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UM membership figures show strength outside U.S.

Numbers might never lie, but in some cases they say different things to different people.

New data on church membership trends drew divergent reactions from the United Methodist Church’s bishops during their April 28-May 2 meeting. Some bishops, focusing on the United States figures, expressed a sense of urgency about reversing the downward membership trend. Other bishops, noting the lack of global data, said the research didn’t necessarily reflect the strength of the denomination as a whole.

The percentage of U.S. congregations not receiving at least one member on confession of faith or “restored” status increased from 37.8 percent in 1984 to 40.7 percent in 2000, according to the report, “Making Disciples for Jesus Christ.” Bishop John Hopkins, who leads the church’s Minnesota Area, presented the report on behalf of the Council of Bishops’ committee on pastoral concerns.

The committee’s Bishop Warner Brown, leader of the Denver Area, proposed that the council suspend its committees except the executive committee in the last year of the quadrennium to focus on making disciples. The executive committee would oversee the other committees’ work for that period. “We need to make priorities in how we lead the church in terms of turning around the trend of a 20-year decline,” Brown said.

While acknowledging the need to address the issue, the bishops had reservations about suspending their committees and referred the proposal to the executive committee.

The report also showed that in 2002, the denomination’s membership rose over the 10 million mark for the first time since 1979. That increase was due to growth in numbers outside the United States, particularly in Africa.

Two African bishops offered a different perspective on the vitality of the church from that reflected in the U.S. membership data.

“Why are we talking about the decline of membership?” asked Bishop Emilio DeCarvalho, retired, of Luanda, Angola. “Thousands and thousands of children are attending Sunday school in Africa.”

Bishop Joao Somane Machado, who leads the Mozambique Area, said he was disappointed in the proposal to suspend the committees, noting that the bishops whose areas are growing in membership have not been asked how their churches are growing while others are not.

“In Africa, we are evangelizing,” he told the council. “It’s like you don’t want to hear that word anymore.” How, he asked, can the bishops exchange and share information so the U.S. bishops can benefit from the experience of the African bishops?

The data shows that the central conferences have nearly 20 percent of the church’s membership, with Africa accounting for 16 percent, Southeast Asia, 2 percent, and Europe, 1 percent.

The Southeastern Jurisdiction has 28 percent of the members; South Central, 18 percent; North Central, 16 percent; Northeastern, 15 percent; and Western, 4 percent.

The Southeastern and South Central jurisdictions were the only two in the United States that had increases in the numbers of people received on confession of faith in 2000 compared with 1984. The breakdown: Southeastern, up 17.4 percent; South Central, up 14 percent; Western, down 11.3 percent; Northeastern, down 14.4 percent; North Central, down 15.6 percent.

As of 2000, United Methodists represented 3.7 percent of the U.S. population, compared with 7.1 percent for the Southern Baptists and 22 percent for the Catholics.

The report also noted that the denomination has a widespread presence. “Out of the 3,171 counties in the United States, the United Methodist Church has a congregational presence in 3,003 counties, more than any other denomination in the United States.”

Adapted from United Methodist News Service.

 

Bishop Sprague blasts “Christo-centric exclusivism”

In a speech at a United Methodist seminary, Bishop Joe Sprague of Chicago assailed “Christo-centric exclusivism that ipso facto prepares the soil of stiff-necked, exclusivistic arrogance.” This kind of christo-centric theology, which potentially breeds “virulence” towards other religions, must be disavowed, he insisted.

Sprague has aroused controversy over the last year by denying Jesus Christ’s virgin birth, bodily resurrection, and unique role as Savior of the world. In two recent speeches delivered April 22 and 23 at the Methodist Theological School in Ohio (Methesco), Sprague responded to his critics and defended his theology, especially as explained in his recent book, Affirmations of a Dissenter.

Not backing away at all from his controversial theological assertions, Sprague said he was “incredulous” that seminary faculty and other “well-informed clergy and laity” still “passionately advocate a virgin birth and physically resurrected” Jesus.

“One wonders what such thinkers do with the horrors of the 20th century,” Sprague remarked. “A God who intercedes to effect a virgin birth, yet a God who permits the innocents to be slaughtered?” Sprague asked, referring to the Holocaust and two World Wars. “What kind of God would this be?”

