United Methodist leaders pray during a Feb. 27-28 summit in Nashville, Tenn., focused on the future of episcopal leadership. This week, the denomination’s Judicial Council will take up questions related to the allocation of U.S. bishops going forward. (Photo by Andrew Jensen, General Council on Finance and Administration)
April 20, 2026 | UM News
Key points:
- United Methodist financial and ministry leaders are working together to strengthen the sustainability of the episcopacy.
- The new level of cooperation comes as the leaders wait for a ruling from The United Methodist Church’s top court that could affect their work.
- The denomination’s finance agency has asked the Judicial Council how to interpret changes made by the 2024 General Conference to the allotment of U.S. bishops.
The United Methodist Church’s top court plans this week to consider questions that could affect the allocation of U.S. bishops, starting in 2028.
But even as they wait for a Judicial Council ruling, United Methodist leaders say they are cooperating like never before to ensure the denomination can sustain the leadership of bishops for generations to come.
The ministry and financial leaders whose work intersects around bishops also have committed to maintaining their collaboration no matter what the Judicial Council decides. This commitment marks a significant change after years of wrangling among various church bodies over the allocation and funding of bishops.
“The future of the episcopacy is one piece of a very large puzzle,” said Bishop Thomas J. Bickerton, who leads the New England and New York conferences.
“As The United Methodist Church walks through days of significant transition, we’re having to look at: How does Methodism look moving forward? What is the next expression of Methodism? … Working together, I pray, creates the picture of how Methodism works best.”
Bickerton is both a former Council of Bishops president and current board member of the denomination’s finance agency, General Council on Finance and Administration. Working with the finance agency, he brought together church leaders for a Feb. 27-28 summit in Nashville, Tennessee, on the future of the episcopacy.
Participants agree that they came away from the summit with a shared sense of purpose, open lines of communication and a better understanding of the role they each play in strengthening denominational ministries.
In addition to staff from the finance agency, the meeting brought together representatives from other church leadership bodies with multisyllabic names.
These include the Connectional Table, which connects the Council of Bishops with the denomination’s general agencies; the Interjurisdictional Committee on Episcopacy, which proposes the distribution of U.S. bishops to General Conference; and a subgroup of the episcopacy committee called the “Super Task Force.” The task force’s name derives from its work studying United Methodist superintendency.
“The summit in February felt like a turning point to bring most of the stakeholders that are attending to matters with the episcopacy into the same room,” said Beata Ferris, the Super Task Force’s convener and a Dakotas Conference rural ministry consultant. “There was a sense of hope and a sense that we are committed to working together, as opposed to each siloing into our own agendas. It just felt hopeful.”
What has changed
Lonnie Chafin, a member of the Jurisdictional Study Committee, was on hand to help explain the changes to bishop distribution adopted by the 2024 General Conference.
The denomination’s top lawmaking assembly eliminated the formula long utilized for calculating each U.S. jurisdiction’s allotment of bishops. The study committee had proposed the changes.
Before 2024, the number of bishops assigned to each jurisdiction largely depended on the number of members on the jurisdiction’s church rolls.
General Conference revised Paragraph 404 in the Book of Discipline, so that recommending the number and distribution of U.S. bishops is now not simply a matter determined by General Council on Finance and Administration calculations. Instead, the responsibility will mostly lie with the Interjurisdictional Committee on Episcopacy, which has seen its role expand from typically only meeting during General Conference to meeting regularly between sessions. The committee, elected by General Conference, brings together members from each jurisdiction’s committee on episcopacy.
“For us, the emphasis was on missional need,” said Chafin, who is also treasurer of the New York and New England conferences.
“We have done experiments with a number of bishops,” he added. “We have a lot of bishops in multiple conferences, and I think our expectation is that the jurisdictional committees on episcopacy can really evaluate where this works and where this doesn’t work and make a practical suggestion for how many bishops we need in order to go forward.”
A procession of United Methodist bishops leads opening worship at the 2024 United Methodist General Conference in Charlotte, N.C. File photo by Mike DuBose, UM News.
Questions before church court
Still questions remain about the revisions to Paragraph 404, and that’s where the Judicial Council comes in.
