.” It was Mittleider who wasout of order!

“K.J. Mittleider: I believe that yourmotion would be out of order. I thinkthe delegation needs to see thoseitems presented from the Constitu-tion and Bylaws Committee, and wemust take the time to have it clearlyunderstood. We’ve not prepared any-one to give a legal summation. Letme explain what I think will help usthrough. As with the assembly ofan automobile, it comes togetherone piece at a time. That is what Iwould hope we could do with theconstitution and bylaws. If we justtake bite-sized pieces and go throughit, we should vote our position onevery item.” (#6, pp. 28-29)

Interpretation: Your motionthat the delegates be given an over-view is out of order, not for any par-liamentary reason, but because wethink so. First, because the C&Bcommittee should send the piecesout to us one at a time, so we cansee each piece, without knowinghow it will all fit together. Second,because we have not prepared any-one to give a slick response. Any-one unprepared might give you thefacts in the case. Third, it is betterto see the trees than the forest. Forexample, if you are going to makean automobile, you do not designthe overall car first. Without know-ing what you will end up with, youmake one piece and then you makeanother piece; hoping that, in theend, it will all look good and runright.

To Mittleider’s put-down, thatbrave man Kibble said this:

“In an effort to move an item,many of these delegates may findthemselves voting things that they donot clearly understand. I believe itwould be fair to ask for a legal opin-ion.” (#6, p. 29)

For the second time, Kibblepresented the motion; this timepleading that Mittleider couldfind it in his good graces to ac-cept it.

But now, Mittleider, ever faith-ful to the cause of his master,resolutely set his face to refuseto accept a proper motion fromthe floor! But he was kind enoughto thank Kibble for having tried.

“K.J. Mittleider: Thank you verymuch. We’re going to proceed. We dohave the Constitution and BylawsCommittee chair here.” (#6, p. 29)

At this juncture, another del-egate, Edward Reid tried topresent a motion requesting thatthe facts about the dangers in allthese amendments be presentedto the delegates. But he was cutshort by Calvin Rock, who calledon Athal Tolhurst to start present-ing more bits and pieces of the72 changes. (#6, p. 29)

At this point, one of our read-ers may be thinking: “Poor souls,those leaders were not at fault; theydid not themselves know muchabout these matters, and theysurely would not know who elsemight know.”

The truth is each of the leadersknow the facts and the implicationsquite well. Items discussed at theSession are their life; they live andbreathe those topics all day, all year.In addition, in their private conver-sations in committee, over lunch to-gether, and on the planes, they dis-

cuss the implications and latestdevelopments among themselves.They well-know every facet and de-tail, and they know what it all isleading to.

The present writer was particu-larly astonished at how some of thedetailed, and even irrelevant, ques-tions from the audience were, with-out consulting anyone, instantly an-swered by the chairman. Read theten bulletins through for yourself,and you will see this. Those menare experts in their field—which ismanaging every aspect of thechurch. Only lifetime experts inchurch business arise to confer-ence, division, and General Confer-ence leadership positions.

No, it cannot be said that noone was able to tell the delegateswhat the forest of the churchwould look like, after the 1901trees had been cut down, and1995 trees had been hauled inand put in their place. Leadershipknew.

At 4 p.m. the meeting was inter-rupted for a prescheduled event,which had been planned for 3 p.m.:the calling into session of the Gen-eral Conference Corporation. Youmight wonder what that was. Likemany organizations, the GeneralConference controls two corpora-tions: The first is the one we allknow about (its legal name is theGeneral Conference of Seventh-day Adventists). The second is theGeneral Conference Corporation,a holding company. By that I meanit has no activity, other than to main-tain ownership of the fixed assetsof the General Conference (prima-rily land and buildings). The pur-pose is that, if anything happens tothe General Conference, a sister

organization can hopefully protectmany of the assets from beingseized. You will find it listed in theYearbook. It has a board and littleelse. But, in order to remain legaland valid, it must hold a brief meet-ing at each General Conference Ses-sion, and that meeting must be an-nounced several months earlier inthe Review.

At 4:45 p.m. on Tuesday, July4, the ongoing business meetingsresumed with an eloquent tributeby leadership to Bert Beverly Beach,who was retiring from the GeneralConference. As our readers will re-call, it was Beach who gave the goldmedal to the pope in 1977.

He was given a vote of appre-ciation by the delegation.

Except for slight modifications,to our knowledge every one ofTuesday’s items was approved.

WEDNESDAY - JULY 5

Now we procede to that memo-rable day, Wednesday, July 5, 1995.It will long be remembered by lib-erals in the church with cries ofheart-broken sadness, rending ofgarments, and gnashing of teeth.

The delegation decided to re-main with the Bible.

Some of our readers will won-der why, since they were so willingto compromise in regard to the Con-stitution and Bylaws. But those is-sues concerned leadership andsubservience. And opposition insuch matters might affect later em-ployment and promotions.

In contrast, women’s ordinationwas strictly a doctrinal issue. Allsides recognized it as such. There-fore everyone felt free to vote theirviews—and they did.

