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Over 100 congregations in Florida have sued a regional body of The United Methodist Church, believing they are not being given fair terms for leaving the second-largest denomination in the United States amid its schism over homosexuality. A total of 106 congregations filed suit against the UMC Florida Annual Conference last Thursday in the Circuit Court for the Eighth Judicial Circuit in and for Bradford County, Civil Division. A specific issue in the lawsuit is how the departing congregations are required to pay the conference a "sum of money" to retain control of their church properties. The complaint alleges that...

Fifty-eight congregations in Louisiana have officially disaffiliated from The United Methodist Church, as the second-largest mainline Protestant denomination in the United States continues to experience schism due to its ongoing debate over homosexuality. The UMC Louisiana Conference held a special session on Saturday, approving the votes of 58 congregations who decided by at least two-thirds vote to leave the UMC. The Rev. Todd Rossnagel, the director of communication strategies at the Louisiana Conference, told The Christian Post on Monday that the 58 churches came after nine other congregations had disaffiliation votes approved at the annual conference in June. Earlier this...

The leadership of a Texas megachurch has decided to leave The United Methodist Church without a congregational vote, which defies denominational rules on dismissal. St. Andrew United Methodist Church of Plano, which has approximately 6,500 members, recently announced that the church is going to disaffiliate with the UMC, the second-largest Protestant denomination in the country. "St. Andrew will disaffiliate from the United Methodist Church (UMC), but not affiliate with any other existing Methodist denomination. St. Andrew will remain Methodist with the same Wesleyan theology that we have always believed," the announcement reads. "St. Andrew will be named St. Andrew Methodist...

Will drag queens in the pulpit become "mainstream" in the United Methodist Church? That's what one Methodist critic is warning after a UMC pastor in Florida invited a man dressed in women’s clothing to preach a sermon with children seated next to him during a recent church service. Allendale UMC Senior Pastor Andy Oliver said he invited Isaac Simmons, who performs in drag as “Ms. Penny Cost,” to deliver the sermon on Oct. 2 because he wants “all people to see people like themselves called by God to preach the Gospel.” In a Facebook post, Oliver wrote that Simmons —...

More than 30 congregations based in North Carolina have threatened legal action so they can leave the United Methodist Church, claiming that the disaffiliation process is unfair to them. The Wesleyan Covenant Association, a theologically conservative network, announced earlier this month that over 40 churches in the Western North Carolina Conference are overseeing "pre-suit negotiation requests." The announcement comes as scores of theologically conservative congregations nationwide have left the second-largest Protestant denomination in the United States amid ongoing debate over the UMC's longstanding opposition to homosexuality and same-sex marriage. According to WCA, the Western North Carolina Conference "sent a legal...

A Texas megachurch has voted to disaffiliate from The United Methodist Church due to the mainline Protestant denomination’s ongoing debate over homosexuality as over 200 churches in the Lone Star State are considering disaffiliation.The Woodlands Methodist Church, a congregation with approximately 14,200 members located in Woodlands, Texas, voted on Sunday to leave the UMC Texas Annual Conference.According to an announcement from the church, about 3,000 members gathered at the church on Sunday and about 2,678 members — or 96.3% of those voting — supported disaffiliation.Senior Pastor Mark Sorensen posted a video on the church’s website saying that the vote affirmed...

Last year, the United Methodist Church accepted Isaac Simmons, who regularly preaches dressed as a drag queen under the name Ms. Penny Cost, as a candidate for ordination. Since that time, Simmons, who serves as an associate pastor at Hope United Methodist Church in Bloomington, Illinois, has challenged basic theological concepts, projecting a worldview where divinity rests not in God but in queerness. In a church preparing to split over LGBTQ issues, the drag queen pastor, who embraces queer theology while barely attempting to plaster on the basic tenets of Christian theology, has become a lightning rod. Conservatives argue that...

A staggering 107 United Methodist congregations based in Florida plan to leave the mainline denomination for the newly launched conservative Global Methodist Church. The Florida chapter of the Wesleyan Covenant Association, a theologically conservative Methodist group, announced Tuesday that 107 churches in the state had “chosen to initiate the process to depart the Florida Conference of The United Methodist Church.” The number of congregations planning to leave represents nearly 20% of the total number of churches belonging to the UMC Florida Conference. "This broad group of churches include both large and small congregations along with Anglo, African American, Latino, Korean,...

A prominent United Methodist Church bishop known for her outspoken theologically progressive stances has been placed on leave after two complaints were filed against her. Bishop Minerva Carcaño of the San Francisco Episcopal Area was placed on leave from her episcopal duties after the Western Jurisdiction College of Bishops received the complaints. According to an announcement by UMC Western Jurisdiction leadership released on Wednesday, retired Bishop Sally Dyck, formerly of the Chicago area, will serve as interim bishop for the time being. "Under church law, complaints regarding bishops are submitted to the president of the College of Bishops in the...

With humility, hope and joy, a 17 member body of theologically conservative Methodist clergy and laity, known as the Transitional Leadership Council, is pleased to announce the Global Methodist Church will officially launch on May 1, 2022.

