by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Feb 13, 2020
As United Methodists face General Conference 2020 and the potential of forming new church bodies, it feels as though the denomination is at a significant crossroad. It’s as if we are doing something we have never done before. If only that were true. Let’s talk about the history of Methodist Schism.
The truth is, Methodist history is fraught with conflict. Two centuries of it. It’s part of our DNA. It’s who we are. Splitting and reforming are woven into our very being. Historically, there are more divided Methodists than there are United Methodists.
I recently led a session on Productive Conflict with Bishop Jimmy Nunn of Oklahoma. In preparation for our time together, he pulled together two centuries worth of Methodist tussles—theological and organizational—that have resulted in splits. Splits in the 1800s produced the following new denominations: African Methodist Episcopal, the Methodist Protestant, the Primitive Methodist, the Methodist Episcopal Church North and Methodist Episcopal Church South, Free Methodist, Salvation Army, Christian Methodist Episcopal, and Nazarene.
Splits in the 1900s produced these movements:
- Pentecostal Holiness
- Social Gospel
- Methodist Church
- Southern Methodist Church
- Evangelical Methodist
- Association of Independent Methodist Churches
- United Methodist Church
- Autonomous Methodist Churches
- The Autonomy of Methodists in South and Central America
It turns out schism is nothing new. It’s in our blood. It’s right there in the history books.
Hidden History of Methodist Schism
Twenty years ago, I mapped my family genogram. I was startled to realize that I wasn’t the only person in my family to have changed their name. Decades earlier, my Italian Catholic grandfather had changed his surname from Scozzafava to Scott. On the other side of my family, my Orthodox Jewish uncle had changed his first name from Harold to Hillel. My cousin Todd became Adlai. All of a sudden, my unique and significant history wasn’t so unique or meaningful. It was almost predictable, in my DNA, a part of my hidden history.
Similarly, the people called Methodist have been doing schism for a very long time. Perhaps what is different this time is that we haven’t split YET over this issue. In the past, splits took place every 20 years on average.
It’s not like the previous issues were less significant. As Bishop Nunn reminded us: “Methodist schisms fall into three distinct categories: theology, inclusion, and polity. Our present conflicts have roots in all three areas.”
“This realization should lead us to ask these three questions,” Bishop Nunn believes. “What do we believe, and how do we live out our beliefs? Who is fully included in the life and ministry of the church? What is the balance between connection and autonomy?”
Today’s Methodists
As we well know, today’s United Methodists respond differently to these questions. Our varied responses give rise to another dynamic that is at play. Historically, when a reform movement happened, it was followed by a restorationist movement. And vice versa. Often these counter-splits happened the very next year.
Our current issues have all the makings of a historical split. It’s a good drama. We have restorationists and reformers. We have the urge and precedent for splitting.
I wonder if we are freer when we split. After all, specific energy comes with a divorce—a sudden burst of freedom of independence. However, this new energy must not be sustainable because we continue to divide.
Perhaps it’s time to split once again. Maybe the genetic/cultural temptation is too strong to withstand, and the call of the times too strong to ignore. On the other hand, perhaps we’ll decide to do something different and find a way to work together—reformers and restorationists under one big tent. If so, we would finally have the opportunity to live out John Wesley’s aspirational thought, “Though we may not all think alike, can we not love alike?”
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | May 1, 2019
As a Christian leader, you have the dreams of God planted within you. Your task of leadership, your greatest act of stewardship, is to dare to bring forth those dreams, then to lead people in their realization.
As you consider what dreams these might be, taste these pungent words from
Radical Grace by Richard Rohr. “What word of hope does the church have to offer the world? The world is tired of our ideas and theologies. It’s tired of our lazy church services. It’s no longer going to believe ideas, but it will believe love. It will believe life that is given and received… For most people in the world the question is not, Is there life on the other side of death? It is, rather, Is there life on this side of death?” A Jesus-like dream enables people to experience the glory of being alive while on earth.
