Speaking as a lay British Methodist myself, you are correct insofar as we lay folk have a large influence in the direction of the church, but the truth is that the vast majority of us support same-sex marriage! That does not make us 'far-left': gay rights are just not a left-right issue here in the UK to the same extent as they are in the US. Of course there are some Methodists that oppose same-sex marriage, but they are a tiny and ever-diminishing minority within our denomination. As for your points about the transfer of property from individual churches in 1976, it is important to note that this was not a public act of Parliament instigated by the government. It was a local act - a piece of legislation of limited scope that was requested by our democratically elected Methodist Conference to transfer the legal ownership of assets all at once without the need for protracted legal proceedings. The British government played no part whatsoever in the decision to transfer the assets. It was church members who voted for it.
I guess the left-right continuum does operate somewhat relatively in relation to the context. Even so, I have a hard time considering this indifference to sexual behavior something that is anything other than left-leaning in any cultural context. Pretty much all world contexts moderate sexual behavior on a sex binary. When a society abandons such a framework, that is a liberal impulse: imagining a society can make up its own social norms. Given that this was not an act of Parliament, I wonder how difficult it would be to reverse this norm so as to let dissenting churches leave with their assets. I wonder if MCGB members and leadership are at all amenable to those who aren't on board with what I would characterize as this leftward drift, or if such antipathy prevails there as here in the US. Thoughts?
@@plainspokenpod It's not indifference: it's a genuine belief among the vast majority of our church members that gay people like me are made in the image of God and should be able to marry the person they love just as straight people can. And it's a belief that has been reached through deep, reasoned, historically informed engagement with scripture and communion with the Spirit. Our Conference didn't leap to allowing same-sex marriages straight away after the law changed here in the UK. It engaged instead in an 8-year process of prayer, reflection and debate until finally coming to a decision a couple of years ago. Churches within the Methodist Church that do not wish to celebrate same-sex marriages are entitled under our rules to refuse to do so. In fact, the onus is on the respective church council (made up entirely of elected lay officers) to register their premises for same-sex ceremonies - not the other way round. I know of a small handful of churches which have decided, after extensive debate on the issue, not to register for same-sex ceremonies, but none of them has expressed a desire to leave the Methodist Church. Most Methodist members are content to occupy the same denomination as people with contradictory convictions. As for the issue of property, my understanding is that even if the 1976 Act were reversed, churches would not be permitted to leave without approval from Conference. But as I say, it's a moot point given even most members opposed to same-sex marriage wish to remain within the Methodist Church.
@@morbius7687 All true believers will acknowledge eagerly that people who are attracted to the same sex are equally made in God's image. We are all fallen and in a state of fatal sin until the preventing grace of God brings about conviction of sin and true repentance. For many, the repentance required is of sexual sin, one kind of which is homosexuality. No serious historical or theological analysis leads to another conclusion on these things. While clever arguments have been used to confuse people enough to become simpletons on the matter, this liberal tradition that makes room for any sex outside of a male-female marital bond is an insult to biblical Christianity and is subject to the wrath of God. I'm sorry you have been led to believe otherwise. It's up to you whether or not you decide to listen to me. I'm sorry the MCGB finds itself so unable to think biblically. Yet Americans aren't far behind you. I'm part of a faction pushing back, along with a majority of developing world Christians. I appreciate the time and energy you have put into your responses. I am wondering if it is possible that more British Methodists might have a problem with these decisions on sexual immorality if they knew about them. In the US, most UMC leadership believed that very few churches would want to disaffiliate. However, when it came time and information was circulated, a great many were uncomfortable with the direction the UMC was headed. They ended up losing the 25% of the churches would could move quickly and get a lot of money together. The only want to know for sure how many want out is to give them the opportunity. It sounds as though the door is closed in Great Britain, and those left in the MCGB are either ambivalent, undiscerning, or just depressed.
