More than 2,400 United Methodist congregations out of a U.S. total of 30,000 have left the denomination since 2019, and many more are expected to before Dec. 31— the last date at which they can leave with their properties after paying apportionments and pension liabilities.
Most of the breakaway churches are joining the Global Methodist Church, a new denomination formed last year that is committed to a traditional view of sexuality; it will not ordain or marry LGBTQ people.
Now the United Methodist Church is turning its attention to taking care of those who want to remain and rebuilding its ranks.
Some 67 churches in the Western North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church have officially become Lighthouse Congregations. More than 80 Lighthouse churches have formed in the eastern part of the state, the North Carolina Conference. In joining the network, they have committed to remaining United Methodist and to affirming LGBTQ people.
“We cannot work with what is not there,” Bishop Thomas Bickerton, president of the denomination’s Council of Bishops, said at in a meeting in Chicago where he advised fellow clergy to spend more time on those who are staying. “But we can see it as a longtime overdue opportunity to reposition this denomination for its next expression.”
Lighthouse churches and their counterparts in other parts of the country — with names like Oasis, Bridge or Beacon churches — allow committed United Methodists to find one another in the midst of the turmoil roiling the nation’s second-largest Protestant denomination.
Other conferences, such as the Northwest Texas Conference, which lost nearly 75% of its congregations last year, are finding virtual solutions. The conference has launched an online church, streaming to more than 100 United Methodists in areas that no longer have United Methodist churches. The hope is that some watching may eventually become new United Methodist churches or satellite campuses of existing churches, said the Rev. Jeff Fisher, who co-pastors the missional online church.
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Stokesdale United Methodist has not yet accepted the Hahns or about 10 other families leaving Oak Ridge United Methodist, where 72% of its members voted recently to break away from the denomination.
But Pastor Ed McKinney said he expected the Hahns will join soon, along with members of other nearby churches not happy with their church’s withdrawal from the denomination. Stokesdale has an electric marquee with the words “All are welcome” out front. It will soon also have a big Lighthouse banner.
“They’re kind of in a trauma phase now — ‘What the heck happened to my church?’” said McKinney. “We’re helping them lick their wounds by offering spiritual and emotional support and space to grieve and worship.”
