Seventh: Biennial

The annual gathering of American Baptists as a convention was scrapped by the SCOR/SCODS reorganization in favor of a Biennial. But more than timing changed, most of the governance work of the denomination was transferred to the General Board, which was being created as an intentional, proportionately representative body. This was a good move. It was the right thing. This is what SCODS said in their final report: “The unrepresentative nature of the annual meeting raises the question of ability and right of such meetings to take legislative action and to handle the business of the A.B.C.” Not only is the participation in national gatherings incredibly small (compared to the whole body), it is at the same time not representative (it is self-selected by those with the time and money to attend), and it is at the same time heavily impacted by geography (driving distance to the meeting). The top three functions for the revised Biennial are: celebration, inspiration, information (reporting on what the General Board had done).

At this point, the plan under discussion does not envision any significant changes in the role of the Biennial. We haven’t talked much about it. True, there are some who want the Biennial to become a stage for conflict and combat like the old Convention meetings—but I don’t think there are many. On the other hand, there are those who are troubled by the costs of the Biennial, and wonder if even less frequent meetings might be in order—but I don’t think there are many of those either.

In my opinion, every critique that SCOR/SCODS raised regarding the old Convention meetings is still true, and even more so. While it is necessary that certain governance functions (especially Bylaw changes) reside in a body larger than the General Board (or its successor) I think the time has come to think in a different way. If the governance functions of the Biennial remain very few (and I think they should), then there is no reason we cannot do a denomination-wide referendum at low cost in a reasonable length of time.

This would make the denomination truly a participative democracy. Yes, it would take a little work, but I don’t believe it would be that difficult. Churches could be assigned “votes” equivalent to a delegate calculation formula. Information would be prepared a distributed. Discussion sessions could be scheduled. Regions would be responsible for collecting and reporting the votes.

It would also take a little more time. But the Biennial deals with no issues that require immediate decision. So what if it takes four months of discussion across the denomination before a decision is registered? Spreading out the discussion, slowing down the decision, deliberately including everyone might actually keep us from saying and doing regrettable things. In particular, all public witness statements need to be done this way.

Keep the Biennial as a celebrative, inspirational, informational meeting. Elect officers. But keep everything else out of it.