UMC

United Methodist clergy have been through the wringer in recent years, with a worldwide pandemic, a church schism and the ongoing decline of one of the nation’s largest Protestant denominations.

To date, more than 5,550 of the United Methodist Church’s approximately 30,000 U.S. churches have disaffiliated from the country’s second-largest Protestant denomination since 2019.

White’s Chapel plans to invite others to join the Methodist Collegiate Church once its disaffiliation is approved by Central Texas United Methodists next month.

United Methodist bishops have proposed a five-day meeting of the denomination’s global decision-making body, the General Conference, in May 2026. The announcement comes at the end of a weekend that saw hundreds of United Methodist churches in the United States leave the denomination.

A Florida judge has dismissed a lawsuit originally brought by more than 100 United Methodist churches wishing to immediately disaffiliate from the Florida Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church.

A North Carolina Superior Court judge dismissed a lawsuit filed last year by 36 United Methodist churches demanding to sever their ties to the denomination.

Bishop Scott Jones isn’t the first United Methodist bishop to join the Global Methodist Church since the theologically conservative denomination launched in May, but his exit from the UMC has arguably caused the greatest stir.

An analysis of departing churches suggests the country’s second-largest Protestant denomination will be weakened, but it is unlikely to break.