Is schism the next step for United Methodism?
9/9/1998 by United Methodist News Service United Methodists should accept the growing ideological polarization in the denomination as the inevitable price tag on pluralism and as a fact of contemporary American culture, according to a widely known church consultant.
Writing in the September/October issue of Circuit Rider magazine, the Rev. Lyle E. Schaller identifies schism as one of several possible responses to the "increasing degree of polarization within what is alleged to be a connectional church."
Circuit Rider is produced for United Methodist Church clergy by the United Methodist Publishing House in Nashville, Tenn.
In the Circuit Rider article, Schaller encourages United Methodists to "recognize that the highly centralized polity of this denomination, built on a high level of distrust of local leadership, is incompatible with ideological pluralism." Instead of searching for a denomination-wide consensus or common ground, he says the goal might be to design a polity that is compatible with ideological diversity. And, to do this, he suggests that the size of the "institutional tent" be expanded and control be decentralized.
One possibility, he says, is to create a federation of annual (regional) conferences. Some non-geographical but relatively homogeneous annual conferences would be organized around a shared ideology or some other point of commonality. Others might be highly pluralistic and non-geographical while others might be traditionally heterogeneous and geographically defined.
In this option, Schaller says the minimum requirement could be that each annual conference include a least 800 churches or congregations with a combined average worship attendance in the most recent reporting year of at least 60,000.
Schaller says an ad hoc task force might be appointed that would introduce appropriate amendments to the 2000 General Conference. Another task force would be charged with the responsibility of designing a polity that is compatible with ideological pluralism and consistent with a larger tent.
"This polity would combine a connectional system with a high degree of autonomy for both congregations and annual conferences," he said.
His article closes with questions: "Should United Methodists continue to quarrel under the roof of a relatively small tent with a shrinking number of people in that tent or split up and move into two or three or four smaller tents or design and build a larger tent?"
One group in the denomination working on missional and organizational possibilities is the Connectional Process Team. The 38-member group was created by the 1996 General Conference to lead the church in a "transformational direction" and to propose to the 2000 General Conference how the church might be organized to accomplish its mission and ministry. Chairperson of the team is Bishop Sharon Brown Christopher of Springfield, Ill.
Christopher said a working draft of a report to the 2000 General Conference will continue to be refined at the team's next meeting in Atlanta Oct. 16-20.
She applauded Schaller for inviting the church to think in new ways about the nature of Christian community and connection and encouraging church members to "step outside our existing assumptions to see Christian life from a new perspective." She also expressed a hope that the Connectional Process Team "will be able to help the church see itself from God's big picture and not from narrow self-interests."
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