At 8:30 a.m., the long-awaitedday began as the business meeting


PART FOUR OF FIVE

1414141414 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarkswas called to order.

But it began with varied routinebusiness, having nothing to do withthat momentous topic.

One key item occurred imme-diately after McClure’s morningwelcome, so it was likely planned.A motion was made which wasvoted:

“Voted, To provide reasonabletime for discussion of items thatwere previously referred to theConstitution and Bylaws Commit-tee, and then to vote on the issueswithout referring them back to thecommittee.” (#8, pp. 27-28; cf. #7,p. 19)

Here it is again, in differentwords:

“Once the item is presented by thechair and the secretary of the Con-stitution and Bylaws Committee,there will be reasonable time pro-vided for discussion without the op-portunity to amend or refer. Thebody will then vote the proposal upor down.” (#7, p. 19)

This was something of a gagrule, affecting as it did the freedomto which delegates could object toconstitutional amendments. Suchmatters were too important to hur-riedly examine, consider only once,and return for modification to theC&B Committee only once.

Why did the delegates approvesuch limitations? Why did theyregularly approve nearly every-thing on an agenda written outmonths earlier?

There are reasons, and you willfind them discussed in detail in thiswriter’s Captive Sessions.

Here are a few:1 - Nearly all the delegates are

church employees on one level oranother. Employees have to be care-ful what they do in the presence oftheir bosses. They had better notbe found disagreeing very muchwith them.

2 - An average of eight percentof the delegates are laymen. Thatmeans only about a couple hundredout of 2,650 are not church employ-ees. Perhaps the Utrecht Session

had a little higher lay representa-tion, but that would not change thepicture much.

3 - During business meetings,the delegates must sit in their re-spective blocks, just as do del-egates to a Republican or Demo-cratic convention. At the right or leftrear of each block, sits the leader,or a worker appointed by him, tokeep track of who is present andhow they are voting.

4 - Nearly all voting is doneby a show of hands. By thus rais-ing hands, all the no votes can eas-ily be noted, and jotted down. Thestandard procedure was for thedelegates to raise their “voting card”as an indication of their vote.“Please signify by raising the votingcard. Opposed, the same sign.” (#7,p. 22) Pictures of the voting cardwill be found on #7, pp. 16-17, anda photo of delegates raising theirvoting cards will be found on #7,p. 16. The bright red of the votingcard really stood out, and made theno votes easy to locate.

5 - The delegates are selectedby the leaders, who know who bestto choose to attend the Session.

Additional factors could bementioned, but the above five areenough. The result is locked-indelegates carrying on a rubber-stamping operation for ten days,at a current cost of US$15 mil-lion. It would be far less expensivefor the divisions, after having se-lected their delegates, to then mailthe names and addresses of the del-egates to the General Conference,—and let the GC mail printed copiesof the complete agenda to the del-egates, so they can fill in a yes or novote by each item, and sign theirnames at the bottom. In addition,for that added touch of realismwhich they would experience at anactual Session (when leaders lookover their shoulders as they raisetheir hands); a cover letter shouldbe included with the mailed agenda,stating that the union and divisionpresidents will look over each bal-

lot sheet, to see how they voted.Just think how much money

would be saved, as the same resultswere accomplished!

Well, back to the Wednesdaymorning business session.

By the way, in addition to theWednesday morning gag rule(which was renewed on Thursdayand Friday), do not forget the ear-lier two-minute gag rule, ap-proved earlier in the week.

Later that same Wednesdaymorning, C.B. Rock instructed thedelegates that they should not dis-cuss any problems—other thanthose related to the preplannedagenda.

“But if we’re going to start pickingup things that we don’t like but thatthe committee hasn’t even talkedabout, we have an insurmountableproblem.” (#7, p. 22)

At one point, a delegate notedthat the proposed amendment per-mitted division committees to havea quorum as low as five members,whereas no other church commit-tees are that low. So he made amotion to refer it back for modifi-cation.

It was voted and approved bythe delegates, but then the chairtold him that all that meant wasthat it would be considered fiveyears later in A.D. 2000 at thenext Session. (#7, p. 22)

WOMEN’S ORDINATION

After the lunch break, the del-egates gathered for the afternoonbusiness meeting at 2 p.m.

The chairman, Calvin Rock,presented the schedule for thatafternoon’s momentous businessmeeting.

He told them there would beseveral introductions, and then thefloor would be open to comments.Recognizing that there could belarge numbers of comments, eachone would be limited to two min-utes (or three if translation was re-quired).

There would be two micro-phones in one of the aisles. Viewed

1515151515The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht Sessionfrom the rear of the auditorium, theone on the right would be for thoseopposed to women’s ordination,and would be labeled “Against.”The other one would be for the pro-ordinationists, and would bear thelabel, “For.” Delegates at each mikewould speak alternately.

(For your information, Utrechtwas the first Session at which therewere routinely three live aislemikes: one for pro, one for con, andone for technical points and parlia-mentary questions. That was a defi-nite improvement. But it would alsogive opportunity to more closelyexamine those in line at the conmike.)

