Well, I got married bc I wanted to have a family. That wasnt the only reason but it was a major reason.J.B.Katz said:I don't know about you, but I got married to have a good, smart, kind, reliable life partner. We weren't sure we would have children when we got married, but we were sure we wanted to spend our lives together. 41 years and counting.muddybrazos said:The entire point of marriage is for procreation and it is meant for a man and a woman. God did not intend for men to marry each other and to do perverted sexual deviant acts on each other. I'm not sure why this is difficult for you to grasp bc it's been understood for all of history.Waco1947 said:Your argument hinges on "is homosexual behavior a sin?" Homosexual behavior within the context of marriage is not a sin. I, too, am begging the question "does the Bible forbid gay marriage?" Again, the answer is no. The most quoted passage on marriage as between a man and woman is Mark 10 but in that passage Jesus is asked about divorce and its consequences not about the nature of marriage being man and woman.EatMoreSalmon said:
If I encourage the power hungry to listen to and acknowledge God and others, does that mean I hate the power hungry?
If I encourage a hoarder to try and resist keeping things in their house that breeds rats, does that mean I hate the hoarder?
If I encourage an agnostic to give God more thought and respect, does that mean I hate the agnostic?
If I encourage a recluse to come and be a part of the church family in some way, does that mean I hate the recluse?
If I encourage a busy woman to spend some time with their parents in assisted living, does that mean I hate the daughter?
If I encourage a murderer to resist the urge to wantonly kill, does that mean I hate the murderer?
If I encourage the serial philanderer to be faithful to his wife, does that mean I hate the philanderer?
If I encourage a person with kleptomania to refrain from stealing things, does that mean I hate the kleptomaniac?
If I encourage the gossiper to quit spreading false stories about others, does that mean I hate the gossiper?
If I encourage the status seeker to reign in their desire to get what others have, do I hate the status seeker?
The only people for whom the sole purpose of marriage = procreation used to be royalty. Henry VIII is a case study in how well that works.
And lots of people these days get married never intending to have children. Do you consider that sinful?
As an argument against gay marriage, this one's bogus. I'd also love to see your wife's face if you told her that the entire point of your marriage to her was procreation.
The Methodists: United v, Global
10,298 Views |
86 Replies |
Last: 3 yr ago by UTExan
Well said. Could not agree moreShooterTX said:My church welcomes drunks and addicts, but teaches sobriety and freedom from sin through Christ.Osodecentx said:This has been my observation as well. My church welcomes adulterers and prostitutes, but teaches abstinenceMothra said:The truth is most Christian churches, like my non-denominational church, openly welcome people who are sinners, including LGBT people. The difference between those churches and the new UNM church is that they recognize what the bible calls sin, and like Christ did, encourage their congregants to repent from same in order to live a live devoted to Christ as opposed to embracing the sin which causes separation from God.J.B.Katz said:
One bit of perspective that I have not seen on this thread:
One glaring difference between the Episcopal situation and the United Methodist situation is that the Methodist Book of Discipline never has allowed for openly gay ministers and never allowed UM ministers to perform gay marriages, even if those ceremonies took place outside a UM church.
There was a case a few years ago in a UM church court where a Methodist minister had performed a same-sex wedding. His gay son had asked him to officiate at his wedding, and given the choice, he felt like he had to say yes to his son. As a consequence, he was removed from the ministry.
There are liberal congregations in the UMC who felt just as aggrieved as the conservatives about the denomination's stance. They were pushing for the church to allow same-sex weddings and openly gay pastors.
What the leaders of the denomination tried to do was NOT change the Book of Discipline but find some acceptable compromise to keep all sides within the larger fold.
The conservatives were suspicious that EVENTUALLY there would be gay ministers and same-sex weddings. Maybe that's true, but impossible to say for sure. What is true today is that the denomination was NOT trying to force conservatives to accept these things.
When you get down to it, a lot of the ones who left simply didn't like the idea of being what some of the liberal churches called "reconciling congregations" that openly welcomed LGBT people.
We don't hand out long necks and needles... we offer support and counseling to overcome sin.
If someone is attracted to the opposite sex, they need support and counseling to overcome those sinful desires. The same is true for every sin. It is not sinful to have a desire towards sin, but it is sinful to act on that desire.
First, congrats on 41 years of marriage. You and your husband should be commended in today's society.J.B.Katz said:
I don't know about you, but I got married to have a good, smart, kind, reliable life partner. We weren't sure we would have children when we got married, but we were sure we wanted to spend our lives together. 41 years and counting.
The only people for whom the sole purpose of marriage = procreation used to be royalty. Henry VIII is a case study in how well that works.
And lots of people these days get married never intending to have children. Do you consider that sinful?
As an argument against gay marriage, this one's bogus. I'd also love to see your wife's face if you told her that the entire point of your marriage to her was procreation.
I would agree that the sole purpose of marriage is not procreation.
Two questions for you or anyone:
How do you define marriage?
