(RNS) — Sexuality won’t be on the agenda when members of the nascent Global Methodist Church convene for the first time Sept. 20-26 in San Jose, Costa Rica.
The breakaway denomination established by departing United Methodist churches two years ago will instead adopt a constitution and iron out its governance structure. The wrangling over sexuality has, for now, been settled.
The new denomination’s rule book spells out that “human sexuality is a gift of God that is to be affirmed as it is exercised within the legal and spiritual covenant of a loving and monogamous marriage between one man and one woman.”
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It was mostly the issue of sexuality that led some 7,600 U.S.-based United Methodist churches (about 25% of all U.S. congregations in the denomination) to break away, fearing the United Methodist Church was about to lift its LGBTQ+ bans on ordination and marriage. It did so at its General Conference in April, freeing queer members and clergy from all previous restrictions.
Some 3,700 formerly U.S.-based United Methodist churches joined the newly formed Global Methodist Church, which promised them it would resist the push to liberalize on the issue. The new denomination now has a total of 4,715 congregations, including many abroad, and it expects dramatic growth over the next two years, particularly from African congregations.
The Costa Rica Convention Center in San Jose. (Photo © Andres Garcia Lachner/Costa Rica Convention Center)
The estimated 350 delegates who will descend on the Costa Rica Convention Center beginning Friday will approve a rule book called the Book of Doctrines and Discipline and drop the “transitional” label from many of its documents and job titles. Delegates will also debate and vote on how to govern and structure the denomination’s 36 geographic regions, called conferences.
“We’ve been operating with extremely wet cement for 2.5 years,” said the Rev. Keith Boyette, the denomination’s transitional connectional officer. “It’s got a little more consistency now, but it’s not dry yet.”
Aside from approving a constitution, delegates to the conference will choose from two plans for selecting bishops. Under one plan, six part-time bishops will join three full-time bishops to proclaim and defend the church’s teachings. These bishops will not be tied down to particular geographic conferences as in the United Methodist model. Instead, administration of church conferences will be handled by conference superintendents.
“The bishops would be in a teaching role where they would make sure that in each of the conferences our doctrine is being taught and they’re holding clergy accountable for upholding the doctrine,” said Cara Nicklas, an Oklahoma lawyer who has served as chair of the transitional leadership council.
This model of episcopacy is envisioned as a corrective to the United Methodist model, where bishops served more as administrators. After two openly gay and married pastors were elected bishops to the United Methodist Church beginning in 2016 (both in western U.S. conferences), there were no mechanisms to discipline them to them to abide by church teachings, which at the time did not allow for the ordination of people in same-sex marriages.
Under another model being presented to delegates, sometimes called the residential model, the denomination would elect 36 bishops each to govern the denomination’s 36 conferences, much as in the United Methodist Church.
The Rev. Keith Boyette. (Photo courtesy of Wesleyan Covenant Association)
The Global Methodist Church intends to have a much lighter institutional footprint than the United Methodist Church. At its conference, it will select what it calls “connectional commissions” staffed by volunteer clergy and lay members. Unlike the United Methodist Church, which has fully funded agencies that oversee finances, administration, higher education and global ministries, the plan envisions commissions.
“One of the overarching values has been to try to keep the church lean and not top heavy and to empower local churches to do the ministry without being burdened by supporting infrastructure,” said Boyette.