According to the afternoonschedule, one person would givean introduction, another give thecon, a third give the pro, and thenthe floor would be open for del-egate comments, which wouldend at 5 p.m. Then, after final re-marks by Folkenberg, a secret bal-lot would be taken.

In view of the fact that most ev-eryone already had their mindsmade up before Wednesday after-noon, the above schedule had sev-eral outstanding qualities: the timelimit, the alternating microphonecomments, the predetermined clos-ing time, and the secret ballots.Those were good and fair points,especially since everyone alreadyknew the issues and had made uptheir own minds.

Keep in mind that the Generalconference and North AmericanDivision had sunk in the opinion ofthe world field—after the little trickthat was played five years ago. Youwill recall when the women’s ordi-nation was voted down in 1990 (onTuesday), a surprise vote was takenlater (on Thursday)—when most ofthe delegates were out sightseeing,That surprise vote permitted localelders to perform the functions ofministers—which effectually gavewomen pastors everything exceptordination.

So the secret ballot was very

much needed to reassure the restof the world field that there was stillsome integrity left in leadership.(The delegates took them at theirword that that Wednesday after-noon would settle the issue, forThursday morning the chair notedthat a lot of delegates were absent.(#8, p. 18)

However, that Wednesday af-ternoon, efforts were still madeto tilt the vote toward approvalof women’s ordination. Considerthe following:

The NAD president, Al McClurewas assigned the task of giving theintroduction. But, in his 20-minutespeech, he obviously favoredwomen’s ordination, and appealedto the world church to accept NorthAmerica’s great need for it.

Then, contrary to the schedule,just before Damsteegt, Rock slippedin his uncle, Charles Bradford fora quick two-paragraph statementon Bradford’s acceptance ofwomen’s ordination. Recognizingthat the African divisions werestrongly opposed to women’s ordi-nation, Bradford’s statement wasslipped in.

Then Gerard Damsteegt (An-drews University Church Historyprofessor) presented the “against”side for 20 minutes.

Following this, Raoul Dederen(Andrews emeritus theology profes-sor), spoke and presented the “for”side.

So, before the delegates spoke,two major and one minor speechfor and one against women’s ordi-nation were given.

Then, after the floor discussionsby delegates, Folkenberg was to saya few words. Well, they were morethan a few words, and he also gavea major statement, leaning towardwomen’s ordination.

Final tally: three major andone minor speech for, and oneagainst. Then the vote was taken.

A clear effort was made to ob-tain a vote favorable to a certainclass of members in North America.

What is all this about?The Bible is clear enough. The

problem is a small, powerfulclique of liberals in the UnitedStates. They have intellect, theyhave money, they have influence,and they are liberal. Becausewomen’s ordination is the currentfad in the other churches, theyare determined to force it on ourchurch also.

You will find the Bulletin reporton this Wednesday afternoon busi-ness meeting in #7, pp. 23-31, and#8, p. 30.

Now, let us proceed through theafternoon:

Calvin Rock’s opening remarks,which began with a brief history ofwomen’s ordination in our denomi-nation, are given on #7, p. 23.

Then L.C. Cooper read the mo-tion:

“The General Conference vests ineach division the right to authorizethe ordination of individuals withinits teritory in harmony with estab-lished policies. In addition, where cir-cumstances do not render it inadvis-able, a division may authorize theordination of qualified individualswithout regard to gender. In divi-sions where the division executivecommittees take specific actionsapproving the ordination of womento the gospel ministry, women maybe ordained to serve in those divi-sions.” (#7, p. 23; #8, p. 30)

Al McClure spoke to “make a20-minute presentation giving thebackground and rationale of theNorth American Division’s request”(#8, p. 30). This he did. If you willread the text of his presentation(#7, pp. 23-25), you will find that itis totally an appeal for a yes votefor women’s ordination. His themewas that the Bible does not say itcannot be done.

“I too was unclear on this matterfor some time. But after much studyand reading, praying and listening, Imust tell you that I am a convert tothis position . . Scripture makes nosuch gender distinction, how can thechurch, takes its commitment fromScripture, continue to make that dis-

1616161616 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarkstinction?” (#7, p. 24)

Then, after Bradford’s brief rec-ommendation for women’s ordina-tion, and sandwiched between two20-minute pro-speeches, cameGerard Damsteegt’s con-speech.It was refreshing, wonderful!Thank the Lord for His faithfulones! His theme was that theBible repeatedly, in a variety ofways, reveals we should not doit,—and that we must stay withthe Bible or we will destroy our-selves!

If there is space elsewhere inthis study, we will provide you withsome quotations from his speech,but for those who have the Bulle-tins, you will find it on #7, pp. 25-26.

Then Raoul Dederen presentedreasons for accepting women’s or-dination. His theme was that theBible does not say it cannot bedone.

