UM-Forward and its constituents will gather in March to begin envisioning a “Liberation Methodist Church.”
Liberation Church
Photo Courtesy of UM-Forward from Facebook
Announcement of the March 6-8 gathering, “Trailblazing the ‘Liberation’ Methodist Church,” came less than a week after UM-Forward representatives challenged prevailing support for other plans coming before the 2020 General Conference. The “Protocol of Reconciliation & Grace Through Separation” was especially criticized for failing to include any representatives of the “Liberationist” perspective on its negotiating team.
UM-Forward is the legislative sponsor of the “New Expressions Worldwide,” or N.E.W. plan going to GC2020. As explained during the Pre-General Conference Brief Jan. 23 in Nashville, N.E.W. proposes dissolving The United Methodist Church and creating four new denominations: traditionalist, centrist, progressive and liberationist. The rationale behind dissolving the UMC stems from the Liberationist argument that continuing the denomination as it is only perpetuates its history of oppression, including racism, sexism, classism, homophobia and other sins of exclusion.
The ”liberationist” perspective emerged last May when UM-Forward sponsored an open consultation on aspirations for a new kind of Methodism. The aspirations gathered from that conference formed the foundation of the N.E.W. plan.
Unfortunately, the N.E.W. plan hasn’t garnered the same level of attention as other, more institutional plans have. In fact, some negotiators of the “Protocol” have said privately that a “lack of organization” among progressive and liberationist plans spurred the allocation of only $2 million in seed money, compared to the $25 million slated to go to a traditionalist off-shoot.
Yet N.E.W. offers perhaps the sole truly fresh and visionary proposal in a large crop of ideas. Therefore, it’s important to remember that no plan has been adopted yet, much less enacted. General Conference delegates are known to pick and choose among what they most like in legislation and then craft them into a single document (with the exception of the force-fed Traditionalist Plan).
So anyone who longs for a fully inclusive expression of Methodism may wish to plan on attending the March event scheduled in Dallas. See the website for details and registration.
Media Mentions as of Jan. 29, 2020
Breaking up is hard to do: Ukiah United Methodist pastor's perspective – Ukiah Daily Journal
Northside United Methodist leaves denomination, changes name – Jackson Sun
Liberal theologian opposes Methodist schism, offers no alternative – OneNewsNow
New radio series explores LGBTQ Mainers abandoned by religious community – Bangor Daily News
Where Are the Faces of Queer and Liberal Christianity? – Advocate.com
Conservative leader says UMC is 'irretrievably broken' over homosexuality debate – Christian Post
Gay rights dispute is pulling apart the United Methodist Church, after decades of argument – Salon
Local Methodist congregations at a crossroads, waiting to 'see what happens' with possible church ... – Chicago Tribune
Cynthia B. Astle serves as Editor of United Methodist Insight, which she founded in 2011.