As you dare to create your own
Jesus-like dream, let’s take a moment and distinguish some key terms, starting with mission and vision.
Your congregation’s mission is the reason it exists. Your vision is the imagined aspirational future your congregation is living into. As Glenn Howell, longtime denominational leader puts it, vision is how you see yourself doing your mission. I would tweak that by saying let your vision be how God believes you are capable of living out your mission.
To get a clear picture of the difference between mission and vision, let’s look at a specific example. In the United Methodist Church, “Making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world” is the denominational mission. It’s the reason that the church exists at this time. Based on what I’ve observed, the vision of the denomination is, “A world in which the hungry are fed, diseases are stamped out, and God’s grace is made known to all.” This isn’t written down anywhere. But it’s the lived vision of the UMC as far as I can tell. Most United Methodist Churches I’ve worked with have some sort of food ministry. The denomination champions an international campaign that invites people to “Imagine no Malaria.” Finally, United Methodists are big on extending the grace of God.
Notice that when it comes to the United Methodist’s working vision, that not every detail is nailed down nor is every nuance figured out. “A world in which the hungry are fed, diseases are stamped out, and God’s grace is made known to all,” paints a picture of the future with broad brush strokes. It’s more like an artistic rendering of a faraway mountain rather than a close-up photo of an immediate landscape.
Now let’s distinguish between a
vision and a goal.
Goals are necessary to enact a vision. But they are not the vision itself.
For instance, one goal necessary to carry out the United Methodist vision might be, “Hold weekly worship services in every congregation so that people in the community can hear and learn about the love of God.” While weekly worship services are a good thing, they are one goal that moves you toward the vision, but they are not the vision. How do you know? Implementing this goal won’t necessarily lead to a world in which the hungry are fed, diseases are stamped out, and the grace of God is made known to all.
Let’s tell the truth. It’s easier to settle for a goal than it is to reach for a dream. Or to define why you exist rather than what God is calling you to now that you do exist. It’s easier to take on something small, do-able and predictable than it is to risk something that might fail. You might even be tempted to do so. But something in you yearns for something more than same old same old. So I encourage you to resist the temptation to settle for a goal and go all the way for a Jesus-like dream.
Soon United Methodists from around the connection will be gathering to dream of a new future in which people of differing theological commitments can minister side by side with peace and respect. I pray they won’t settle for goals, but will go all the way by daring to dream like Jesus.
Not sure how to create your own Jesus-like dream? Check out
Creating a Culture of Renewal or contact me at rebekah@rebekahsimonpeter.com to learn more.
This blog is excerpted from the upcoming book Dream Like Jesus, Market Square Books.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Apr 11, 2019
My colleague, Martha Taylor, recently reported a conversation with a parishioner in which said parishioner gushed, “Oh, I just love my church to death!” Martha noted that she had a tight grip on the reins and leadership of the church and thought, “Yes, sadly, you probably do.”
In a time when different factions are fighting over the future of the church, it’s important to consider how not to love the church to death.
These days biblical interpretation, the unique claims of Christianity, worship on Sunday mornings and even church itself are up for grabs.
What’s a church leader to do? How do you achieve peace in your congregation? Is it even possible?
Letting go of power, control, possessions, preferences and life itself is tough stuff. Yet, this is the call of faith and of spiritual maturity. It is also the pathway to harmonious relationships.
How might this work? For now, I’m going to skip over the obvious disagreement before United Methodists—norms of human sexuality and of biblical interpretation—in favor of something less charged:
worship style. When traditionally-minded worshipers are able to let go of the exclusive use of organ music played at a stately pace, in order to accommodate the addition of a band’s lively music or meditative Taizé chant, this move not only includes more worshiping preferences, it also enriches the spiritual life of the whole community.
The key word is exclusive. It’s not that the organ can’t be incorporated into multi-generational worship. It’s just that insisting on it can suffocate other options. And ultimately the life of the church.