“There is not a single statementin the Scripture that addresses thisissue . . As you noticed, neither Dr.Damsteegt nor Elder McClure wasable to quote a statement in theScritures saying that women shouldnot be ordained to the gospel minis-try . . How can we reconcile the viewsof those who stick to certain biblicalpassages—which, by the way, do notexist—and those who look at theoverall principles of Scripture?” (#7,p. 27)

“The Bible does not explicitly ad-dress the issue of ordination ofwomen to the ministry. I would liketo see the statement. I think there isno conclusive statement in the Scrip-tures.” (#7, p. 28)

—Can you see the basic issuehere? It is clear enough. Thewomen’s ordination activitistsbase their case on the fact thatthe Bible does not say womencannot be ordained to the minis-try. But they omit mentioning thatthe Bible does not say they shouldbe ordained.

The classic statement on suchmatters is to be found in Great Con-troversy, 289-290, which by theway, Damsteegt quoted:

“The very beginning of the greatapostasy was in seeking to supple-ment the authority of God by thatof the church. Rome began by en-joining what God had not forbid-den, and she ended by forbiddingwhat He had explicitly enjoined.”

There you have it; the principleis clear enough.

After those three speeches,Rock opened the floor to the alter-nating pro and con comments bythe delegates. Only a very smallnumber are quoted in Bulletin #7(pp. 28-30). Most of the names areunknown to us, but two well-knownpeople were included: NoeleneJohnsson (wife of the Review edi-tor) and Benjamin Reaves (presi-dent of Oakwood College), both ofwhom spoke in favor of women’s or-dination. Actually, in the NorthAmerican Division, it is quite po-litically popular among leader-ship to be favorable to that inno-vation.

Next, as prearranged, RobertFolkenberg came to the podium andspoke for about 10 minutes—andhe leaned toward women’s ordina-tion also.

He also said:“It was with fear and forboding

that some of us foresaw the approachof this debate this afternoon.” (#7,p. 30)

Folkenberg had good reason tosay that, for the leaders were well-aware that, whichever way theoutcome, there will be those whowill be extremely upset; somemay wish to bolt from the church.

After he concluded with prayer,the secret ballot cards were distrib-uted. J.H. Zachary asked whetherit would be a two-thirds or 51 per-cent vote. Rock said 51 percent.

Then the schedule called for afew songs to be sung while the voteswere collected and counted. Butthen, to pass some time, to B.B.Beach’s surprise, Rock requestedthat he step forward and tell the au-dience who were the guests sittingbeside him (Beach had a reservedsection of seats, in a front row for

himself and his guests.)Beach stepped to the podium.“One of the blessings of a General

Conference session is to have a num-ber of guests in our midst, leadersof other denominations, or otherworld organizations, or Christianworld communions. We’ve had about20 special guests from different com-munions. Some of them have comeand already gone. A few have notarrived yet, so they kind of come inrelays. I would just like to take theopportunity of asking these specialguests that are here in front right nowto stand so that you can take noticeof where they come from.” (#7, p.31)

We are not told who all theguests were, but the three there,right then, were spectacular.There can be little doubt thatBeach would have preferred thatthey not be displayed publicly.They would not have been, butRock needed to fill time:

“The three that are here are fromthe Netherlands representing theold Catholic Church, the WorldBaptist Alliance, and also theWorld Council of Churches. We’revery happy that these gentlemen arehere with us, and we ask them tostand. [Applause.] [In addition to the“20 special guests,” mentioned in theabove-quoted paragraph] We alsohave about 20 observer delegates orobserver guests from a great varietyof Christian communities. And we’rehonored that they have come andspent time witnessing and commun-ing with us.” (#7, p. 31)

Since these three guests—Catholic, Baptist, and WCC lead-ers—were so amazing, one cannothelp wondering who the otherguests were, that Beach broughtto the Session!

After more singing, the ballotresults came back:

“Total number voting: 2,154. Ofthat number, 673 voting YES [forwomen’s ordination], and 1,481 vot-ing NO.” (#7, p. 31)



Another major decision: Thewomen’s ordination issue wasvoted down.

A friend who attended theUtrecht Session told us that hespoke with many people before andafter that Wednesday afternoonmeeting, and by far the majoritywere against women’s ordination.He told me that one high-placed of-ficial personally told him that NorthAmerican leaders knew this wouldbe the last opportunity for Americato get women’s ordination voted inat a Session—because churchmembership outside of NorthAmerica was steadily increasingevery year, and it was the overseasvote which kept it from being ap-proved.

What is ahead?I predict that, within a few

months, Southeastern CaliforniaConference will bolt, and begin or-daining women ministers—in spiteof the Utrecht decision!

Watch for it. It is coming. Whatwill the General Conference doabout it? I predict they will fuss alittle, but will, essentially, do noth-ing. Other areas, such as PotomacConference, may follow their leadand also bolt.

“I have the distinct impressionthat very few people changed theirminds during the course of the af-ternoon: most delegates already haddecided how they would vote.

“And, of course, the result wasidentical with 1990—thumbs down.Support for women’s ordination per-haps increased from about 25 per-cent in Indianapolis to 31 percent.”(William Johnsson, #7, p. 3)

A few paragraphs ago, we statedthat the underlying problem waswhether or not we should stay by

[Dederen] also appealed to Scriptureand Ellen White, but in terms of[what he called] the principles be-hind the statements.

