File photo by Maidstone Mulenga. With the amended call, members of the Commission on a Way Forward - not the bishops - will present the report to the 2019 Special Session of General Conference

The Council of Bishops has amended its call for the 2019 special General Conference.

Under the new call, delegates to the denomination’s top lawmaking body will receive petitions from the 32-member Commission on a Way Forward — not the bishops themselves. The bishops appointed the commission to help the denomination find a way through its intensifying debate over how the church ministers with LGBTQ individuals.

“The purpose of this Special Session of the General Conference shall be limited to receiving and acting upon a report from the Commission on a Way Forward based upon the recommendations of the Council of the Bishops,” said the amended call by Bishop Kenneth H. Carter Jr., Council of Bishops president. The special General Conference, the denomination’s top legislative assembly, will be Feb. 23-26 next year in St. Louis.

The amended call means that delegates will receive legislation for not only the bishops’ recommended One Church Plan but also the Traditional and Connectional Conference plans the commission brought to the bishops. Read the full story here.