The current rate of change is more rapid than any previous generation has ever experienced. That means Postmoderns, Millennials, and Digitals are far more fluid and adaptable than Baby Boomers, Pioneers or GIs. Futurist Ray Kurzweil noted, “We won’t experience 100 years of progress in the 21st century—it will be more like 20,000 years of progress (at today’s rate).”
So while the church is deciding if it’s okay to sing songs out of the new hymnal, use projection screens, or incorporate new musical instruments, the Confirmation Class of 2019 is learning how to navigate more change in a few months than we have previously encountered in our lifetimes! They don’t understand the church’s collective reluctance to embrace change. For them, change is a matter of course.
Before you love your church to death, ask yourself these questions: What do I need to let go of to be faithful to younger generations? To older generations? A house divided against itself cannot stand.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Feb 11, 2019
On the evening of December 31, 1999, First UMC of Rawlins Wyoming hosted a Y2K gathering at the church. We prayed, played games, and ate. We danced like it was 1998, as we waited to see what would happen. Would computer networks make the big turn to 2000? Or would they falter, forever stuck in 1999, thereby plunging the world into darkness and chaos?
Even in the midst of the Y2K scare, one thing kept me going. I knew that the sun would rise the next morning even if my computer wouldn’t turn on. I knew I would continue breathing. I knew that life would go on. It’s old news now, but life did indeed go on. Quite nicely in fact. It seems anticlimactic to say it now. But the anxiety was real back then.
In some ways, the special called session of the General Conference reminds me of the eve of Y2K. No matter what gets decided or what gets postponed, no matter what holds together or what falls apart, life and ministry will go on. Three things will remain true whether delegates pass the One Church Plan, the Connectional Conference Plan or the Traditionalist Plan. Or, heaven forbid, whether they pass no plan at all.
Here are the three things that will remain unchanged:
- God will still love us—all. And we will still—all–be called to love our neighbors and our enemies.
- We will still have disagreements on human sexuality and on biblical interpretation.
- We will still have people who love the church as it is and people who don’t. We will still have people who leave the church and people who stay.
Don’t get me wrong. I believe this gathering and its outcomes are important. They will determine how we will organize ourselves in years to come.
I’m personally in favor of the One Church Plan. It allows for regional and theological diversity. It provides a flexible structure that reflects the actual spectrum of commitments of the UMC. And it allows for people to follow their conscience, without judgment or retribution.
But we don’t have to wait until General Conference is over to decide who and how we are going to be. If Jesus is our leader, then love is still our foundation. We would do well to breathe deep, calm our anxieties, and move forward in our practice of love and acceptance.
Are you ready to move forward in your ministry? Join us for a free webinar: Does Your Church Dream Like Jesus? It will be Friday, March 1, 11am-Noon Mountain Time. Email us at rebekah@rebekahsimonpeter.com to register and reserve your space in the webinar.
Then, stay tuned. Next week, I’m going to share with you the seven abilities we need to cultivate no matter how General Conference turns out.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Jun 12, 2017
Will the United Methodist Church split or not over differing interpretations of human sexuality and biblical hermeneutics? That was the topic of informal conversation at a recent denominational retreat I co-led in New England.
“If The Way Forward doesn’t come back with something everyone can live with, we’ll split,” offered one pastor knowingly. “We’ve already split,” asserted another, “it’s just not official.” A contemplative silence ensued. “What if it’s not schism?” asked one savvy lay person. The group leaned in, curious. “What if it’s self-differentiation?” she continued. It got me thinking. Not all splits are schism.
Schism implies irreparable differences and anxious or angry reaction. Self-differentiation has a whole other feel to it. Yes, it’s a way of distinguishing oneself from the rest of the group. But it implies health, self-knowledge, and courage. Unity is the opposite of schism, but not of self-differentiation. Students of family systems know that anxious enmeshment is its opposite.