“The differences are striking andimportant. They impact not only thewomen’s issue but many others. Wehave not heard the last of this mat-ter. Adventists will have to wrestlewith this most basic concern: Howshall we interpret Scripture?”(Johnsson, #7, p. 3; italics his)

Except for slight modifications,to our knowledge every one ofWednesday’s items was ap-proved—except one, the ordinationissue, which was rejected outright.

THURSDAY - JULY 6

On Thursday, July 6, 8:30 a.m.,the next business meeting con-vened. It was time to get back torewriting the Constitution.

Did the delegates know, inadvance, that they would be at-tending a Con-Con? That is theabbreviation for a ConstitutionalConvention. The delegates weresent there to change, not the U.S.Constitution, but the basic frame-work and governing paper of theSeventh-day Adventist denomina-tion! What have we come to whenone man can decide to radicallydo that—and no one dares opposehim!

Significantly enough, therewas one man who had been op-posing Folkenberg: David Dennis,the head auditor at world head-quarters for over a decade. Buthe had been ousted just a fewmonths before the Utrecht Ses-sion. (You can read all the detailsin our new book, Collision Course,which is now available in our bookstore or by phone, on credit cardorders: 615-692-2777.

At this Thursday morning meet-

PART FIVE OF FIVE

The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionContinued from the preceding tract in this series Scripture. But the liberals declare

they are remaining with Scripture.While the conservatives take thewords of Scripture, the liberals in-terpret it. Their view is not whatwe read in Scripture, but what weread into it that counts. This isclearly seen in the two speeches—Damsteegt’s and Dederen’s. Howshould we interpret the Bible?Should we take the literal wordsfor what they say, or should westrive to adapt the overall mes-sage to conform with modernfads?

The modernist view is that,when the Bible does not say notto do something, therefore weshould consider doing it. Conser-vatives maintain we must remainwith what is taught in Scripture.But liberals want to interweavetheir own ideas, by finding pas-sages which could possibly meanthis or could be stretched to in-clude that.

William Johnsson presents his(somewhat slanted) view of the con-troversy:

“The crux is how Adventists inter-pret the Bible. The Bible doesn’t di-rectly speak to the issue. If it did, wecould have resolved women’s ordi-nation long ago, because both sideswant to submit to the authority ofthe Word of God.

“Out of this silence one side says—‘Go forward under the leading of theSpirit.’ The other side says—‘We darenot without direct counsel from theLord!’

“And there is more. Yesterday[Wednesday afternoon] we saw tworespected Adventist scholars ap-proach the Scriptures in differentways. One [Damsteegt] based hiscase on specific verses and state-ments of Ellen White, arguing froma literalistic basis. The other

1818181818 WWWWWaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksaymarksing, the expelling churches item wasapproved.

The item entitled “Disbanding orExpelling Churches” was approved.(#8, p. 19)

It would not be simple for thedelegates to easily recognize thesignificance of all these changes.The delegates were presented withprinted material which had little re-lationship to their everyday lives,and they were asked to approve itall. Yet only an expert could be cer-tain of the significance of the pro-posed changes—and twice theywere denied information by suchan expert.

Who but an expert would beable to identify the significantchanges? This is the way it wentthroughout most of the Session; amass of material was set beforethem, and, after a few comments,a hurried vote was needed so thenext of the 72 changes could bevoted on.

As mentioned in an earlier tractstudy, some of the changes ap-proved by the 1994 Annual Coun-cil—were not sent on to Utrechtfor approval. Why are not all con-stitutional and bylaws changessent on to the Session for theirapproval? At any rate, this fact wasbriefly mentioned on #8, p. 20.

The chair next directed the at-tention of the delegates to a majoritem on the agenda: should the to-tal number of delegates attendingeach Session be capped (limitedto a certain maximum amount), orleft uncapped? (#8, p. 21) At the1980 Session this point was pre-sented, and the delegates voteddown capping. Once again it isbrought up, and it is a valid issue.The more delegates which attend,the greater the cost. Since, to agreat degree, a rubberstampingpattern is adhered to during eachten-day Session, the churchmight as well reduce the numberwho attend.

It is of interest that, in response,one delegate arose and said this:

“M.A. Fargo: . . I feel that if we areinterested in solving the problem andaddressing the issue we should cutthe expenses and the size by send-ing and paying for only delegates, notspouses as well.” (#8, p. 22)

Well, that is a discovery new tosome of us! Why are spouses paidto attend General Conference Ses-sions?

Shortly afterward, in spite ofmany who wanted to speak aboutthe capping, discussion was closedbecause it was time for the meetingto adjourn for lunch.

At 2 p.m. on Thursday after-noon, the business meeting shouldhave convened. There was urgentbusiness before the delegates, andthey needed time to discuss the re-maining items of proposed amend-ments (72 of them), and the manyChurch Manual changes (a total of30).

The situation was made moreurgent by the fact that Friday wasthe last day that business meetingswould be held, and so many itemswere yet unfinished!