What is the purpose of marriage?
Do you believe that Jews in Jesus time, understood that homosexuality within a marriage was good?Waco1947 said:Your argument hinges on "is homosexual behavior a sin?" Homosexual behavior within the context of marriage is not a sin. I, too, am begging the question "does the Bible forbid gay marriage?" Again, the answer is no. The most quoted passage on marriage as between a man and woman is Mark 10 but in that passage Jesus is asked about divorce and its consequences not about the nature of marriage being man and woman.EatMoreSalmon said:
If I encourage the power hungry to listen to and acknowledge God and others, does that mean I hate the power hungry?
If I encourage a hoarder to try and resist keeping things in their house that breeds rats, does that mean I hate the hoarder?
If I encourage an agnostic to give God more thought and respect, does that mean I hate the agnostic?
If I encourage a recluse to come and be a part of the church family in some way, does that mean I hate the recluse?
If I encourage a busy woman to spend some time with their parents in assisted living, does that mean I hate the daughter?
If I encourage a murderer to resist the urge to wantonly kill, does that mean I hate the murderer?
If I encourage the serial philanderer to be faithful to his wife, does that mean I hate the philanderer?
If I encourage a person with kleptomania to refrain from stealing things, does that mean I hate the kleptomaniac?
If I encourage the gossiper to quit spreading false stories about others, does that mean I hate the gossiper?
If I encourage the status seeker to reign in their desire to get what others have, do I hate the status seeker?
Unfortunately, this is an erroneous and heretical assumption that contradicts the plain language of scripture.Waco1947 said:There no "going and sinning no more" with regards to homosexual behavior within marriage because in that context it is not a sin.Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
But regardless, to the point I was trying to convey, a sinner can still love an individual and at the same time realize he's headed down a path toward destruction. Based on your previous post, wherein you accused traditionalists of being full of love for gays but believing they are headed for eternal torment, it appears you have difficulty grasping this concept, which is why I pointed out that is exactly what Christ did in his short time on this planet. He loved those caught up in sin, but told them if they want to follow him they must go and sin no more.
You say this because you dismiss the Pauline letters.Waco1947 said:Your argument hinges on "is homosexual behavior a sin?" Homosexual behavior within the context of marriage is not a sin. I, too, am begging the question "does the Bible forbid gay marriage?" Again, the answer is no. The most quoted passage on marriage as between a man and woman is Mark 10 but in that passage Jesus is asked about divorce and its consequences not about the nature of marriage being man and woman.EatMoreSalmon said:
If I encourage the power hungry to listen to and acknowledge God and others, does that mean I hate the power hungry?
If I encourage a hoarder to try and resist keeping things in their house that breeds rats, does that mean I hate the hoarder?
If I encourage an agnostic to give God more thought and respect, does that mean I hate the agnostic?
If I encourage a recluse to come and be a part of the church family in some way, does that mean I hate the recluse?
If I encourage a busy woman to spend some time with their parents in assisted living, does that mean I hate the daughter?
If I encourage a murderer to resist the urge to wantonly kill, does that mean I hate the murderer?
If I encourage the serial philanderer to be faithful to his wife, does that mean I hate the philanderer?
If I encourage a person with kleptomania to refrain from stealing things, does that mean I hate the kleptomaniac?
If I encourage the gossiper to quit spreading false stories about others, does that mean I hate the gossiper?
If I encourage the status seeker to reign in their desire to get what others have, do I hate the status seeker?
When you refer to the "plain language of Scripture," which plain language do you mean?Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The plain language where women are to be silent in church? Or the plain language about how women should dress WHEN THEY'RE PREACHING?
The plain language about how women are not permitted to teach men? Or the plain language where Paul asks a woman to help teach a man?
For those who don't believe women should have leadership positions over men in the church (like the Baptist morons who drove out Beth Moore), what should they make of the plain language that a woman was one of the early apostles? And that women mentioned in Paul's letters were clearly leaders? And that the first evangelist of Jesus' resurrection was a woman -- something that all 4 gospels agree on?
Should we adhere to the plain language of scripture that woman was created following man, and from man's rib? Or the plain language of scripture that God made male and female together, at the same time.
Should we follow the plain language of scripture that disobedient children should be stoned?
And that two different types of material should not be used in making a garment?
The plain language of scripture says there are times when God not only ordains genocide but punishes those who do not fully carry out that genocide.
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
Your assertions about the Roman world are not founded in historical writings or archeology.J.B.Katz said:When you refer to the "plain language of Scripture," which plain language do you mean?Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The plain language where women are to be silent in church? Or the plain language about how women should dress WHEN THEY'RE PREACHING?
The plain language about how women are not permitted to teach men? Or the plain language where Paul asks a woman to help teach a man?
For those who don't believe women should have leadership positions over men in the church (like the Baptist morons who drove out Beth Moore), what should they make of the plain language that a woman was one of the early apostles? And that women mentioned in Paul's letters were clearly leaders? And that the first evangelist of Jesus' resurrection was a woman -- something that all 4 gospels agree on?
