The ministry now known as Peacemaker Ministries began in the early 1980’s with a singular purpose: equip the church with dispute resolution skills so that disputes among Christians are resolved among Christians, using Christian principles, to God’s glory. The two foundational Scriptures for the ministry complement one another: I Corinthians 6:1-7 exhorts Christians not to sue one another in court, and Matthew 18:15-17 describes a process for how Christians should resolve their disputes. If Christians follow the principles in Matthew 18, they are unlikely to have unresolved disputes needing a court decision; but if they do, they can bring them to fellow Christians “wise enough” to resolve them, so there’s no need for Christians to bring their disputes to civil courts.
As the ministry grew, the development of inter-personal peacemaking skills (Matthew 18:15) was distinguished from the development of skills needed to intervene in other people’s conflicts (Matthew 18:16, I Cor. 6:5). All aspects of intervening in others’ conflicts—case administration of mediation and arbitration, Rules of Procedure, contract clauses, advanced training, and the certification of gifted conciliators—were placed under the umbrella of the Institute of Christian Conciliation (ICC) as a division of Peacemaker Ministries over twenty years ago.
Now the ICC will be formally separated from Peacemaker Ministries (PM). As PM sharpens its focus on equipping laypeople to respond to conflict biblically, it is seeking a new “owner” for the ICC. The board came to the difficult decision that it could not be a good steward of the ICC as well as of the other resources entrusted to it, especially the newest offering, The Path of a Peacemaker. The ICC audience is much smaller than the church at large, and deserves resources devoted to it. As one who has been involved with Peacemaker Ministries for decades, and now as a member of the board of directors, I have struggled with this decision. It feels in some ways like we’re cutting the heart out of the ministry; but on another level, it is a logical next step, given the dual audiences and the fiscal constraints in which PM is currently operating. I do believe God has made it clear to the board that things need to change and, as a matter of good stewardship, PM should transfer the ICC to another organization that can better enable it to fulfill its potential.
The church needs the ministry of the ICC more than ever. Christians continue to sue one another because they don’t know there’s a viable Christian alternative; and Christians gifted as mediators and arbitrators are searching for opportunities to use their skills to serve the church. With God’s help, the next owner of the ICC can energize this ministry so that it becomes a standard, integral component of the church.
A recent article on CNN highlights the difference it makes to a medical patient when the offending physician/institution apologizes versus when it refuses to acknowledge its error. In the case where a woman’s son died due to hospital error, the hospital immediately apologized, explained to her how it had occurred, provided some financial compensation, and invited the mother to help it take steps to ensure this wouldn’t happen again. In a different case where the physician removed the wrong rib, the physician tried to cover up the error, and now the patient is suing the physician and hospital. Her lawyer says the lawsuit isn’t about the mistake; it’s because no one ever apologized.
Should the statute of limitations be tolled while a denomination follows internal dispute resolution procedures? Expressed another way: Does it violate religious freedom when disputing parties of faith following their mandatory internal process must also file their case in court or lose their chance to pursue a remedy in the civil courts?
There have been many disputes in the U.S. recently between local congregations and their denominations regarding who owns the property where the congregation meets. It’s not unusual for these to end up in court. One recently went through the Michigan court system, and the denomination is asking the U. S. Supreme Court to give them another chance in the state courts.
Defendant Bais Chabad claims the title to the property in West Bloomfield where their congregation is located. Plaintiff Chabad-Lubovitch of Michigan claims all property should be titled in its name. After several years of internal dispute resolution proceedings, Plaintiff filed suit in Michigan’s circuit court. Defendant argued that the statute of limitations had expired; Plaintiff countered that the statute was tolled while the parties tried to resolve this internally. The trial court agreed with the Defendant and dismissed the case.
Plaintiff appealed to the Michigan Court of Appeals. That court reversed, holding that mandatory dispute resolution procedures toll the statute of limitations, and that includes exhaustion of “ecclesiastical remedies.” The court referred to this as the doctrine of equitable tolling, noting that the reasons behind statutes of limitations—that plaintiffs not sleep on their rights, or expect defendants to defend stale claims—were not present here, where parties have been litigating this matter vigorously for years.