—So what do you think wasdone? In order to hurry up the “getthe motion approved quick” pat-tern, the delegates were told thatThursday afternoon was assignedto “breakout discussion groups”!(#7, p. 3)

The delegates, when they ap-proved the agenda and schedulethat first Thursday afternoon (#2,p. 26), had little idea that they weregreatly limiting the amount of timethey would have for business, andokaying a vast amount of agendachanges which would be presentedto them.

There was also another usefulreason for skipping the Thursdayafternoon business meeting: Lack-ing it, the delegates would have evenless time to bring up new items ofbusiness on the floor.

Please know that they fully hadthe power and authority to do this.But, unfortunately, many of themdid not know that fact. Consider the

plight of delegate Morten Thomsen,who, in the Friday afternoon meet-ing, said this at the microphone:

“How does a delegate get an itemon the agenda? There is no planscommittee as such.” (#9, p. 19)

Consider the picture: MortenThomsen, as a bonifide delegate tothe 1995 General Conference Ses-sion, at a business meeting of thatSession, had the authority to makea motion, right then, to bring a newitem of business to the floor for dis-cussion and vote—in this meetingof this Session!

Or if he preferred, right then,he could make a motion to placean item on the next Session’sagenda (with approval, of course,from the delegates).

Yet, instead of telling BrotherThomsen that fact, he was given afive-year roundaround, duringwhich the conference, the union,and all the division presidentswould have to decide if they wantedto bother presenting his agendaitem to the A.D. 2000 Session!

“G. Ralph Thompson: Agendaitems generally follow the route ofgoing through the organizations fromthe conference committee to theunion committee, then to the divisioncommittee, and finally to the Gen-eral Conference. If, after discussion,all the divisions think the matter isof general interest for a session, thenit will be brought through the chan-nels to the General Conference An-nual Council, and that’s the body thatrecommends items for the GC ses-sion agenda.” (#9, p. 19)

That which Thompson forgot tomention to the Thomsen (and theother listening delegates)—was thatthat was the pattern used by achurch member, NOT A DELEGATESITTING IN A BUSINESS MEETINGOF THE SESSION!

Except for slight modifications,to our knowledge every one ofThursday’s items was approved.

FRIDAY - JULY 7

At 8:30 a.m., Friday, the busi-ness meetings resumed. One item

1919191919The Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht SessionThe Utrecht Sessionbrought before the delegates in-cluded the point that the treasurerand secretary of the GC could notbring anything to the GC commit-tee—until they had first counseledwith the president regarding thematter!

Several delegates, observingthis effort to further tighten controlsin the hand of Folkenberg, objected.

“Susan Sickler: . . If the differencein terms means that the presidentcan kill a report of fellow officersbefore it goes to the Executive Com-mittee, we are in deep trouble. Oneof the major checks and balancesthat we have is that these people havefree access to the Executive Commit-tee. I have personally been in a con-ference in which, if the treasurer hadnot gone directly to the ExecutiveCommittee despite what the presi-dent wanted, we would have becomebankrupt.” (#9, p. 10)

In response, it was stated byTolhurst (the one who underFolkenberg’s direction had writtenall the changes) that everythingwould work out all right, so the itemwas approved by the delegates. Butnot before Joyce Hopp expressedher concerns:

“I also wish to speak to the samewords, ‘in consultation with.’ I amvery concerned lest the treasurer andthe secretary be unable to go directlyto the Executive Committees if thereis a problem. It’s when there is aproblem that you need all the safe-guards you can get. I am very con-cerned with this language.” (#9, p.10)

Another item was to appoint aspecial board to recommend whoshould be elected onto the nextauditing staff. When it was sug-gested that those on the boardought to be decided right then (in-stead of waiting five years to do so),the chair said there was not enough

time to pick names. Yet this item ofbusiness had been known monthsahead of time. There had been lotsof time to select names for the del-egates to choose from. Instead, itwill not be selected till half a decadelater (#9, p. 10). In connection withthis, associate division auditorswould not be elected at Sessions.(#9, p. 11)

At one point, it was noted thatsome church entities are not au-dited by church auditors (#9, p.11), even though it was stated thatchurch auditors do a better job thanoutside auditors (#9, p. 12). In con-nection with this discussion, the factcame out that our most notoriouschurch entity for running up bigbills and going heavily into debt—Adventist Health Systems—is ex-empt from having church auditorscheck on what they do! (#9, p. 11)

No wonder the church does notknow what is happening in AHS fi-nances!

Eventually, the item of whetherto cap the delegates at 2,650 or2,000 was brought back from thetable and presented to the delegatesfor their vote. After discussion, itwas voted to table the item until thatafternoon.

After lunch, the delegates reas-sembled for the final business meet-ing, which convened at 1:30 p.m.

A major part of the meeting wasallocated by the chair to honoringretired and retiring workers withwords of appreciation. Severalspeeches were given.

Partway through the afternoon,the final report of the nominatingcommittee was presented to thedelegates. It included many, manynames which were approved in asingle vote. It is of surprising inter-est that Wintley Phipps, the well-

known Black singer, was included:According to the Bulletin, he is nowassociate director of the GC PublicAffairs and Religious Liberty De-partment (#9, p. 18)! Yet he hasprobably never had a day of train-ing in legal affairs, courtrooms, orlegislative lobbying in his life.