Should we adhere to the plain language of scripture that woman was created following man, and from man's rib? Or the plain language of scripture that God made male and female together, at the same time.
Should we follow the plain language of scripture that disobedient children should be stoned?
And that two different types of material should not be used in making a garment?
The plain language of scripture says there are times when God not only ordains genocide but punishes those who do not fully carry out that genocide.
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
I suggest you do some research about modern homosexual relationships among sexual active gay men.J.B.Katz said:Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
Those relationships are much less like Jane Austin novels and often times more like prison relationships.
https://www.them.us/story/30-percent-gay-men-open-relationships-new-study
"A new report suggests that at least a third of gay men are in open relationships"
https://slate.com/human-interest/2013/06/most-gay-couples-aren-t-monogamous-will-straight-couples-go-monogamish.html
"The dirty little secret about gay marriage: Most gay couples are not monogamous. We have come to accept lately, partly thanks to Liza Mundy's excellent recent cover story in the Atlantic"
And I doubt you even want to go down the depraved rabbit hole of what kinds of demented sexual acts are considered normative or at least unproblematic among homosexual men.
https://www.thehomoculture.com/2015/12/09/go-ahead-be-the-pig-that-you-are/
[A "pig" in the gay community is usually defined as a man who enjoys the more fringe and extreme flavors of sex: leather, latex, fetish, BDSM, orgies, etc. And there are sex parties just for pigs. In smaller urban areas, these are usually private, invite-only parties hosted by one or more guys. However, in larger cities with a significant gay population, these are often bigger events that are advertised in the gay community: think the regular Bay of Pigs parties that go on in San Francisco.]
Simulated rape is also sometimes a main part of these events.
While procreation is not the only reason to get married. In terms of Christian marriage it is one of the main components. Being at least open to new life being one of its main purposes.J.B.Katz said:I don't know about you, but I got married to have a good, smart, kind, reliable life partner. We weren't sure we would have children when we got married, but we were sure we wanted to spend our lives together. 41 years and counting.muddybrazos said:The entire point of marriage is for procreation and it is meant for a man and a woman. God did not intend for men to marry each other and to do perverted sexual deviant acts on each other. I'm not sure why this is difficult for you to grasp bc it's been understood for all of history.Waco1947 said:Your argument hinges on "is homosexual behavior a sin?" Homosexual behavior within the context of marriage is not a sin. I, too, am begging the question "does the Bible forbid gay marriage?" Again, the answer is no. The most quoted passage on marriage as between a man and woman is Mark 10 but in that passage Jesus is asked about divorce and its consequences not about the nature of marriage being man and woman.EatMoreSalmon said:
If I encourage the power hungry to listen to and acknowledge God and others, does that mean I hate the power hungry?
If I encourage a hoarder to try and resist keeping things in their house that breeds rats, does that mean I hate the hoarder?
If I encourage an agnostic to give God more thought and respect, does that mean I hate the agnostic?
If I encourage a recluse to come and be a part of the church family in some way, does that mean I hate the recluse?
If I encourage a busy woman to spend some time with their parents in assisted living, does that mean I hate the daughter?
If I encourage a murderer to resist the urge to wantonly kill, does that mean I hate the murderer?
If I encourage the serial philanderer to be faithful to his wife, does that mean I hate the philanderer?
If I encourage a person with kleptomania to refrain from stealing things, does that mean I hate the kleptomaniac?
If I encourage the gossiper to quit spreading false stories about others, does that mean I hate the gossiper?
If I encourage the status seeker to reign in their desire to get what others have, do I hate the status seeker?
The only people for whom the sole purpose of marriage = procreation used to be royalty. Henry VIII is a case study in how well that works.
And lots of people these days get married never intending to have children. Do you consider that sinful?
As an argument against gay marriage, this one's bogus. I'd also love to see your wife's face if you told her that the entire point of your marriage to her was procreation.
It's part of why the Roman Catholic Church (and many others) consider homosexuality deeply disordered.
[According to the Catechism, homosexual acts are acts of grave depravity that are "intrinsically disordered." It continues, "They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved."]
Homosexuals couplings are incapable of producing natural life without modern medical assistance.
Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Tooley and IRD are funded by very conservative backers including the Scaife Family Foundation
the IRD, backers of The Good News magazine, WCA, GMC. The IRD is the Institute for Religion and Democracy. The majority of IRD's funding comes from the Smith Richardson foundation. Donors include the Scaife Foundations, Scaife Family Charitable Trusts/Scaife Foundations, Roberta Ahmanson's Fieldstead & Company, the Adolph Coors Foundation, and The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation.