The Michigan Supreme Court tersely reversed the Court of Appeals, in lieu of granting plaintiffs’ leave to appeal, ordering that “there are no grounds on which to equitably toll the statute of limitations.” (Order 149567, May 20, 2015) So now the plaintiff is petitioning the US Supreme Court to grant cert to establish a First Amendment “church autonomy” exception to statutes of limitations. Peacemaker Ministries supports the petitioner in this case. Requiring parties to file a lawsuit to preserve their legal remedy — including their right to enforce the parties’ agreement — is contrary to the proscription in I Corinthians 6 against suing believers in court. Filing a lawsuit also makes it much more difficult for disputing parties to reconcile.
February 13, 2016 – 1:11 pm
The mother of one of the Columbine shooters told the families of her son’s victims last night on TV, “I’m sorry.” Sue Klebold, mother of Dylan Klebold, broke her years-long silence in an interview with Diane Sawyer in anticipation of release of her book, A Mother’s Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of the Columbine Tragedy. “I’m so sorry for what my son did. And yet I know that just saying I’m sorry is such an inadequate response to all this suffering.”
Sue Klebold has spent the last eleven years trying to figure out what went wrong. She realizes now that her son was suffering from depression, whereas she chalked up his moodiness to normal adolescence. She regrets that she didn’t heed warning signs.
After shooting 12 fellow students and teachers at his high school in April 1999, Dylan and his colleague Eric Harris committed suicide. Dylan cannot apologize for what he did. Can his mother apologize for his actions? It’s tough to apologize on behalf of someone else, and the apology probably brings little relief to victims.
Perhaps more helpful to victims is to hear Sue Klebold acknowledge what she wishes she had done differently. She regrets that she didn’t search his bedroom, didn’t discover his journal, didn’t ask more questions about school. She didn’t specifically apologize for that in the TV interview; perhaps she does in the book.
The father of one of the victims said after the incident, “There’s a false teaching that God forgives everyone; he doesn’t. God never forgives the unrepentant.” Is he implying that, if God will not forgive, neither can he? But the family of Rachel Scott, another victim, has established a foundation promoting forgiveness. And Ann Marie Hochholter, paralyzed from the waist down, said, ”I realized that holding onto that anger does nothing; it just brings you down.”
February 2, 2016 – 7:52 pm
The panel of mediation experts who addressed this question in an ADR Section-sponsored phone conference today concluded, “It depends.” The more parties trust the mediator, the more the mediator can push without appearing “pushy.”
From a legal perspective, mediators can be as pushy, or coercive, as they want to be, without repercussion. Prof. James Coben of Hamline University Law School reported that, although there are a dozen cases a year nationally where parties claim mediator coercion, courts aren’t receptive to such claims, partly because courts favor settlements, and partly because the legal definition of “coercion” doesn’t fit mediation, where the complaint is not about the other party to the contract, but to a third party.
But from a professional perspective, a party who felt pushed into a resolution is not a satisfied customer. So the panel developed an impromptu list of “best practices” to help a mediator avoid pushing too hard for a resolution:
- Mediators should always begin facilitatively, in order to build trust.
- Beware that coercive possibilities increase as time goes on; the longer the mediation session, the more likely that a party will feel undue pressure.
- Attend to party requests to take a break, or to cease altogether.
- Consider letting parties leave without signing an agreement, so they can “sleep on it” – although the panel agreed that this will likely result in fewer agreements.
- Be gracious and artful in raising risk-exposing questions. If a party has a past drunk driving conviction, Mediator can ask, “Have you had conversations about how this will play out?” instead of, “You’re going to look like an idiot if this comes out!”
- Beware of party perceptions – the mediator may be communicating what the other side told her to say, but a party may perceive it as the mediator’s own opinion.
- Make sure parties go through domestic violence screening, and refuse to mediate a case where domestic violence patterns may make mediation ineffective.
