Delegates to the Susquehanna Conference will consider the request of churches to cut ties with the denomination due to its stance on LGBTQ issues.
At issue is whether the bishops of the United Methodist Church, which has some 6.4 million members, are allowed to officiate over same-sex weddings, and whether the bishops themselves are allowed to live openly as members of the LGBTQ community.
“We didn’t have the same language then that we have now, but that’s been a conversation since essentially the beginning of UMC.” This week, the Susquehanna Conference will become the latest jurisdiction to consider petitions from about 18% of its churches. Since 2019, for instance, the Texas Annual Conference, a region that covers East Texas with headquarters in Houston, has lost 302 of its nearly 600 churches — the most of any conference, an analysis by the denomination found.Still, William Lawrence, an ordained UMC elder and retired Professor Emeritus at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, does not think this latest shake up threatens the future of the denomination.
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