The Rev. Andrew Weaver, a United Methodist minister and well-regarded author who died in 2008, studied the IRD extensively and wrote on the University of Chicago Divinity School website that:
The IRD was created and is sustained by money from right-wing foundations and has spent millions of dollars over 20 years attacking mainline denominations. The IRD's conservative social-policy goals include increasing military spending and foreign interventions, opposing environmental protection efforts, and eliminating social welfare programs. In a document entitled "Reforming America's Churches Project 2001-2004," the IRD states that its aim is to change the "permanent governing structure" of mainline churches "so they can help renew the wider culture of our nation." In other words, its goal extends beyond the spiritual and includes a political takeover financed by the likes of Richard Mellon Scaife, Adolph Coors, the John M. Olin Foundation, and the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation of Milwaukee.
According to their 2016 990, their expenditures for 2016 were around $1.4M Mark Tooley takes in $165k salary plus a nice retirement contribution. There Board of Directors is: Fred Barnes; Janice Shaw Crouse; Matt Blunt; Kenneth Collins; Mateen Elass; Thomas Farr; Craig Vincent Mitchell; Paul Marshall; Johannes Jacobse; Martin Nicolas; James Robb; Wendy Wright; Helen Rhea Stumbo; Graham Walker; Eric Paterson; Bishop John Guernsey.
The IRD originally intended to investigate and oppose certain social action programs of the mainline Protestant churches. Therefore, anyone favorable to liberation movements in the third world and church leaders who support these inevitable revolutionary changes is criticized. But their sharpest critique continues to be leveled at those religious leaders who feel other people must have the right to self-determination in choosing their own form of government even if that choice is not democracy. Allowing that right to exist is regarded as oppressive. Consequently, churches are called to address the "oppression" of self-determination. Unfortunately, the real causes of oppression are never stated, much less analyzed. Since "American power and opinion can be decisive," the IRD seems to believe that only American foreign policy attempts can secure democratic change. Christian leaders who do not follow this mandate are libelled by the IRD as disloyal to the Church and to the Gospel of Christ.
The Institute for Religion and Democracy everywhere presents its political theology within a holy war framework.
What it comes down to is that these wealthy individuals fund the organization for the sole purpose of dividing, and hence weakening the influence, of any mainline denominations which have a social justice mission of protecting workers rights, supporting the poor, etc. Frankly, Mark Tooley could give a damn about gay marriage and abortion...those are just the "tools" he uses to drive wedges through mainline denominations he's been told to dismantle. Unfortunately, gullible people don't do their research, and fall pray to his "culture war" created from wholecloth.
Waco1947 ,la
We had dinner last night with some old friends who are 4 th generation Methodists . ( very conservative) .
They brought up this whole schism thing.
Among other things they said
1. Any congregation that leaves loses their Church building and the land it sits on unless they pay the United Methodists any price they demand for it .
2. Pastors who's congregation leaves ….lose their RETIREMENT regardless who many years of service they have .
3. Homosexuality is clearly prohibited in the Bible . The prohibition is not ambiguous in the slightest. It is US city dwellers ( for the most part ) pushing their woke agenda and rural congregations ( along with African congregations) fighting against such changes .
4. They expect the schism to be finalized next August.
They brought up this whole schism thing.
Among other things they said
1. Any congregation that leaves loses their Church building and the land it sits on unless they pay the United Methodists any price they demand for it .
2. Pastors who's congregation leaves ….lose their RETIREMENT regardless who many years of service they have .
3. Homosexuality is clearly prohibited in the Bible . The prohibition is not ambiguous in the slightest. It is US city dwellers ( for the most part ) pushing their woke agenda and rural congregations ( along with African congregations) fighting against such changes .
4. They expect the schism to be finalized next August.
Actually, she's spot on about the Roman world.EatMoreSalmon said:Your assertions about the Roman world are not founded in historical writings or archeology.J.B.Katz said:When you refer to the "plain language of Scripture," which plain language do you mean?Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The plain language where women are to be silent in church? Or the plain language about how women should dress WHEN THEY'RE PREACHING?
The plain language about how women are not permitted to teach men? Or the plain language where Paul asks a woman to help teach a man?
For those who don't believe women should have leadership positions over men in the church (like the Baptist morons who drove out Beth Moore), what should they make of the plain language that a woman was one of the early apostles? And that women mentioned in Paul's letters were clearly leaders? And that the first evangelist of Jesus' resurrection was a woman -- something that all 4 gospels agree on?
Should we adhere to the plain language of scripture that woman was created following man, and from man's rib? Or the plain language of scripture that God made male and female together, at the same time.
Should we follow the plain language of scripture that disobedient children should be stoned?
And that two different types of material should not be used in making a garment?
The plain language of scripture says there are times when God not only ordains genocide but punishes those who do not fully carry out that genocide.
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
There are no words for "homosexual" or "heterosexual" in Greek (or Hebrew), because the concept of born sexual orientation was unknown in the ancient world.
To put it bluntly, in the Greco-Roman world, it was all about penetrator-penetrated. There was no shame in being the penetrator in sex between men. The shame was in being penetrated. It was all a matter of pleasure. There was no commitment involved.
