Free Republic

More than 6,000 congregations have been given the approval to leave the United Methodist Church over the past four years amid a schism within the second-largest Protestant denomination in the United States over whether to change its rules against homosexuality. According to numbers compiled by UM News, the number of UMC congregations granted disaffiliation passed the 6,000 mark earlier this week, with 6,182 as of Thursday morning. While the number includes all churches that have disaffiliated from the UMC since 2019, more than 1,800 came in 2022 and more than 4,000 in 2023. The UM News count derives from a...

A Cobb County judge recently ruled in favor of 186 Georgia churches suing to disaffiliate from the United Methodist Church. In a crowded courtroom filled with more than 200 people, Superior Court Judge Steven Schuster ruled Tuesday that 186 United Methodist churches should be able to vote to disaffiliate from the UMC, according to a news release from the Wesleyan Covenant Association, an organization helping north Georgia churches disaffiliate. The Georgia churches listed in the lawsuit, filed on March 30, requested the North Georgia Annual Conference restore the processes that were already in place allowing churches to disaffiliate.

More than 140 United Methodist Church congregations in the Susquehanna Conference, including 14 in the Harrisburg area, plan to end their affiliations with the denomination under agreements approved by the conference Wednesday night. Among those churches are 14 in the Harrisburg district and 43 in the York district. The seven-district Susquehanna Conference includes 870 churches, almost 150,000 members and close to 580 pastors. Nationally, simmering disagreements over the 6.4 million-member church’s position on ordaining and marrying members of the LGBTQ community, as well as other issues, have caused a rift fueling the “disaffiliations” by more moderate and conservative churches. Marriage...

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...

After the United Methodist Church agrees to divide, a new Global Methodist Church will form for traditionalist conferences, congregations and persons to join, it was announced today. The Transitional Leadership Team of the anticipated new denomination includes 17 persons, three retired bishops among them, plus the Rev. Martin Nicholas of the Houston area, an IRD board member who chairs UMAction. A vision for this emerging church was posted last year, with Nicholas, myself as IRD President and UMAction director John Lomperis participating. United Methodism’s governing General Conference will meet August 29, 2022. Its chief action item will be to divide...