Eventually, the tabled item ofcapping was again taken up anddiscussed further. It was voted tolimit the number of delegates sentto future Sessions to 2,000.

The concluding portion of thismeeting consisted of statements byformer leaders, now retired, whospoke of how well the businessmeetings had gone, and theprogress that had been made.

Except for slight modifications,to our knowledge every one ofFriday’s items was approved.

So the 1995 General Confer-ence Session is past. But it is wellto consider one point on which it,and every other Session could havebeen improved. There was abso-lutely no mention—not one—ofBible or Spirit of Prophecy prin-ciples throughout the entire Ses-sion, except in those two women’sordination sermons (Damsteegt’sand Dederen’s). One would thinkthat the Bible and Spirit of Proph-ecy has nothing to say about churchbusiness matters, but God’s Wordhas much to say about such mat-ters.

How can we have success incarrying on God’s work, when wedo not put God’s Inspired Writingsfirst when we discuss that work?

For your information, the nextGeneral Conference Session isslated to be held in Toronto, Canadain the summer of A.D. 2000.

If you will count the total numberof hours allocated for business meet-ings at this Session, you will find theyare about average for General Confer-ence Sessions.

Looking through the schedules

and text of the business meetings, andsubtracting the extraneous speeches,honorariums, etc., we find that there wasonly about 41 hours and 47 minutesactual hours of business. With eight busi-ness days, this averaged a little over 5

hours per day.Yet that is what the delegates were

brought to Utrecht to do—initiate andtransact five years’ worth of business.!

See the chart on the next page.Pray for our people.


More WAYMARKS - from — PILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS REST HCR 77, BOX 38A - BEERSHEBA SPRINGS, TN 37305 USA

LISTSList of delegates #1, pp. 21-31List of radio stations #1, p. 19Session agenda #1, p. 8Highlights from past Sessions #1, p. 4Nominating Committee members #3, p. 31

NOMINATING COMMITTE REPORTS:1st Report: #2, p. 312nd Report: #2, p. 313rd Report: #3, p. 314th Report: #4, p. 315th Report: #5, p. 316th Report: #5, p. 317th Report: Not printed in the Bulletin8th Report: #6, p. 319th Report: #10th Report: #

THURSDAY

DAY ONE: Thursday, June 29 #2, pp. 2-3FIRST BUSINESS MEETING [Part One]: 3 p.m. #2,

pp. 24-26ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinFIRST BUSINESS MEETING [Part Two]: 7 p.m. #2,

pp. 27-28ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinSCHEDULE: Thursday, June 29 #2, p. 6

FRIDAY

DAY TWO: Friday, June 30 #2, pp. 2-3SECOND BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. pp. 28, 30ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinTHIRD BUSINESS MEETING: 12 noon pp. #2, pp.

30-31ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinFOURTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #3, pp. 12-15ACTIONS: #3, p. 30SCHEDULE: Friday, June 30 #2, p. 6

SABBATH

DAY THREE: Sabbath, July 1 #2, pp. 7-8SCHEDULE: Sabbath, July 1 #2, p. 6

SUNDAY

DAY FOUR: Sunday, July 2 #3, pp. 2-4FIFTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #4, pp. 23-

24, 26-28ACTIONS: #4, pp. 30-31SIXTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #4, pp. 28-30

ACTIONS: #5, pp. 20-21SCHEDULE: Sunday, July 2 #3, p. 4

MONDAY

DAY FIVE: Monday, July 3 #4, pp. 2-4SEVENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #5, pp.

12-15ACTIONS: #5, pp. 21-23EIGHTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #6, pp. 20-21ACTIONS: #6, pp. 21-23SCHEDULE: Monday, July 3 #4, p. 4

TUESDAY

DAY SIX: Tuesday, July 4 #5, pp. 2-4NINTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #6, pp. 23-

27ACTIONS: #7, p. 13TENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #6, pp. 28-31ACTIONS: #7, pp. 13-14 and #8, 26-27ELEVENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 4:45 p.m. #6, pp.

31ACTIONS: #8, p. 27SCHEDULE: Tuesday, July 4 #5, p. 4

WEDNESDAY

DAY SEVEN: Wednesday, July 5 #6, pp. 2-4TWELFTH BUSINESS MEETING: #7, pp. 19-22ACTIONS: #8, pp. 27-30THIRTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #7, pp. 23-31ACTIONS: #8, pp. 30SCHEDULE: Wednesday, July 5 #6, p. 4

THURSDAY

DAY EIGHT: Thursday, July 6 #7, pp. 2-3FOURTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #8, pp. 18-22ACTIONS: #9, pp. 22-23, 25-27Afternoon BUSINESS MEETING: None held, instead

small discussion groups met [#7, p. 3]SCHEDULE: Thursday, July 6 #7, p. 3

FRIDAY

DAY NINE: Friday, July 7 #8, pp. 2-3FIFTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #9, pp. 10-14ACTIONS: #9, pp. 27-30SIXTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #9, pp. 14-15,

18-19ACTIONS: #9, pp. 30-31SCHEDULE: Friday, July 7 #8, p. 3

SABBATH

DAY TEN: Sabbath, July 8 #9, pp. 2-3SCHEDULE: Sabbath, July 8 #9, pp. 3

Frankly, General Conference Sessions are somewhat difficult to figure out. The followingguide to the ten General Conference Bulletins may help you in your personal analysis.