The only sort of semi-commitment was between men and teenage boys. There was largely no shame in men having sex with teenage boys. There was no shame for the teenage boys until they became men. In fact, this kind of relationship was regarded as romantic. Disgusting, but true.
So it was in this context that the scriptures spoke. There was no idea that people are born with a sexual orientation. Today, we know scientifically and anecdotally that we're born on a scale between the two.
As for the scriptures themselves, only a handful of passages address it. The primary text people use is the Sodom story in Genesis. But you have to interpret that story in the contexts of domination and hospitality. A good indication that we've misunderstood it is Ezekiel 18:49, which doesn't mention homosexuality at all, but says the sin of Sodom was materialism and oppression of the poor.
The other OT text is in Leviticus, which says it's an abomination for a man to lie with a man as with a woman. But Leviticus lists a number of things as abominations that we don't say are abominations today. Like eating an animal in its mother's milk.
That brings us to the NT, which I think mentions homosexual practices only three times. One is Romans 1, which isn't clear. Another is 1 Corinthians 6:9, which seems to use the "penetrator" "penetrated" language. But we forget that Paul places the greedy, slanderers, and swindlers in the same category, and we don't exclude them in church. The last is in 1 Timothy 1:10, which is often translated something to the effect of "those who practice homosexuality" or ''Sodomites." But technically it's the same word used for "penetrator" back in 1 Corinthians.
All this is to say that the ancient context and the passages themselves make this a debatable issue. I respect those who believe that all homosexual relationships are condemned in the scriptures but I disagree with them. I also add that this isn't an issue at the core of the faith and that the Bible emphasizes many other issues (like the oppression of the poor) than this one.
Looks like the vast majority of Methodist churches aren't leaving. I wish they could part amicably, but sadly that's not happening.
Talked to a Texas Methodist (N of Houston). Sounds like Texas is doing it a little differently.Canada2017 said:
We had dinner last night with some old friends who are 4 th generation Methodists . ( very conservative) .
They brought up this whole schism thing.
Among other things they said
1. Any congregation that leaves loses their Church building and the land it sits on unless they pay the United Methodists any price they demand for it .
2. Pastors who's congregation leaves ….lose their RETIREMENT regardless who many years of service they have .
3. Homosexuality is clearly prohibited in the Bible . The prohibition is not ambiguous in the slightest. It is US city dwellers ( for the most part ) pushing their woke agenda and rural congregations ( along with African congregations) fighting against such changes .
4. They expect the schism to be finalized next August.
1. The departing congregation keeps the property
2. Departing congregation that owes the denomination money (retirement, loans granted during lean times) must square up before departing)
3. Yep
4. They are in a period of "contemplation" wherein the congregation decides whether to stay or go.
Apparently some UMC jurisdictions are being vindictive and are trying to strip a departing congregation of everything of value financially. Others are being more accommodative
C. Jordan said:Actually, she's spot on about the Roman world.EatMoreSalmon said:Your assertions about the Roman world are not founded in historical writings or archeology.J.B.Katz said:When you refer to the "plain language of Scripture," which plain language do you mean?Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The plain language where women are to be silent in church? Or the plain language about how women should dress WHEN THEY'RE PREACHING?
The plain language about how women are not permitted to teach men? Or the plain language where Paul asks a woman to help teach a man?
For those who don't believe women should have leadership positions over men in the church (like the Baptist morons who drove out Beth Moore), what should they make of the plain language that a woman was one of the early apostles? And that women mentioned in Paul's letters were clearly leaders? And that the first evangelist of Jesus' resurrection was a woman -- something that all 4 gospels agree on?
Should we adhere to the plain language of scripture that woman was created following man, and from man's rib? Or the plain language of scripture that God made male and female together, at the same time.
Should we follow the plain language of scripture that disobedient children should be stoned?
And that two different types of material should not be used in making a garment?
The plain language of scripture says there are times when God not only ordains genocide but punishes those who do not fully carry out that genocide.
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
There are no words for "homosexual" or "heterosexual" in Greek (or Hebrew), because the concept of born sexual orientation was unknown in the ancient world.
To put it bluntly, in the Greco-Roman world, it was all about penetrator-penetrated. There was no shame in being the penetrator in sex between men. The shame was in being penetrated. It was all a matter of pleasure. There was no commitment involved.
The only sort of semi-commitment was between men and teenage boys. There was largely no shame in men having sex with teenage boys. There was no shame for the teenage boys until they became men. In fact, this kind of relationship was regarded as romantic. Disgusting, but true.
So it was in this context that the scriptures spoke. There was no idea that people are born with a sexual orientation. Today, we know scientifically and anecdotally that we're born on a scale between the two.
As for the scriptures themselves, only a handful of passages address it. The primary text people use is the Sodom story in Genesis. But you have to interpret that story in the contexts of domination and hospitality. A good indication that we've misunderstood it is Ezekiel 18:49, which doesn't mention homosexuality at all, but says the sin of Sodom was materialism and oppression of the poor.