Europe and the UK are far more liberal than the US. The people are more socially liberal and I think one of the easiest ways of describing the difference is just the fact that they kicked out all the religious zealots and party-poopers to the American Colonies. What happens when one society is dominated by or almost exclusively very rigid and hyper religious and the other society agreed to get rid of all their rigid and hyper religious people? It's similar to what I suspect the mainline denominations are like on the coasts in the US. Bishops, clergy, and laity are all more liberal than the heartland. That's not to say that there aren't still more conservative voices there, but they are the minority. The Scottish Episcopal Church and the Presbyterian Scottish Kirk are both pretty liberal, as is the Church in Wales, and also the British Methodist Church. The Church of England would be officially more liberal than it is if it weren't for bishops actually trying to show restraint for the sake of the Anglican Communion as a whole, but that has to do more with politics than their beliefs. Conservatives are primarily found in the evangelical wing of the Church of England, and evangelicals across the board I think are starting to leave the established denominations for either independent congregations or offshoots like the Free Church of England. The Catholic wings of the Church have become largely synonymous with liberalism, and the conservatives either suffer through or have left to join the Catholic Church in things like the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. I suspect that conservative Methodists have aligned with other evangelicals in the UK. Denominational categories in my opinion are more consolidated and therefore broader in scope than in the US where each tradition has 30 different denominations that all split over things like whether Adam & Eve had belly buttons or not - it's the legacy of established churches by law as opposed to freedom of religion from the get-go. On the note of Methodist polity, the superintendency of British Methodism is one of the factors that has caused not only the Church of England and Methodists to not rejoin, but has also caused issues with Anglican-Catholic dialogue as well. There was a plan proposed at one point for the Anglicans and Methodists to reunite that would grandfather in all the Methodist clergy but would require all future clergy to be ordained by Anglican bishops, but the plan was stopped because Catholics pointed out that this undermined what the Anglicans were saying they believed about holy orders, apostolic succession, episcopacy, etc. When the Anglicans agreed and then decided that all the Methodists would need to be re-ordained by Anglican bishops, but the Methodists refused to that deal. A lot of the American break-away denominations of Methodism like Free Methodists, Wesleyans, and I think Church of the Nazarene (from what I can tell) blur episocopacy and superintendency by using the terms interchangeably when it seems very clear that what they are talking about are superintendents in the way the British Methodists do. They don't have bishops and don't believe in the historic episcopate, and at least they are consistent with sticking to superintendents. I believe in the notion that words have meanings, and I don't think these American Methodist groups should use the term bishop if that isn't actually what they mean. The UMC (and the AME & AMEZ?) are unique in the Methodist world for their stronger episcopacies and councils of bishops.
Well if you’re talking about the religious zealots, those are the millenarian puritans of New England, and their descendants are the modern woke leftist puritans. They cannot rest until the whole world is changed into their image. The leftist are religious zealots
Speaking as a lay British Methodist myself, you are correct insofar as we lay folk have a large influence in the direction of the church, but the truth is that the vast majority of us support same-sex marriage! That does not make us 'far-left': gay rights are just not a left-right issue here in the UK to the same extent as they are in the US. Of course there are some Methodists that oppose same-sex marriage, but they are a tiny and ever-diminishing minority within our denomination.
As for your points about the transfer of property from individual churches in 1976, it is important to note that this was not a public act of Parliament instigated by the government. It was a local act - a piece of legislation of limited scope that was requested by our democratically elected Methodist Conference to transfer the legal ownership of assets all at once without the need for protracted legal proceedings. The British government played no part whatsoever in the decision to transfer the assets. It was church members who voted for it.
I guess the left-right continuum does operate somewhat relatively in relation to the context. Even so, I have a hard time considering this indifference to sexual behavior something that is anything other than left-leaning in any cultural context. Pretty much all world contexts moderate sexual behavior on a sex binary. When a society abandons such a framework, that is a liberal impulse: imagining a society can make up its own social norms.
Given that this was not an act of Parliament, I wonder how difficult it would be to reverse this norm so as to let dissenting churches leave with their assets. I wonder if MCGB members and leadership are at all amenable to those who aren't on board with what I would characterize as this leftward drift, or if such antipathy prevails there as here in the US. Thoughts?
@@plainspokenpod It's not indifference: it's a genuine belief among the vast majority of our church members that gay people like me are made in the image of God and should be able to marry the person they love just as straight people can. And it's a belief that has been reached through deep, reasoned, historically informed engagement with scripture and communion with the Spirit. Our Conference didn't leap to allowing same-sex marriages straight away after the law changed here in the UK. It engaged instead in an 8-year process of prayer, reflection and debate until finally coming to a decision a couple of years ago.
Churches within the Methodist Church that do not wish to celebrate same-sex marriages are entitled under our rules to refuse to do so. In fact, the onus is on the respective church council (made up entirely of elected lay officers) to register their premises for same-sex ceremonies - not the other way round. I know of a small handful of churches which have decided, after extensive debate on the issue, not to register for same-sex ceremonies, but none of them has expressed a desire to leave the Methodist Church. Most Methodist members are content to occupy the same denomination as people with contradictory convictions.
