Explainer – United Methodists open first top-level conference since breakup over LGBTQ inclusion
United States AP Thousands of United Methodists are gathering in Charlotte, North Carolina, for their big denominational meeting, known as General Conference. It’s a much-anticipated gathering. Typically it is held every four years, but church leaders delayed the 2020 gathering until now due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Rev K Karen, left, of St Paul & St […]
African Methodist Episcopal Church leaders call for halt to all US funding of Israel
United States RNS The African Methodist Episcopal Church’s top officials have called for the US Government to halt all its funding of Israel, citing the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians in the Hamas-Israel war. “The Council of Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church calls on the United States Government to immediately withdraw […]
UMC bishops request 2026 General Conference as hundreds more churches disaffiliate
Chicago, USRNS 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 the Council of Bishops’ spring meeting last week in Chicago and a weekend that saw hundreds of United Methodist churches in the United States leave […]
United Methodist bishops meet, look to pivot after 2,400+ churches disaffiliate
Chicago, USRNS About 100 active and retired United Methodist bishops from across the globe are meeting this week in Chicago for the first time in person since the COVID-19 pandemic and since the launch one year ago of the Global Methodist Church, a conservative denomination formed for United Methodist churches looking to disaffiliate over LGBTQ […]
In the US, AME bishops condemn leaders who took massive kickbacks from church sales in New York
United StatesRNS A group of New York clergy took more than a million dollars from a real estate developer who sought to turn distressed Black churches into lucrative properties, according to settlements with that state’s Attorney General. The settlements, posted on the Attorney General’s website in August, show that a bishop, two pastors and a […]
US Bishop slams “negative rhetoric” as conservative Methodists declare end to moratorium
United StatesRNS In his first official address as president of the United Methodist Church’s Council of Bishops, Bishop Thomas Bickerton of the New York annual conference called out conservative groups that are encouraging United Methodist churches to join a splinter denomination, citing divisive rhetoric and “accusations and statements that are just not true”. Bickerton accused […]
Mexican bishops to put photos of dead priests in churches
Mexico City, MexicoAP Mexico’s Roman Catholic Council of Bishops called Monday on parishes throughout the country to put photos of dead nuns and priests in their churches this Sunday and to hold Masses for all those killed in gang-fueled violence. The call for special celebrations throughout July came after two Jesuit priests and a tour […]
United Methodists: What happened to the proposal to split the denomination?
EMILY MCFARLAN MILLER, of Religion News Service, reports that before United Methodists could vote on the widely endorsed plan, traditionalists went ahead and launched a new denomination and several representatives of centrist and progressive groups revoked their support…
United Methodist bishops acknowledge breakup is imminent
United StatesAP The United Methodist Church’s Council of Bishops, ending a five-day meeting Friday, acknowledged the inevitable breakup of their denomination – a schism that will widen this weekend with the launch of a global movement led by theologically conservative Methodists. The breakaway denomination, called the Global Methodist Church, will officially exist as of Sunday. […]
United Methodist bishops open spring meeting in US with message of unity amid schism
United StatesRNS Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey, the outgoing president of the United Methodist Church’s Council of Bishops, opened the bishops’ spring meeting on Monday with a recap of the historic events the denomination has faced since she took office in 2020: political turmoil in the United States and beyond; the war in Ukraine; a global […]