Alabama West Florida Conference Sues Trustees & Pastors of Perdido Bay Methodist Church
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 ม.ค. 2025
- These stories of United Methodist dysfunction don't go away. Their leadership cannot seem to manage much grace. Rather, as churches try to walk away, they escalate. In this latest episode, a lawsuit has been filed, not just against a church, but against its leadership personally. This is a new low.
This segment covers the details. I go through the different documents associated and talk through how it is that this really is pretty one-sided. There is a right and a wrong here.
Links:
Church Website - www.perdidobay...
Denominational Data - www.umdata.org...
AWF Publication - www.awfumc.org... - Legal Filing - awf-email.brta...
Thank you for covering this Jeffrey! Super important for people to know how churches are being treated. It’s shameful. Levi has real courage and I’m proud of him and this church for standing their ground spiritually and materially. Thankful for you as well for the same!
So glad we got out when we did. Pray for these folks please. This is truly insane.
Thank you! We appreciate your prayers.
When the United Methodist Church went 100% WOKE, I realized they had abandoned Christ and embraced fully human values only. Very sad! I am still searching for another Christ Following Church. Not as easy as I thought it would be. The UMC is not really alone.
I’m glad you are searching for a Christ Following Church. Please keep reading your Bible and searching. You might want to do a TH-cam search on ‘Why the Church of Christ.’
Same here.
I remember our DS just left a month prior to the vote. He then showed back up the day of our vote. We had to move heaven & earth to find someone to help us. Dirty tricks left and right. We have grown to where we are larger than we were before disaffiliation. Thank you Jesus!
Thank you for this video. I stand with my wonderful pastors, Levi and Scott…. And so does the majority of our congregation. ❤
Thank you for keeping us informed on all these actions.
I used to teach classes on cults, and that's another place where words get redefined. This "progressive" pseodo-Christianity is quite cultic in many ways.
My father was personally sued as a member of the vestry when our Episcopal parish voted to leave ECUSA. We ended up being evicted but, overall, that was the best thing that could have happened as we got a fresh start as an Orthodox parish in a new location.
I met Dr Levi Gardner at Annual Conference this year. He presented a proposal for continued disaffiliations allowong churches to keep theit property and paying the conference based on worth of property as well as any apportionments/pensions due. It was sustaianed as we had already voted to ask Judicial Council for clarity under P 2549. I'm praying for him & his church. Look at their website to see their community outreach and support. Didn't hear Jean Tibbits group doing that.
Pray for these folks please. This is truly insane.
Finding a real Christian church in the west is becoming like trying to find a hay in a needle-stack.
One option I did not see considered is that of the congregation simply walking away from this property and starting over somewhere else. In the Episcopal/Anglican fight, I have read about many parishes who tossed the keys to the buildings and left to start anew. In almost every example, they ended up better than before.
That option was one our small country church considered. Most folks don't want to leave their property but the trust clause is pretty binding from what I understand. Our little church is, I think, mostly hurt and angry. Hard to make a good decision when emotions run high. Pray for those who have choices to make, that their decisions be good ones.
We, as a congregation, did major fundraising and recently built a brand new, beautiful sanctuary but unfortunately the building is owned by the conference.
The Bishops are hiding behind this parroted "connectionalism" to justify their absolutely egregious behavior.
There comes a point in which Christians of any local church should ask themselves questions like: "How excited am I in knowing that when I put my tithes and offerings into the offering plate, a portion of that supports a bureaucracy that spends that money on lawyers, rather than helping the poor, investing in kids and youth ministry, disaster relief, campus ministry, or a huge variety of other ministries and Kingdom endeavors?" "How much money on frivolous lawsuits needs to be spent by an entity like the Alabama-West Florida Conference before it is deemed bad stewardship of God's resources/the tithes and offerings of the people?"
Levi is an outstanding leader and I cannot say enough good things him.
Agreed! He’s my pastor and I will stand with him and Scott Hohn. 🙏🏻
Suing individuals seems like “making an example” of folks, so that others will not dare to try to break the trust clause. I don’t know if it has been tested in court in Florida. Based on what we’ve seen with the Episcopal/Anglican split and some other former UMC churches, it seems like some states are deciding in favor of the congregations, while other states are deciding in favor of the denomination.
It is most likely a matter of law that specifically identified individuals - and not a generic group (e.g. "Trustees of _____") - must be sued if litigation is going to be filed. And since the individual trustees of the local congregation are the legal representatives of the local congregation, those individuals would need to be named in the litigation for the litigation to be validly filed. It is also most likely the case that they are being sued in their capacity as trustees and not in a personal capacity. And the local congregation has most likely provided the individual trustees with indemnification.
