North Alabama United Methodists split on whether to leave denomination

Dec. 4—Division over doctrine that has roiled the United Methodist Church nationally has been felt locally with at least seven churches in Morgan County voting to disaffiliate from the denomination and two large Decatur churches staying put even though a majority of their members wanted to disaffiliate.

In order to disaffiliate, a church needs a two-thirds majority vote to leave. More than 60% of members voting at Central UMC and Decatur First United Methodist last month favored disaffiliating from the denomination but they didn't reach the 66.7% threshold needed.

"Ours was very close, but we didn't make that majority," said Decatur First UMC Pastor Alex Beaube.

Decatur First had more than 500 members at the end of 2021 and Central had more than 700, according to Stay UMC, a group tracking disaffiliations in the North Alabama Conference of the UMC.

Beaube said the process of considering whether to leave the UMC has been stressful for his church, which is at Church Street Northeast and Canal Street.

"There is sadness and grief regardless of which way the vote was going to go," he said. "There's no happiness to stay, there would have been no happiness to leave. The people I love and care about as a pastor are hurting.

"I only feel sadness and grief."

The most high-profile issue for United Methodist members wanting to leave the denomination involves whether to ordain LGBTQ clergy and whether to perform gay marriages.

The UMC Discipline is conservative on the issues, banning ordination of openly LGBTQ clergy and prohibiting churches from performing gay marriages, but conservative UMC leaders complain that the denomination has been lax in enforcement. In part due to concerns about enforcement and in part out of an expectation that the UMC will liberalize its rules on human sexuality at its next General Conference in 2024, many congregations are voting to disaffiliate from the denomination.

Lindy Smith, the annual conference delegate for Central UMC at the corner of Jackson Street Southeast and Sixth Avenue, said the vote at her church was respectful but painful.

"It's been a very difficult period of time for everyone in our church, and I really am sorry that we had to go through that time," she said. "For me personally and for my family, I'm very pleased. But I think it's going to take a while for people to process all of this, and every family will process it differently."

'Dysfunction' blamed

Wesley Memorial UMC in Southwest Decatur next to Austin Junior High is one of at least 160 congregations out of the 638 in the North Alabama Conference of the UMC that voted to disaffiliate from the denomination.

"We're not leaving angry at all," said Pastor Jason Greene. "This has been very painful for everybody.

"Let's part ways and do it graciously and bless each other as we part."

He said that while human sexuality is a major issue, his main concern is a lack of consistency within the UMC.

"The larger issue is dysfunction in the broader denomination," he said. "Lack of accountability for violating doctrine is the issue.

"We don't hate gay people. There are surely homosexuals in many congregations."

He said the UMC at first supported a "one church" plan, which would have allowed individual churches to decide whether they would perform gay marriages and accept LGBTQ clergy. Despite being recommended by the UMC Council of Bishops, the plan was rejected when it met conservative resistance.

Greene said the more progressive churches who "declined to uphold the Book of Discipline" made his congregation feel they should move to a denomination that better matched their theology.

"There's no consistency in enforcing the Book of Discipline," he said. "It's what I would see as chaos. If you say, 'Hey, we believe this — no, not really,' you lose some credibility."

He said the UMC decision not to have a General Conference — a governance meeting of UMC leaders from around the world — in 2022 was "foolish."

"It seems like we're just kicking the can down the road and not addressing the situation in front of us," he said.

The General Conference originally scheduled for 2020 was delayed to 2022 due to COVID, and the 2022 conference was postposed to 2024 due to ongoing COVID issues and related visa backlogs that the UMC concluded would prevent many delegates from traveling to the United States. Issues of human sexuality and disaffiliation were expected to be on the agenda at the 2020 and 2022 conferences, and the latest postponement accelerated the calls for disaffiliation.

Greene's congregation is moving now to the more conservative Free Methodist denomination.

"I'm extremely pleased with that decision. There's a level of excitement about the Free Methodist Church," he said. "We came to the conclusion as a church God is calling us to the Free Methodists."

Many churches deciding to disaffiliate from the UMC are going to the Global Methodist Church denomination. The Global Methodist Church was formed shortly after the 2022 General Conference was postponed.

Not all voting

In addition to the UMC's Book of Discipline requiring a two-thirds majority vote to leave the denomination, there are also financial prerequisites for exiting. A disaffiliating church must pay two years of that congregation's apportionment commitment, and pay the congregation's pro-rata share of the conference's pension liability.

Two other large UMC churches in the area that have voted to disaffiliate are Hartselle First UMC and Friendship Church in Athens, according to Stay UMC. Friendship, with more than 800 members at its Athens campus at the end of 2021, voted 95% to disaffiliate and 96% to join the Global Methodist Church, Stay UMC said. Hartselle First, with more than 1,000 members, voted in September to leave the denomination.

Some churches have avoided the disaffiliation issue, preferring to wait until the UMC decides how to deal with issues of human sexuality at the General Conference scheduled to take place in Charlotte, North Carolina, in April 2024.

Other churches aren't even taking up the issue of disaffiliation.

Steven Barber, the pastor of Neel United Methodist Church, said his congregation wanted to concentrate on ministry.

"While we understand other United Methodist churches in our area are disaffiliating, we are focused on being the best outpost of the Kingdom of God we can be in (our) community right now," he said. "We will worry about denominational issues when the time comes, but everything right now is preemptive. We also realize things are happening outside of our jurisdiction which raise some concern, but ... those things do not directly affect us."

Barber said the split within the church is similar to a divorce.

"In a divorce, nobody wins, and it's incredibly sad and incredibly heartbreaking," he said. "Everybody wants to be right, and everybody wants to be justified no matter what side they stand on."

He said he and his congregation are focused on their faith.

"We are in the season of Advent. This is the time where we learn to sit in the uncomfortable darkness while awaiting the Light of the Word, Jesus, to come," he said. "So we sit and wait while loving Jesus and our community well."

— emma.daniel@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2437. Twitter @DD_EDaniel