Jesus was self-differentiated. He didn’t go along just to go along. He stated his beliefs, his values, and his world-view. Even when it wasn’t popular. He offered his teaching—both when it coincided with current Jewish teaching, and when it veered away from it. He didn’t back down from either.
He was a non-anxious presence who allowed others to claim their own truth and life- experience. He was clear about his purpose, but he didn’t insist that others follow suit. For instance, he never decided for others whether they were “true Jews,” or faithful followers of his. By his estimation, even the Pharisees would enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Jesus didn’t ostracize Judas, or cut him off from the others. Nor did he split his followers from mainline Judaism. That happened way after his death.
Could we learn to do the same?
Could we allow people to pursue truth as they see it? Could we calmly and lovingly self-differentiate, even as we maintain our bonds of connection? In other words, is there room for an intentional big-tent United Methodism?
Yes, I think so. Local churches do it all the time.
When you walk through the doors of First UMC, Anytown US, no one stops you to find out your theology or sociology. There’s no litmus test for biblical interpretation, or understandings of human sexuality. We don’t sort people at the door. We don’t sort people at the Lord’s Table, or at the Baptismal font. When we are baptized, it’s not into a set of doctrines. It’s into the Body of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit.
When a person joins the UMC, they covenant to faithfully participate in the ministries of the church by their prayers, their presence, their gifts, their service and their witness. That’s it. The rest is open to interpretation.
The way our current system is set up, a simple majority prevails when it comes to setting up the rules we live by in the Book of Discipline. The whole idea is get people to agree with you so that your “side” can “win.” But we all know that that’s a losing battle. Winners create losers.
We’re not made to agree on everything. We’re made to be one in Christ—in all of our glorious differences. That’s the miracle and magic of it all. We can be Jew and Greek, male and female, servant and free. And be one in Christ Jesus.
A self-differentiated United Methodist Church would be unlike our current gridlock Methodism. It would require an intentional openness about our differences. And an intentional acceptance of them.
We would need to make space for a wide spectrum of understandings of sound biblical interpretation and healthy human sexuality. Likewise, we would need to make space for a spacious variety of Christologies, and understandings of the Holy Spirit. And we would have to be okay with them openly co-existing.
It would mean giving up being right. Or making others wrong. And it would mean more Christlikeness than we currently manifest as a body.
It can happen. Confirmation came around a New Mexican table laden with carne adovada and green chile stew a few weeks ago. I sat with a group of beloved colleagues I met through Creating a Culture of Renewal; we were talking theology. In our small group of 3-4, we had at least one tongues-speaking Charismatic, one fervent evangelical, and one liberal-evangelical-passionate-progressive (me).
It took a while for us each to be clear about our theological differences. But as we did, we discovered something very interesting. We had many things in common—beyond our love and respect for each other. We had shared goals in ministry. Shared compassion. Not to mention shared fears of being marginalized in our current system.
God had called each of us to ministry in a unique way. Yet, no one person’s call undid anyone else’s. They were all valid; they all came from God.
What if we treated each other the same way? No insistence of sameness. Just insistence on authenticity. The truth is, the UMC is inherently diverse. We just don’t really ‘fess up to it—in a non-anxious, self-differentiated way.
I wonder what might happen if we could openly own our values and worldviews and theologies? We might not need to split. Or schism.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | May 10, 2017
News flash! The orthodox wing of the United Methodist Church is not going away. In fact, it’ll likely get stronger. Likewise, the progressive wing of the United Methodist Church is not going away. It too will get stronger.
That leaves us with a dilemma: How to go forward when we have two very strong, and somewhat opposing points of view? Especially when it comes to human sexuality and biblical hermeneutics.
Here’s what else is not going away: a fair number of United Methodist people who identify as LGBTQ, and their supporters.
What’s a denomination to do? If we want schism we’re set up perfectly for it. After all, we seem to have irreconcilable differences. If we want unity, not so much. Neither side is going away and neither side is backing down. All of us want to be heard and respected. Now what?
