This surprises me as I thought the Methodists were fairly liberal. But apparently there are strong conservative elements in the Philippines and Africa as well as some in the U.S.
Disclosure: I belong to a UMC church, which is a “reconciling congregation” (that is, we are fully supportive of full inclusion in the church of people of all sexual orientations).
Yes, most of the UMC in the northern US (and much of Europe) is liberal. But, there is a very conservative southern US wing of the church, and that group has been responsible for rallying support from the conservative Methodists in Africa and Asia, to fight against the efforts from liberal Methodists to remove wording in the Book of Discipline (that is, the law book of the UMC) which prohibits Methodist ministers from conducting same-sex marriages, as well as prohibiting those ministers from being practicing homosexuals.
The relevant passages from the Book of Discipline (source):
In fact, the UMC has been in the middle of an internal “war” over this topic for several years. After the UMC was unable to settle the issue at the last General Conference (in 2016), they spent two more years studying it. In a special conference last year, the conservative wing of the church was able to force through their “Traditional Plan,” which not only kept the current wording in the Book of Discipline about homosexuality, but established more punitive punishment for Methodist ministers who went against it.
When that happened, those of us in liberal UMC churches were stunned, and it became pretty clear that schism was going to be inevitable.
No surprise to me. Both the Mrs. and I grew up Methodist (NOT the same congregations, nor even in the same state), and we were taught there early that homosexuality was bad, no question about it.
Why don’t all the mainstream Protestants just realign on liberal/conservative lines? At this point the differences between Episcopalians/ELCA/liberal Methodists are far smaller than the differences between say ELCA Lutherans and Missouri Synod Lutherans.
The priest from my mother’s church has been instructed not to marry gays. But he flat out told them if a gay couple comes to him asking to get married, he WILL NOT turn them away.
And they pretty much have to deal with it because he has a huge draw. His sermons are televised locally in Tulsa if I understand correctly.
There’s a whole bunch of other issues that can cause church splits, or (in this case) prevent denominations from merging. Mode and method of baptism, liturgy, mode of church government, etc., etc.
Episcopal or Catholic? The first one is hard to grasp because the Episcopalians are the most friendly LGBT church out there, and the second is even harder because I don’t care how popular you are, the Vatican ain’t letting priests even think of same sex marriages.
Methodist.
This is gonna be happening more often in the next couple of years. The Reformed Church of America is bracing for a schism this summer at their General Synod, and the Christian Reformed Church of North American (which, incidentally, was formed by way of schism with the Reformed Church of American in the 1800s), will likely be doing the same at their Synod in 2021.
FTR, I’m officially a member of the Christian Reformed Church, currently attending a Reformed Church, and will be following the progressive gay-supporters out the door when this all goes down. I hope, and I think, the Reformed congregation that we’re attending now will go the way of the LGBTQ progressives. They’ve always been somewhat of a rebel congregation (they’re *Second *Reformed because the founding members were tired of all of the services being in Dutch at *First *Reformed).
How long have Methodists been using the term “priest”? I know they have bishops, but didn’t know they have priests.
The United Methodist Church doesn’t refer to its clergy as “priests” – they’re typically referred to as “pastors,” though it appears that the technical term is “elder” (though I also know Methodist deacons).
Churches don’t join based on one issue, they are theologically and polity distinct. That said, Canada had the Methodist, Congregational, and Presbyterian churches form, and Methodism is (historically) theologically very different from the other two.
You’ll have to forgive me. I’m an atheist that doesn’t take much interest in religion. This was a conversation I had in passing with my mother. We didn’t get into the details.
And I obviously got the labels wrong.
Question: which has more members, the more liberal UMC churches or the more conservative ones?
So calling it the United Methodist Church is a bit of a misnomer, yes?
In the US? It’s a pretty “liberal” denomination, far cry from their roots. Some of the really conservative (politically and theologically) ones are already in the non-UMC Methodists and have been for generations.
What do you and she believe now, in today’s society?
Just curious…Thanks.
double post, my bad!
No, the name is because of a merger:
Sunflower and I were raised Roman Catholic and taught the same thing. Of course there was a percentage of those who were doing the teaching during the day and molesting altar boys in the evening. Not to mention the organizational cover up extending clear to the Vatican.
We are now Episcopal