As for the issue of property, my understanding is that even if the 1976 Act were reversed, churches would not be permitted to leave without approval from Conference. But as I say, it's a moot point given even most members opposed to same-sex marriage wish to remain within the Methodist Church.
@@morbius7687 All true believers will acknowledge eagerly that people who are attracted to the same sex are equally made in God's image. We are all fallen and in a state of fatal sin until the preventing grace of God brings about conviction of sin and true repentance. For many, the repentance required is of sexual sin, one kind of which is homosexuality. No serious historical or theological analysis leads to another conclusion on these things. While clever arguments have been used to confuse people enough to become simpletons on the matter, this liberal tradition that makes room for any sex outside of a male-female marital bond is an insult to biblical Christianity and is subject to the wrath of God. I'm sorry you have been led to believe otherwise. It's up to you whether or not you decide to listen to me. I'm sorry the MCGB finds itself so unable to think biblically. Yet Americans aren't far behind you. I'm part of a faction pushing back, along with a majority of developing world Christians.
I appreciate the time and energy you have put into your responses. I am wondering if it is possible that more British Methodists might have a problem with these decisions on sexual immorality if they knew about them. In the US, most UMC leadership believed that very few churches would want to disaffiliate. However, when it came time and information was circulated, a great many were uncomfortable with the direction the UMC was headed. They ended up losing the 25% of the churches would could move quickly and get a lot of money together. The only want to know for sure how many want out is to give them the opportunity. It sounds as though the door is closed in Great Britain, and those left in the MCGB are either ambivalent, undiscerning, or just depressed.
Europe and the UK are far more liberal than the US. The people are more socially liberal and I think one of the easiest ways of describing the difference is just the fact that they kicked out all the religious zealots and party-poopers to the American Colonies. What happens when one society is dominated by or almost exclusively very rigid and hyper religious and the other society agreed to get rid of all their rigid and hyper religious people? It's similar to what I suspect the mainline denominations are like on the coasts in the US. Bishops, clergy, and laity are all more liberal than the heartland. That's not to say that there aren't still more conservative voices there, but they are the minority. The Scottish Episcopal Church and the Presbyterian Scottish Kirk are both pretty liberal, as is the Church in Wales, and also the British Methodist Church. The Church of England would be officially more liberal than it is if it weren't for bishops actually trying to show restraint for the sake of the Anglican Communion as a whole, but that has to do more with politics than their beliefs. Conservatives are primarily found in the evangelical wing of the Church of England, and evangelicals across the board I think are starting to leave the established denominations for either independent congregations or offshoots like the Free Church of England. The Catholic wings of the Church have become largely synonymous with liberalism, and the conservatives either suffer through or have left to join the Catholic Church in things like the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham. I suspect that conservative Methodists have aligned with other evangelicals in the UK. Denominational categories in my opinion are more consolidated and therefore broader in scope than in the US where each tradition has 30 different denominations that all split over things like whether Adam & Eve had belly buttons or not - it's the legacy of established churches by law as opposed to freedom of religion from the get-go.
On the note of Methodist polity, the superintendency of British Methodism is one of the factors that has caused not only the Church of England and Methodists to not rejoin, but has also caused issues with Anglican-Catholic dialogue as well. There was a plan proposed at one point for the Anglicans and Methodists to reunite that would grandfather in all the Methodist clergy but would require all future clergy to be ordained by Anglican bishops, but the plan was stopped because Catholics pointed out that this undermined what the Anglicans were saying they believed about holy orders, apostolic succession, episcopacy, etc. When the Anglicans agreed and then decided that all the Methodists would need to be re-ordained by Anglican bishops, but the Methodists refused to that deal. A lot of the American break-away denominations of Methodism like Free Methodists, Wesleyans, and I think Church of the Nazarene (from what I can tell) blur episocopacy and superintendency by using the terms interchangeably when it seems very clear that what they are talking about are superintendents in the way the British Methodists do. They don't have bishops and don't believe in the historic episcopate, and at least they are consistent with sticking to superintendents. I believe in the notion that words have meanings, and I don't think these American Methodist groups should use the term bishop if that isn't actually what they mean. The UMC (and the AME & AMEZ?) are unique in the Methodist world for their stronger episcopacies and councils of bishops.
Well if you’re talking about the religious zealots, those are the millenarian puritans of New England, and their descendants are the modern woke leftist puritans. They cannot rest until the whole world is changed into their image. The leftist are religious zealots