As a retired elder with 35 years of ministry in the Alabama West Florida Conference I can confirm the veracity of the pastor's letter and the concerns mentioned within. Promises were indeed made to ensure that "churches and pastors would be able to get where they need to be" in terms of disaffiliation. And, the promise that disaffiliation would be possible after general conference was assured. In the midst of all of that the 'goalposts' for disaffiliation were indeed moved and the process made more difficult, if not impossible. I would like to commend the pastors mentioned in the lawsuit, one of whom I consider a colleague and even a friend with whom I had the honor to work on numerous occasions. It is profoundly disappointing that a process which could have been more kind and considerate -- we used to talk about 'Christian Conferencing' -- was allowed to disintegrate into this breakdown of civility. One would hope that one day -- sooner rather than later -- the conference leadership would take time for self-reflection -- but that may be asking too much.
I'm glad that God showed Hays McKay grace in bringing him home before this mess erupted.
What a testimony in this world? Whatever led church Bishops to believe their actions would be accepted.
My daughter's church went through the same thing.They had to pay a 2 or 4 million dollar fine to get out. Fortunately they could pay it and are free from the UMC . I can imagine how sad this makes our Lord.
He just left South Carolina where he would not allow disaffiliation under the original paragraph by falsely claiming we were already adhering to the 2019 discipline. He said wait until after general conference. He blatantly lied
A CORPORATION is not a church!
No TRUSTEES any where in THE BIBLE!
The Trust Clause was intended to work both ways. Unfortunately the Bishops interpret it to only work one way.
Which group Bishops or local churches are trying to hold to biblical teachings. The church needs to teach the Gospel not a social agenda.
I guess they won’t be receiving any apportionments this year. They’ll be used for legal fees
Give them the keys and walk away
In my local conference there seemed to be more interest in church owned cemeteries that are on the same deed. WHY?
And here you see why so many are divorcing themselves from organized religion. This is NOT what God expected his church to be. Back in circuit riding days, a pastor entered a community with his Bible and little else and preached God's word. It is sounding increasingly like there needs to be a reversal to some semblance of the former (sans the mule).
Perdido is beautiful.
Seems so much of the UMCs actions are based on money.
What relief does the conference want from the lay people through the lawsuit? Financial penalties? Their own real estate?
I suspect our tiny, older building would be more of an albatross around their neck than a monetary asset. It's all many smaller churches can do to keep up general maintenance.
🤘🤘🤘
How can I send you a doc?
My email address is plainspokenpod@gmail.com
It is most likely a matter of state law that specifically identified individuals - and not a generic group (e.g. "Trustees of _____") - must be sued if litigation is going to be filed. And since the individual trustees of the local congregation are the legal representatives of the local congregation, those individuals would need to be named in the litigation for the litigation to be validly filed. It is also most likely the case that they are being sued in their capacity as trustees and not in a personal capacity. And the local congregation has most likely provided the individual trustees with indemnification.
Nobody cares
but it was okay for the churches to sue the conference? churches sued first. how godly was THAT?!
I guess I'm not willing to say that it was okay for churches to sue the conference first. I have been uncomfortable with that from the beginning, though I haven't been as clear in condemning it, as I am genuinely conflicted. But something I think most thinking adults can agree on is that 'two wrongs don't make a right.' Even if it was wrong for the local churches to file against the conference, that by no means justifies the conference answering in kind.
Many local churches who wanted to disaffiliate carefully followed the requirements of the UMC leadership, only to have the requirements change. This is like moving the goal posts. These same churches filed lawsuits only as a last resort. Some churches were told to wait until after the general conference because they would be given opportunities to leave with their assets even though 2553 expired. This is dishonest. They showed no honor or integrity. I think your question should be why is the UMC leadership punishing local churches who have faithfully supported the UMC for many years, but because of the unfaithfulness of the UMC, they want to leave?
Funny that you talk about progressives and leftists changing the meaning of words to suit their purposes. I could say the same thing about conservatives. Calvinists base their theology on this and the entire conservative movement has done this with the word woke. Maybe you should come up with a better argument
I believe that the progressives are in charge of the UMC. Most conservative congregations are out of the UMC or the members who are conservatives have left to join conservative Methodists or other denominations more in line with their traditionalist beliefs.