The other OT text is in Leviticus, which says it's an abomination for a man to lie with a man as with a woman. But Leviticus lists a number of things as abominations that we don't say are abominations today. Like eating an animal in its mother's milk.
That brings us to the NT, which I think mentions homosexual practices only three times. One is Romans 1, which isn't clear. Another is 1 Corinthians 6:9, which seems to use the "penetrator" "penetrated" language. But we forget that Paul places the greedy, slanderers, and swindlers in the same category, and we don't exclude them in church. The last is in 1 Timothy 1:10, which is often translated something to the effect of "those who practice homosexuality" or ''Sodomites." But technically it's the same word used for "penetrator" back in 1 Corinthians.
All this is to say that the ancient context and the passages themselves make this a debatable issue. I respect those who believe that all homosexual relationships are condemned in the scriptures but I disagree with them. I also add that this isn't an issue at the core of the faith and that the Bible emphasizes many other issues (like the oppression of the poor) than this one.
Looks like the vast majority of Methodist churches aren't leaving. I wish they could part amicably, but sadly that's not happening.
Actually gay marriage was banned when Christianity took over the Roman world. Not just gay sex.
There's a lot wrong with this, but I'll mention one thing in particular. The prohibition of cooking meat in its mother's milk comes from two passages in Exodus and one in Deuteronomy, none of which suggest at all that it's an "abomination." Like other dietary rules that were abrogated in the New Testament, it isn't a moral law. Sexual prohibitions are reaffirmed in the New Testament because they are moral laws.C. Jordan said:Actually, she's spot on about the Roman world.EatMoreSalmon said:Your assertions about the Roman world are not founded in historical writings or archeology.J.B.Katz said:When you refer to the "plain language of Scripture," which plain language do you mean?Mothra said:Did Christ love sinners that were headed for eternal torment? I don't seem to recall him hating any of the people he encountered, even those who falsely accused him and beat him.Waco1947 said:It breaks my heart. I learned so much from traditionalists. They were my pastors and youth leaders with whom I grew up at youth group, youth camp, local church.Osodecentx said:Hate to see a once great denomination of believers going through a schismWaco1947 said:I am a United Methodist pastor and will remain one. I heard Mark Tooley speak at Baylor University about 5 years. Mark Tooley has misrepresented the United Methodist Church for 30 years. He joined forces with the traditionalist Good News Movement and Wesleyan Covenant Association i(WCA) in our denomination to disrupt dialogue with lies, innuendos, and straw men.Osodecentx said:
A Messy Methodist Church Schism
Hundreds of local congregations have left over teachings on sex.
Theological schisms are never pretty. The United Methodist ChurchAmerica's third-largest religious body, with over 6.2 million membersis in the thick of its own over its teachings on sexuality. Hundreds of congregations have voted to leave the denomination, which had 13 million members world-wide as of 2020, and thousands more likely will. On Aug. 7, United Methodism's second- and seventh-largest churches by attendance, both in the Houston area, voted to quit the denomination.
What brought United Methodism to this divide was its decision-making body's 2019 "Traditional Plan"a document that affirmed its ban on same-sex marriage and mandated that all clergy be celibate if single and monogamous if married. That sets the church apart from nearly every other mainline Protestant denomination. The traditionalists won thanks to votes from conservative African delegates, whose churches have grown by millions even as the U.S. has declined by nearly the same magnitude.
When liberal-leaning U.S. bishops and clergy chafed at complying with the plan, a compromise was born. In early 2020 conservative and liberal church leaders announced a "Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace Through Separation." The protocol allowed each congregation to vote its preference between a more traditional or more liberal denominationand was expected to be approved at the General Conference's quadrennial assembly in Minneapolis that year. But then Covid arrived, and the convention was postponed three times, to 2024. The decision left many traditionalists feeling betrayed and exasperated. In May of this year, those who couldn't wait any longer launched the Global Methodist Churcha traditionally conservative denomination, led by the Rev. Keith Boyette.
Now some congregations are weighing whether to join this Global Methodist Church. Local church properties are owned by the denomination through state-level conferences. The 2019 General Conference approved a temporary policy allowing congregations to leave with property by paying two years' worth of "apportionments" to the national church, plus clergy pension liabilities. Those exits must happen by December 2023.
Between 2019 and 2021, 167 congregations exited. When the 53 local annual conferences met this spring, they ratified 305 additional exits from 24 conferences. At least 11 conferences will host special sessions later this year to ratify reportedly 1,000 more. Additional thousands are expected next year as congregations scramble to meet the 2023 deadline. (There are about 30,000 United Methodist churches nationwide.) Complicating the process are more firmly liberal conferences that are adding extra payments to churches' exits. Some conferences with more sympathetic conservative leadership have reduced payments by applying millions of dollars in their reserves toward the exit fees.