The General Council on Finance and Administration, with the support of the interjurisdictional committee’s leadership, has asked the church court to clarify the finance agency’s role in the new bishop-allocation process. The finance agency also has asked the Judicial Council what allowing jurisdictions to request additional bishops beyond means for apportionments — shares of church giving that the agency collects to support bishops and other denomination-wide ministries. The Discipline allows each jurisdiction to have a minimum of five bishops.
The finance agency is responsible for administering the Episcopal Fund that supports the work of bishops. Since 2019, the agency has warned that the Episcopal Fund is in danger of running out of money.
Trying to shore up the fund, the 2024 General Conference reduced the number of active U.S. bishops to 32 from the 46 previously budgeted by the 2016 General Conference. But even with the reductions, supporting the full cost of bishops requires dipping into the Episcopal Fund’s reserves.
Caitlin Congdon, the new top executive of the General Council on Finance and Administration, said all who attended the summit shared a commitment to sustaining the Episcopal Fund while honoring the church’s leadership and missional needs.
“Whatever the outcome of the Judicial Council’s ruling, the hope is that the collaborative momentum established at the summit will carry forward,” Congdon said. “Our challenges can be solved if we work together. Leaders from across the connection came together to create space for listening, learning and gaining a clearer understanding of the work surrounding the episcopacy. That shared understanding will help guide next steps in a more coordinated and aligned way.”
What is happening now
For now, the Interjurisdictional Committee on Episcopacy has paused its work until the Judicial Council releases its ruling.
In 2028, 14 U.S. bishops will reach mandatory retirement age, but the interjurisdictional committee is still determining how many episcopal elections it will recommend to General Conference.
At the 2024 General Conference and the month following, the interjurisdictional committee had a very short timetable to ensure each U.S. conference had a bishop’s oversight over the next four years. Ultimately, the committee’s plan resulted in the unprecedented assignment of two bishops serving conferences across jurisdictional lines.
The Rev. Kim Ingram, the interjurisdictional committee chair, said the desire is that the committee can now be even more strategic in its recommendations.
“Right-sizing the episcopacy is not about reduction — it’s about alignment," said Ingram, who is also the Western North Carolina Conference’s director of ministerial services and conference secretary. "We are discerning how bishops can lead effectively in a church that looks different than it did a generation ago while still ensuring every conference is meaningfully connected and shepherded."
At this point, Ingram said, the interjurisdictional committee plans to recommend the number of U.S. bishops this summer. The committee will also adjust to whatever the Judicial Council rules.
But by making a recommendation early, she added, the hope is also to help the General Council on Finance and Administration and the Connectional Table, as the bodies begin work this fall on the denominational budget that will go before the 2028 General Conference.
Ferris, who chairs the Super Task Force, said her group is leaving the work of recommending the number of U.S. bishops up to the full interjurisdictional committee. For now, her group is considering submitting legislation to the still-forming U.S. Regional Conference that could shape U.S. bishops’ workloads.
The task force has been surveying U.S. bishops, especially those who oversee more than one conference, about their challenges and successes.
“We as the Super Task Force get to do the work that we were originally tasked to do, which is to examine what parts of the episcopacy are working and what parts of the episcopacy can change,” she said.
As the task force does its work, Ferris said, she hopes to consult with United Methodists in Africa, Europe and the Philippines about the work of their bishops. Most bishops outside the U.S. oversee multiple annual conferences.
Ferris also wants to consult with the heads of the denomination’s general agencies about the impact of the Episcopal Fund on their budgets.
Judi Kenaston, the chief connectional ministries officer for the Connectional Table, echoed Ferris’ desire to see the collaboration broadened to include more international and agency voices.
But she, too, expressed hope that the cooperation that has started will continue. The conversations about the sustainability of the Episcopal Fund and about the episcopacy itself cannot be separated.
“While it is necessary to consider the financial implications,” Kenaston said, “I am hopeful that the recommendations around the function of the bishops can be based on how best to accomplish the mission and ministry of the church rather than approaching the question from a position of fear or scarcity.”
Kenaston added that she sees this time as an opportunity to step back and allow The United Methodist Church to do new things.
“It requires a shift in thinking, including expectations of both the bishops, the conferences and the clergy and lay members of the local churches,” she said.
Bickerton said it will take all people in the denomination cooperating, alongside bishops, to carry out the mission of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.
“All of that working together, I believe, will create a vital picture of the next expression of Methodism,” he said.
Heather Hahn is assistant news editor for UM News.