May I suggest a really good fight? Before you hit “delete”, allow me a moment to elaborate.
Patrick Lencioni in his bestseller, 5 Dysfunctions of a Team, lays out the pitfalls of not engaging in constructive conflict: meetings are unproductive, a team doesn’t commit to the decisions it makes, no one holds each other accountable, and desired results do not materialize.
For 45 years, United Methodist General Conferences have been unproductive in resolving our differences of opinion on human sexuality. About 40% have favored full LGBT inclusion in the life and leadership of the church; 60% have been against. Even though we make doctrinal decisions on human sexuality via the Book of Discipline, we lack commitment to carry them out. Once back home, people perceive the movement of the Holy Spirit in very different ways. And act accordingly. Many conferences ordain gay people. The Western Jurisdiction was swayed by the Holy Spirit in the election of Bishop Karen Oliveto. The truth is we have varying commitments. We can’t hold one another accountable to a vision we don’t share.
Even so, we’ve tried to enforce accountability through the Book of Discipline. We’ve tried it through church trials. These have only increased the rift, and the resolve.
In the midst of if all is this persistent fact: we don’t have the real results we desire – an overall increase in the number of disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. Even with all the resources at our disposal, our numbers show that we’re not gaining ground. US churches have been shrinking for decades. If it wasn’t for our expansion into Asia and Africa, our denomination would be significantly smaller.
The history of how we got here is long and arduous. But here’s where we’re at: the Judicial Council both ruled that the consecration of the first openly gay, partnered bishop stands, and that in the future, more attention must be paid to the sexual orientation and practice of would-be clergy. At the same time, the Bishops of the UMC have commissioned a Way Forward for the entire denomination.
After 45 years, a lot of folks would be okay with schism. But here’s the thing. It would be like most other church splits: two very different stories of what happened, lingering hurt, blame and resentment. Yes, there would be freedom; there would also be regret.
That’s why I’m suggesting a really good fight. The Commission on the Way Forward could accomplish this. I’m talking robust conflict, vigorous debate. Mind you, not the kind of fight we have at General Conference every four years. Keep the legislators away. No secretive filings with the Judicial Council allowed. Instead, let’s have an old fashioned, no holds barred sharing of ideas, concerns, fears and worries of all sides. This needs to include orthodox and progressive, gay and straight, perhaps even Christian and non-Christian folks. Include biblical scholars who deeply understand the text and context of our sacred texts, and the times we live in. Let’s get all the consequences and implications laid out on the table. People won’t buy in if they don’t get to weigh in. But if they do feel heard, they’ll be much more likely to commit to future decisions even if their ideas didn’t win out.
Here’s what constructive conflict could do for us:
- Air the real fears people have.
- Surface all the consequences and implications of our potential decisions.
- Cause us to feel and think outside the box.
- Co-create something no one has thought of yet.
But before we have a fight like this, here are the ground rules I suggest:
- Establish trust by sharing stories.
- No personal attacks.
- No assuming the worst about each other.
- Be vulnerable with one another.
Patrick Lencioni says “vulnerability based trust” (not predictive trust) is the foundation for cohesiveness. It’s the willingness to say I’m sorry, I don’t know, I was wrong, I’m in over my head or I’m not sure. It comes from knowing each other at a deep level. From sharing and listening deeply, without fear of censure or retribution. It requires real courage.
One ground rule for the rest of us: give them latitude and freedom to come up with solutions that are very different than what we might have imagined.
Is there a future for a united Methodist Church? Only if we remember that we’re not stuck. Jesus gave us permission to decide how things will be: whatever we bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatever we loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. In other words, we get to decide how to interpret and apply scripture. As long as we’re aligned with each other, Heaven will align with us.
Trust is essential to conflict. Good constructive conflict is essential to commitment. Commitment is essential to holding one another accountable to shared decisions. And accountability is the only way that people will strive together for the results they profess. You want results? It all starts with conflict grounded in trust.