The messiest departure so far has been in the Florida conference, where 106 congregations (roughly 20% of the state's membership) are jointly suing the bishop for charging exorbitant exit fees. They believe they're being held for "ransom." Their litigation also alleges that their bishop isn't upholding denominational law about sexuality. One Florida minister, the congregations point out, has openly conducted six same-sex weddings. The bishop himself attempted to ratify two openly gay clergy in June but failed to achieve the 75% threshold needed from Florida clergy. This litigation complains of wider defiance of church law, citing the 2016 election of an openly lesbian bishop in the church's western jurisdiction and a drag queen candidate for ordination in Illinois.
Meanwhile, United Methodist leaders in Africa remain committed to the church's conservative teachings. They are waiting for the General Conference's convention in 2024, which they hope will ratify the church's protocol for separating the denomination into liberal and conservative branches. It's unlikely many of them would stay in a denomination that liberalizes on sex. While most of Africa's Methodists will likely join the Global Methodist Church, some may be tempted by autonomy.
That temptation could apply to many congregations in the U.S. fed up with denominational bureaucracy. Congregationalism defies Methodism's more connectional tradition, which has typically featured bishops' appointing pastors to churches.
Challenging both United Methodism and the Global Methodist Church are declining denominational interests among American Christians. While most historical denominations are declining, nondenominational churches in the U.S. are growing.
Working against this drift are 60 traditionalist theologians who met in Alexandria, Va., in January to craft a 25,000-word articulation of "classic" Methodist doctrine. Rooted in the teachings of 18th-century founder John Wesley, their statement ("The Faith Once Delivered") is broken into six sections and addresses the nature of God, creation, revelation, salvation, the church and eschatology.
Promoting a specific Protestant tradition over generic nondenominational evangelicalism in America will be difficult. United Methodism has lost five million members in the U.S. since 1968 and will lose millions more. Mainline Protestantism has been sidelinedand it will take years for United Methodism's schism to resolve.
The hope of traditional American Methodists is that once freed from denominational bureaucracy, they'll be able to grow anewas their peers in Africa are doing, and as America's early Methodists did. Americans hoping for revived spirituality and civil society ought to wish them well.
Mr. Tooley, a United Methodist member, is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-messy-methodist-schism-united-global-church-sex-general-conference-florida-africa-2024-tradition-11660855107?mod=Searchresults_pos1&page=1
Good News and the WCA evolved into the Global Methodist Church. For 10 - 15 years WCA bishops have been appointing pastors to churches who actively denigrated the UMC and misled their congregations. These pastors regularly took every chance possible to put down the UMC hierarchy and our General Conference. The central issue is the full inclusion of the LGBTQ community in church life including ordaining gays and letting pastors marry gay couples.
but the GMC moved the goal posts to issues like
1) our trust clause -- our local churches are held in trust for their Annual Conferences, meaning the local church does not own the property or buildings. In actuality the trust clause is part of a covenant between the Annual Conference . The AC, for its part, covenants to send the local church a pastor and financial help if a church threatens to go belly up.
2. "Progressive" pastors who do not believe in the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, Blood Atonement, or a Satan who rules over a hell of endless torment. Progressives do indeed, including me, believe in all those doctrines just not their interpretations of the doctrines
3. "Progressives" do not believe in the Authority of the Scriptures which is a lie. Progressives do believe in the authority of the scriptures for faith and life but our interpretations are indeed different.
4. and the GMC propagates the lie that Annual Conferences will force pastors to marry gay couples or force a gay pastor on a local. No one "forces" me to do a wedding because I full authority as to who I will perform weddings for. A local church, also, reserves the right as to who uses their building for a wedding.
No one will "force" a gay pastor on a church, but historically the church has always moved slowly when appointing a pastor outside the local church's biases such as African Americans or women.
Good friends have heard these lies and had no one who made the case for the UMC.
I thought I was dealing people and pastors who were rational about this decision but I am disappointed to hear that they never heard the other side (UMC). I, personally, know of the lies because they are directed at me and people prejudged me from the start.
I was and am still committed to the UMC in which we are big tent that includes the traditionalists in our denomination. I say, "Traditionalist preach and teach your interpretations and I will teach and preach mine and let the hearer go where they may go."
I have friends going Global and that saddens me. They are full of swarmy love for gays but ultimately they believe that are headed for eternal torment.
Would it have been more loving of him to say, "go and continue sinning" while allowing them to head down a path toward destruction, or to tell them about their sin, repentance, and the saving grace that only he can provide?
The plain language where women are to be silent in church? Or the plain language about how women should dress WHEN THEY'RE PREACHING?
The plain language about how women are not permitted to teach men? Or the plain language where Paul asks a woman to help teach a man?
For those who don't believe women should have leadership positions over men in the church (like the Baptist morons who drove out Beth Moore), what should they make of the plain language that a woman was one of the early apostles? And that women mentioned in Paul's letters were clearly leaders? And that the first evangelist of Jesus' resurrection was a woman -- something that all 4 gospels agree on?
