A Surprise in the United Methodist Church?

[Tim Bonney]

[Haruo]

21 to 1

I'm interested in knowing the thinking of the one nay voter. Anti-inclusiveness? Pro-UMC-obedience? Opposed to the Bolshevistic appearance of unanimous tallies? ¿?

[Dave Roberts]

I've been listening to some of my UMC friends and their responses to the recent General Assembly. There are two UMC churches in our small city. Interestingly, one is much more conservative than the other. The people of the first group seem quite happy while the second church which has a small LGBTQ group that is active in the church seems less happy. My suspicion is that the second group might be open to leaving the UMC, but I am not certain.

[Sandy]

Most of the contact I've had with members and pastors in the UMC occurred when we lived in Pennsylvania. We had a couple dozen students from three or four UMC congregations in the school and I'd say all of them were as conservative as the school's Christian and Missionary Alliance sponsors. When we first moved there, we were invited by one of the parents of a student in my wife's classroom to a very contemporary church called "CrossFire." It met in a metal building converted from a previous use, about 700 in attendance at the service we attended, they had two, both the same. Pastor preached in jeans and an untucked shirt. I would never have picked up on the fact that it was a United Methodist Church except that I recognized the logo on the wall by the entrance to the auditorium. Knowing the families in my former school from there, I would guess it was pleased with the General Conference decision. The preaching would have been well received in most of the Southern Baptist churches where I've been a member. One of the other UMC churches from which we had several families and students called itself "Country Chapel Church" and I was halfway through my tenure there before one of the parents told me it was a United Methodist congregation. I knew the pastor, and I would guess he's happy with the GC as well as their church.

Around here, the only "Methodists" in our school, about two dozen, are A.M.E. and I don't know if they're connected to the UMC general conference or not.

[KeithE]

[KeithE]

[Haruo]

[Tim Bonney]

[Tim Bonney]

[KeithE]

[Tim Bonney]

[Sandy]

It sounds like this comes down to "don't force my church to do something it doesn't want to do," whether that's to be "welcoming and affirming" or to hold to a traditional view. What it sounds like to me is that there are some district superintendents in the UMC who are sensitive to the perspectives of the congregations in their district and are able to find pastoral leadership that fits well with each local church. That might avoid a lot of the problem.

The biggest problem with the whole issue is that even in "liberal" or "progressive" denominations and churches, it is difficult to push against a position that has traditionally and historically been held by the church. The progressive or liberal view must step away from widely accepted views of Biblical authority and interpretation to arrive at their conclusions. Even though there are many churches and denominations that don't subscribe to inerrancy, there are far fewer who will go so far as to say that the writings of the Old Testament, or those of Paul carry less inspiration, weight and authority than the rest of the Bible. I don't believe even the most liberal Methodist church in the world would accept a pastor who continued to be involved in an adulterous affair without repenting and stopping it. And as far as Jesus goes, well, his view of sexuality considers any physical relationship outside of marriage as sinful. The Methodist church's statement of faith doesn't include inerrancy, but it does include statements about the authority of scripture that are counter to the interpretation Adam Hamilton, in one of Keith's posts, used to make his point. I can observe that, even among many of the UMC's clergy in the United States, there are wide gaps in the views on this subject and how the church should handle it.

[Tim Bonney]

Sandy, I don’t have the energy to argue about UMC theology right now. (No negative comment about you intended.) But I believe there are some very solid Biblical arguments with an authoritative understanding of scripture for accepting LGBTQ+ people fully into the Church.

Some day, when I’m less worn with denominational stuff myself, I’d be happy to discuss that more. But suffice it to say, Progressives believe we haven’t had to move any further away from Biblical authority than we had to move to be against slavery or for women in ministry, both of which are hard to argue about from a Pauline perspective since Paul supported women being silent (in some places) and told slaves to obey their masters. We take the Bible seriously, not literally.

Unfortunately part of United Methodism have been infected by a right wing evangelicalism that is not at all a part of our heritage.

[Sandy]