Liberation Methodist Connexion Launches New Denomination

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In a wave of enthusiasm and emotion as unsettling and hard to define as the Holy Spirit’s coming on Pentecost, a new denomination calling itself the Liberation Methodist Connexion launched Nov. 29 with a virtual worship service including Holy Communion, a panel describing the movement, and an “after party” celebrating its birth.

As its leaders known as “collaborators” call it, LMX has evolved out of 18 months of discussions about what a radically egalitarian denomination devoted more to righteous practices than orthodox theology might be and do, according to its website and several participants.

LMX emerged from a series of meetings that began in May 2019 in Minneapolis after the 2019 General Conference imposed tighter restrictions against same-sex marriages and ordaining LGBTQ clergy in The United Methodist Church. The Minneapolis meeting, organized by the group UM Forward, developed a set of aspirations for a denomination that would be radically inclusive of all persons, especially sexual minorities and people of color who have been historically harmed by The United Methodist Church.

A document from the May 2019 gathering titled “Loved and Liberated: A Proclamation from Our Movement Forward Summit” described the movement’s motivation:

“The Holy Spirit has been unleashed, and we are no longer captive to unjust systems in our denomination that oppress and crucify marginalized bodies. Time and again, these systems fail to live out the rules of the Wesleyan way. In fact, they have repeatedly broken the first rule to do no harm. This betrayal of Methodism catalyzes the unraveling of the UMC. As the connection crumbles, we no longer settle for crumbs.”

Through two more meetings, an Advent gathering in Denver in late 2019 and a Lenten meeting in Dallas in early 2020, LMX leaders crafted a movement that rejects the kind of institutional boundaries that historically have defined the UMC and its predecessor bodies. In particular, LMX rejects hierarchy and what its leaders term “colonialist” structures. Using a religious metaphor, the Liberation Methodist Connexion “puts new wine into new wineskins,” said Adrian Hill, a member of LMX’s “Interim Wisdom Council,” during the Nov. 29 presentation.

“We seek new and just ways to live out our faith,” said the Rev. Martha E. Vink, pastor of a two-point charge in the New York Annual Conference, during the Nov. 29 worship service.

Sue Laurie, a longtime advocate for LGBTQ inclusion in the UMC, gave the reflection for the worship service. Ms. Laurie received a “grassroots ordination” outside the site of the 2016 General Conference in Portland, Ore., from a group of inclusion advocates after she was refused United Methodist ordination for 21 years because she identifies as lesbian. At the 2008 General Conference in Fort Worth, Tex., Ms. Laurie and her partner Julie Bruno exchanged marriage vows in a park near the conference site, although same-sex marriage wasn’t legal at the time.

Ms. Laurie said the Liberation Methodist Connexion intends to be a faith community for those who have been “traumatized” by The United Methodist Church. She likened the LMX to another social activist organization, Repairers of the Breach, which coordinates the nationwide Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival led by the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber.

Ms. Laurie added that she regretted past efforts to achieve full inclusion for LGBTQ persons and people of color in the UMC because they “slowed progress.”

“I’m thankful for a fresh constellation of believers with the ability to vision a new community,” she said. “We’re not sure what shape [the community] will take. We are witnesses called to love our neighbors, to let go of the yoke of past oppression.”

During the presentations after worship, two LMX leaders, the Rev. Dr. Althea Spencer-Miller and the Rev. Alex Da Silva Souto, described the genesis of the Liberation Methodist Connexion as an attempt at “holy troublemaking” that is moving forward under the guidance of God’s Holy Spirit. Rev. Da Silva Soto likened LMX to a “mustard seed” of possibilities “for justice to prevail,” while Dr. Spencer-Miller described it as a network of relationships open to all people, including those who wish to retain their ties to The United Methodist Church.

Other presenters offered equally open-ended descriptions of how LMX intends to go about organizing itself through collaborative leadership for sharing resources, providing pastoral care, and developing theology. The Rev. Terri Stewart, a United Methodist pastor serving as director of the Youth Chaplaincy Coalition in Seattle, Wash., said LMX’s consensus decision-making process “pushes against the Western white patriarchal” way of conducting church ministry. She emphasized a mutual relationship between clergy and laypeople to avoid “clericalism” that LMX believes has oppressed the UMC.

Another leader, Ian Carlos Urriola, said LMX intends to follow Jesus’ instructions regarding money, including rejecting “the falsehood of scarcity” and the ways that past Methodist economic practices have “propped up unjust human systems.” He urged the virtual gathering to develop and maintain ties with all United Methodism’s ethnic caucuses representing groups of people that historically have been economically oppressed by the church.

Rather than contributing directly to the Liberation Methodist Connexion, online participants were encouraged to support two projects: the Black Trans Prayer Book, and Ekvn Yefolecv, a Maskoke “eco village” being developed on 764 acres in northern Alabama that seeks to return historically indigenous land to the Maskoke people while fostering sustainable lifestyle practices and resurrection of the Maskoke language.

The next meeting of the Liberation Methodist Connexion will be a virtual New Year’s Eve service.

Cynthia B. Astle serves as Editor of United Methodist Insight, which she founded in 2011.