Should we adhere to the plain language of scripture that woman was created following man, and from man's rib? Or the plain language of scripture that God made male and female together, at the same time.
Should we follow the plain language of scripture that disobedient children should be stoned?
And that two different types of material should not be used in making a garment?
The plain language of scripture says there are times when God not only ordains genocide but punishes those who do not fully carry out that genocide.
The point is that scripture requires interpretation not only against other individual scriptures but against the weight of scripture. This also requires some understanding of context behind scriptures, particularly when it involves Paul's letters.
Waco 47 is right about the context for Paul's references to homosexuality. In his world, stable, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships were not a thing, at least not publicly. The practices he is referring to were about dominance and degradation (more like homosexual behavior in prisons today than like gay marriage) and about loose and licentious behavior (which obviously applies equally to heterosexuals and homosexuals).
Not claiming that Paul endorses homosexuality, but context and interpretation are important. The "plain language of scripture" often doesn't mean what you might think it does.
There are no words for "homosexual" or "heterosexual" in Greek (or Hebrew), because the concept of born sexual orientation was unknown in the ancient world.
To put it bluntly, in the Greco-Roman world, it was all about penetrator-penetrated. There was no shame in being the penetrator in sex between men. The shame was in being penetrated. It was all a matter of pleasure. There was no commitment involved.
The only sort of semi-commitment was between men and teenage boys. There was largely no shame in men having sex with teenage boys. There was no shame for the teenage boys until they became men. In fact, this kind of relationship was regarded as romantic. Disgusting, but true.
So it was in this context that the scriptures spoke. There was no idea that people are born with a sexual orientation. Today, we know scientifically and anecdotally that we're born on a scale between the two.
As for the scriptures themselves, only a handful of passages address it. The primary text people use is the Sodom story in Genesis. But you have to interpret that story in the contexts of domination and hospitality. A good indication that we've misunderstood it is Ezekiel 18:49, which doesn't mention homosexuality at all, but says the sin of Sodom was materialism and oppression of the poor.
The other OT text is in Leviticus, which says it's an abomination for a man to lie with a man as with a woman. But Leviticus lists a number of things as abominations that we don't say are abominations today. Like eating an animal in its mother's milk.
That brings us to the NT, which I think mentions homosexual practices only three times. One is Romans 1, which isn't clear. Another is 1 Corinthians 6:9, which seems to use the "penetrator" "penetrated" language. But we forget that Paul places the greedy, slanderers, and swindlers in the same category, and we don't exclude them in church. The last is in 1 Timothy 1:10, which is often translated something to the effect of "those who practice homosexuality" or ''Sodomites." But technically it's the same word used for "penetrator" back in 1 Corinthians.
All this is to say that the ancient context and the passages themselves make this a debatable issue. I respect those who believe that all homosexual relationships are condemned in the scriptures but I disagree with them. I also add that this isn't an issue at the core of the faith and that the Bible emphasizes many other issues (like the oppression of the poor) than this one.
Looks like the vast majority of Methodist churches aren't leaving. I wish they could part amicably, but sadly that's not happening.
I don't know that much about Hebrew language and history, but as a classicist I find the Christian apologists for gay rights to be exceedingly naive in their view of sexuality in the ancient world. The idea that "commitment" is the core value at stake in Paul's writings on sex is comically anachronistic. The inherent social value of sexual commitment apart from the duties of family and child-rearing is nothing but a vestige of Romantic thinking filtered through modernity and struggling to survive in the aftermath of the sexual revolution. It would have been utterly baffling to Paul and his audiences, both Jewish and pagan.
The modern UMC would turn John Wesley's stomach.
It isn't just a denominational stand on sexuality: it is how the Council of Bishops have rigged the system to insure that traditionalists and charismatics/evangelicals are marginalized. The largest and most successful UMC churches are evangelical in theology. One 14,000 member church in the North Georgia conference paid $3 million to leave and keep its property.
But make no mistake: the real schism is over the authority of the Bible as God's Word. The liberals know they will accelerate the decline in numbers as they take over, and they need to retain the property of traditionalist/evangelical churches or extract a ransom to insure the UMC clergy pension plan remains solvent.
Here is a good site for tracking the schism/watching the meltdown if it hasn't yet been posted.
https://juicyecumenism.com/tag/umc/
It isn't just a denominational stand on sexuality: it is how the Council of Bishops have rigged the system to insure that traditionalists and charismatics/evangelicals are marginalized. The largest and most successful UMC churches are evangelical in theology. One 14,000 member church in the North Georgia conference paid $3 million to leave and keep its property.
But make no mistake: the real schism is over the authority of the Bible as God's Word. The liberals know they will accelerate the decline in numbers as they take over, and they need to retain the property of traditionalist/evangelical churches or extract a ransom to insure the UMC clergy pension plan remains solvent.
Here is a good site for tracking the schism/watching the meltdown if it hasn't yet been posted.
https://juicyecumenism.com/tag/umc/