Healing continues as Synod declares ‘full communion’ with Puerto Rican partner

U.S. and Puerto Rican church partners who parted ways nearly 20 years ago took a big step back toward each other on July 14.

Meeting in Kansas City, the 35^th General Synod of the United Church of Christ declared the church to be in ‘full communion’ with its longtime Caribbean partner, Iglesia Evangélica Unida de Puerto Rico. The UCC Board had brought the proposal to the Synod with encouragement from leaders of the Puerto Rican church, after years of conversation.

Synod delegates passed the resolution by a vote of 606 yes, 52 no and 22 abstaining.

The lingering wounds on both sides since the Iglesia left the UCC in 2006 became clear as soon as delegates started discussing the matter. So, however, did new hopes that have emerged since the split.

UCC General Minister and President/CEO the Rev. Karen Georgia Thompson spoke in favor of full communion to a committee of delegates considering the matter on July 12. She said LGBTQ issues had been a reason, but not the only one, for the rift.

The Iglesia left after the UCC Synod voted in 2005 to support marriage equality for LGBTQ people, “and that’s something we’ve had multiple conversations with IEUPR since then,” Thompson said.

A denomination unto itself within Puerto Rico, the Iglesia had also functioned as the UCC’s Puerto Rico Conference since 1961. After the marriage equality vote, the Iglesia’s assembly voted in 2006 to disaffiliate with the UCC. It ceased to exist as a UCC Conference in 2007.

During those same years, however, the Puerto Rican church was also discussing “what it meant for IEUPR to be part of the United Church of Christ at a time when questions were being raised in Puerto Rico around sovereignty: questions about colonialism, the relationship between the United States and Puerto Rico,” Thompson said.

Pastor General Edward Rivera confirmed that. He acknowledged a variety of opinions on LGBTQ issues in IEUPR churches, just as exists among UCC congregations. “But this is not the only issue,” he told the committee. “We have political issues. We have nationalism issues. We have colonization issues.” He spoke of the church’s fight – joined by the UCC over many years – to get a U.S. military bases off the island. “Because we are a nation,” he said. “We are Puerto Ricans. We are Caribbeans. We are Latin American people.”

Despite the 2007 break, the two partners never lost contact. The joint Global Ministries of the UCC and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) provided one built-in tie with Puerto Rico. But years of focused, bilateral talks between the UCC and Iglesia Unida also followed. The two discussed their historic ties and how a new relationship might look.

A big step came in 2019. That year, the UCC Synod and the Iglesia’s churchwide assembly voted to work toward ‘visible unity’ and “the closest possible relationship while each church retains its autonomy.”

In Kansas City, floor debate on the matter focused mostly on three issues.

One was trust. Several UCC delegates born in Puerto Rico questioned the Iglesia’s openness on LGBTQ issues and said they were skeptical that they would be accepted by churches on the island.

“As a Puerto Rican, as a member of both churches for more than 30 years, I’ve been a witness to the ups and downs of the relationship,” said Jeanette Zaragosa, a delegate from the Collectivo de Latinx Minsitries. “It is Christian to hope for change and for reconciliation.” However, translating from Spanish, she said a section of the IEUPR’s manual on ministry says the church “stands against the practice of homosexuality.”

A second issue came as counterpoint. The UCC is in full communion with other churches, such as the Reformed Church in America, that lack an equivalent to the UCC’s Open and Affirming stance. Thompson pointed that out to the committee and delegates on the floor noted it.

Michigan Conference delegate Aaron Rider said First Congregational Church of Sheboygan had rejoined the UCC while he was serving there. “When we did so, we were not asked if we were ONA,” he said. He said he believed other partners should not be subjected to questioning “that my church was not.” 

A third was whether the Collectivo – not yet involved of full communion conversations – would be in the future. Thompson confirmed that it would.

The UCC’s history with the church in Puerto Rico dates back to the work of the American Missionary Association, a forerunner of today’s Justice and Witness Ministries. It is visible in things like a hospital, a seminary, hurricane recovery and a commitment to justice for Puerto Rican political prisoners.

Full communion is not a merger or union. Rather, the World Council of Churches has laid out a vision for this kind of relationship between churches. It involves:

• common confession of Christ

• mutual recognition of members

• common celebration of the Holy Communion

• mutual recognition and reconciliation of ordained ministries, and

• common commitment to mission.

More on full-communion relationships, including those that the UCC shares with other denominations, can be found here.

“As with every other full communion agreement that we have, this is a beginning,” Thompson told the Synod. “There is a lot to be done as we work through the details of what it means to be in relationship.”

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