Conservative congregations fear the denomination could eventually swing more toward progressives The Global Methodist Church, a new denomination of theologically conservative Methodists, will officially launch on May 1, a move that was expected for some time in the fight over full inclusion of the LGBTQ community. The issue of full inclusion has been brewing in the United Methodist Church for decades. In 2019, the denomination upheld and strengthened prohibitions against the ordination of non-celibate LGBTQ clergy and performing same-sex marriages.

In a move critics are calling “unwise and potentially destructive,” the United Methodist Church has delayed its General Conference meeting for a third time amid the COVID-19 pandemic, prompting theologically conservative United Methodists to announce the official launch of a new denomination. On Thursday, General Conference organizers announced they are postponing the meeting to 2024 “due to COVID-related and governmental policies/constraints.” The 2020 General Conference originally had been set for May 2020 in Minneapolis but was rescheduled for Aug. 29 – Sept. 7, 2021. It was rescheduled again for 2022 at the same venue. Commission Chairperson Kim Simpson said the...

The United Methodist Church is going to split. No one knows the exact contours of the split, but everyone seems confident that it is coming. There is a gulf between traditionalists and progressives in the UMC regarding same-sex marriage, and that gulf is widening: several Methodist bishops have performed same-sex weddings, defying official UMC teaching; and Karen Oliveto was elected as the first Methodist bishop in a same-sex relationship. At the root of these divisions is the fact that the UMC has always been made up of believers with distinctly different theological trajectories. The UMC was formed as an experiment...

NEW YORK (AP) — The Rev. Craig Duke has been a Methodist minister for three decades, building a reputation as a staunch advocate of LGBTQ inclusion. His pastoral duties have now been terminated — the result of a bitter rift surfacing in his Indiana church after he sought to demonstrate solidarity by appearing in drag alongside prominent drag queens in the HBO reality series “We’re Here.” Duke, 62, said he thought most of his 400-member congregation at Newburgh United Methodist Church shared his inclusive views, and he was taken aback when a prominent congregation member, soon backed by other churchgoers,...

A United Methodist Church leader is promoting the notion that killing an unborn baby in an abortion is okay as long as the mother makes a “thoughtful and prayerful” decision first. Pastor Robert Vaughn Jr., director of the General Board of Church and Society for the UMC, told Baptist News Global that the denomination takes a “reluctant pro-choice” stance on abortion. And his board is in charge of supporting that position. “Terminating a pregnancy isn’t just a medical decision; it requires advanced pastoral care so that a person can look at the whole picture,” the Herndon, Virginia pastor said. “The...

The United Methodist Church, a denomination that sponsors thousands of Boy Scout troops, recently told congregations to consider ending or altering their current agreements with the Boy Scouts of America as the embattled scouting organization settles a major sex abuse lawsuit.The UMC’s Office of Public Information released a statement last week explaining that the mainline Protestant denomination had a long history with the BSA, dating back for more than a century.Church leadership cited the recent BSA lawsuit filed by thousands of victims of sexual abuse. Earlier this year, BSA reached a settlement with a proposed payout of over $850 million...

Two congregations in Georgia have left the United Methodist Church over the denomination’s opposition to homosexuality and merged into one church. Asbury Memorial Church and Wesley Oak Church, both based in Savannah, recently voted to disaffiliate from the UMC South Georgia Conference. Asbury, which averaged 387 attendees in weekly worship in 2019, finalized its process of disaffiliation last fall. Meanwhile, Wesley Oak, which averaged 29 attendees, finalized disaffiliation earlier this month. Asbury Memorial Pastor Rev. William Hester told The Christian Post on Monday that the decision to leave came soon after the 2019 special session of the UMC General Conference....

Mt. Bethel United Methodist Church of Marietta, Georgia. In April 2021, the church voted to begin a profess of disaffiliation from the UMC A regional body of the United Methodist Church has seized control of the assets of a Georgia megachurch trying to leave the mainline Protestant denomination. The leadership of the UMC North Georgia Conference unanimously voted to approve the seizure of assets belonging to Mt. Bethel United Methodist Church, a Marietta-based congregation with approximately 10,000 members. In April, Mt. Bethel voted to begin a process of discernment for leaving the UMC due to the conference’s decision to...

A group of Methodists in California are protesting against a regional body of the United Methodist Church, accusing its leadership of mistreating three theologically conservative Korean pastors by terminating their appointments. The Rev. Jonathan Lee of San Diego Korean United Methodist Church, the Rev. Jae Duk Lew of the Valley Korean United Methodist Church, and the Rev. Nak In Kim of the Bell Memorial United Methodist Church each had their appointments as senior pastors terminated. The three pastors fell under the jurisdiction of the UMC California-Pacific Conference, a largely theologically progressive regional body headed by Bishop Grant Hagiya. Nearly 50...

America's third largest Christian denomination – the United Methodist Church – is splitting as conservative pastors aim to create a new denomination that will adhere to traditional biblical teachings. Methodist church leaders have formed a new denomination – called the Global Methodist Church (GMC) – and filed for formal separation from the UMC over the latter's growing acceptance of modern teachings on sexuality and gender. "In the United States, particularly, some bishops, clergy, and churches are operating in open defiance to the teachings of the United Methodist Church," said Keith Boyette, president of the conservative Wesleyan Covenant Association and spokesperson...