GUIDE TO THE BULLETINS

More WAYMARKS - from — PILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS RESTPILGRIMS REST HCR 77, BOX 38A - BEERSHEBA SPRINGS, TN 37305 USA

GUIDE TO THE BULLETINS

Frankly, General Conference Sessions are somewhat difficult to figure out. The followingguide to the ten General Conference Bulletins may help you in your personal analysis.

LISTSList of delegates #1, pp. 21-31List of radio stations #1, p. 19Session agenda #1, p. 8Highlights from past Sessions #1, p. 4Nominating Committee members #3, p. 31

NOMINATING COMMITTE REPORTS:1st Report: #2, p. 312nd Report: #2, p. 313rd Report: #3, p. 314th Report: #4, p. 315th Report: #5, p. 316th Report: #5, p. 317th Report: Not printed in the Bulletin8th Report: #6, p. 319th Report: #10th Report: #

THURSDAY

DAY ONE: Thursday, June 29 #2, pp. 2-3FIRST BUSINESS MEETING [Part One]: 3 p.m. #2, pp.

24-26 [c. 2 actual hours of business]ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinFIRST BUSINESS MEETING [Part Two]: 7 p.m. #2, pp.

27-28 [0 hours actual busines]ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinSCHEDULE: Thursday, June 29 #2, p. 6

FRIDAY

DAY TWO: Friday, June 30 #2, pp. 2-3SECOND BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. pp. 28, 30 [ c.

20 minutes actual business]ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinTHIRD BUSINESS MEETING: 12 noon pp. #2, pp. 30-

31 [c. 15 minutes actual business]ACTIONS: Not printed in the BulletinFOURTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #3, pp. 12-15

[c. 3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #3, p. 30SCHEDULE: Friday, June 30 #2, p. 6

SABBATH

DAY THREE: Sabbath, July 1 #2, pp. 7-8SCHEDULE: Sabbath, July 1 #2, p. 6

SUNDAY

DAY FOUR: Sunday, July 2 #3, pp. 2-4FIFTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #4, pp. 23-24,

26-28 [c. 3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #4, pp. 30-31SIXTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #4, pp. 28-30 [c.

3-1/2 hours actual business]

ACTIONS: #5, pp. 20-21SCHEDULE: Sunday, July 2 #3, p. 4

MONDAY

DAY FIVE: Monday, July 3 #4, pp. 2-4SEVENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #5, pp. 12-

15 [c. 3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #5, pp. 21-23EIGHTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #6, pp. 20-21 [c.

3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #6, pp. 21-23SCHEDULE: Monday, July 3 #4, p. 4

TUESDAY

DAY SIX: Tuesday, July 4 #5, pp. 2-4NINTH BUSINESS MEETING: 8:30 a.m. #6, pp. 23-27

[c. 3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #7, p. 13TENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 2 p.m. #6, pp. 28-31 [c.

2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #7, pp. 13-14 and #8, 26-27ELEVENTH BUSINESS MEETING: 4:45 p.m. #6, pp. 31

[c. 1 hour actual business]ACTIONS: #8, p. 27SCHEDULE: Tuesday, July 4 #5, p. 4

WEDNESDAY

DAY SEVEN: Wednesday, July 5 #6, pp. 2-4TWELFTH BUSINESS MEETING: #7, pp. 19-22 [c. 3-1/2

hours actual business]ACTIONS: #8, pp. 27-30THIRTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #7, pp. 23-31 [c.

3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #8, pp. 30SCHEDULE: Wednesday, July 5 #6, p. 4

THURSDAY

DAY EIGHT: Thursday, July 6 #7, pp. 2-3FOURTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #8, pp. 18-22 [c.

3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #9, pp. 22-23, 25-27Afternoon BUSINESS MEETING: None held, instead

small discussion groups met [#7, p. 3]SCHEDULE: Thursday, July 6 #7, p. 3

FRIDAY

DAY NINE: Friday, July 7 #8, pp. 2-3FIFTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #9, pp. 10-14 [c. 3-

1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #9, pp. 27-30SIXTEENTH BUSINESS MEETING: #9, pp. 14-15, 18-

19 [c. 3-1/2 hours actual business]ACTIONS: #9, pp. 30-31SCHEDULE: Friday, July 7 #8, p. 3

SABBATH

DAY TEN: Sabbath, July 8 #9, pp. 2-3SCHEDULE: Sabbath, July 8 #9, pp. 3

The Utrecht SessionActually, it is the business ses-sions which are the most important! “The...

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Transcript of The Utrecht SessionActually, it is the business ses-sions which are the most important! “The...