Sprague said it was “baffling” that some “sophisticated so-called post-modernists” insist on an “intervening, supernatural, can-do-anything-God” that was conceived by the early church. He specifically cited Billy Abraham, a noted theology professor at Perkins School of Theology in Dallas, who Sprague claims accused him of being “naïve, ill-formed, and exhibiting false humility.”

“Why do the time-influenced constructs of the early church fathers hold such awe and reverence for them, given the oblique and rather slippery language employed?” Sprague asked. He also referred dismissively to the “male-only politics” of the early church.

Warning against “docetic tendencies” [Docetism denied Christ’s humanity], Sprague alleged that “High Christology” threatens to remove Jesus from history and humanity so that His followers “proudly venerate His image” while they “shamefully fail to follow His example.”

Admitting that his book “contains nothing new under the theological and biblical sun,” Sprague said he wants it nonetheless to prod a “theologically myopic church” and challenge the three “increasingly strident right wing caucus groups within United Methodism.”

As an example of dangerous High Christology’s followers failing to follow the example of Christ, Sprague cited one “right wing” caucus group, Good News, which honored President George W. Bush as its 2002 Layman of the Year.

According to Sprague, President Bush is also a “Christology-from-above proponent of personal piety,” who presided over 153 “state-sanctioned murders” as governor of Texas. And now Bush has endorsed an “unethical” National Security Strategy that employs pre-emptive war, which Sprague called a “demon.”

Sprague faulted the Bush Administration for behaving “arrogantly” and “self-righteously” while pursuing a “domination theory.” He warned against the Administration’s “PR blitz” for war with Iraq and alleged that the media had become “an extension of the Bush Estate.”

Condemning the U.S. for its “unilateral arrogance,” Sprague said the conflict in Iraq had placed a “stain” on the U.S.’s global image.

Sprague warned against “fundamentalism,” which he said is a “demon” in all of the monotheistic religions. “The misuse of sacred tradition by the religious and political right has to be exposed and discounted,” he asserted.

“False phenomena like Left Behind [a book and movie premised upon belief in a “rapture” for Christians before the onset of the End Times] and radical jihad...are manifestations of the misappropriation of God’s revelations,” Sprague said.

Terrorism in the form of al Qaeda must be confronted, Sprague admitted. But so too must the “terror” that is visited upon the “forgotten poor, the immigrants and refugees, and innumerable innocent people of color, and the child and aged in this nation.”

The more Jesus is removed from his humanity, as Sprague claimed proponents of High Christology do, the “murkier the ethics” become for following Jesus’ example of “social justice” and “non-violence.”

As another example of this, Sprague cited United Methodism’s “arrogant and unethical statements regarding gay and lesbian people.” He was referring evidently to the church’s prohibition against practicing homosexual clergy and against the celebration of same-sex unions. These stances “fuel the fire of covert, if not overt, actions of discrimination, meanness, and violence against gays and lesbians.”

Sprague said a friend of his had offered to sell hot dogs and marshmallows should Sprague be “burned at the heretical stake.” The friend also remarked that Sprague was only guilty of “plagiarizing” Rudolf Bultmann, the liberal German 20th century theologian who interpreted the Gospel’s miraculous events as metaphor.

“I plead guilty to being a non-recovering, unrepentant Methesco-ite, circa 1965,” Sprague explained to the seminary audience. “The legacy of this place is to be blamed, at least in part, for all the troubles I have seen, caused or known across my ministry.”

Sprague recalled that as a young man he had “discarded the Bible in my revolt against the fundamentalism of my childhood.” But his learning about the “various schools of higher criticism” at Methesco helped him rediscover the Bible as a “veritable treasure house.”

Faulting clergy for being “afraid” to teach what he learned in seminary, Sprague said “critically thinking people” have been driven away from the church. Meanwhile, “neo-literalism” has exploited the remaining void to the detriment of the church.

Sprague said the church “reeks” of the “stench” of mediocrity and practical atheism. As evidence, he pointed to the church’s hesitancy to embrace the Prince of Peace during “this chauvinistic moment in this nation.”

Mark Tooley is the director of UM Action, a committee of the
Institute on Religion and Democracy in Washington, D.C.

British theologian N.T. Wright comes to defense of the Resurrection
By Richard N. Ostling

Easter is a day not only of hope, but discord—at least among theologians.

Throughout modern times, liberal scholars have challenged a central tenet of Christianity: that Jesus Christ rose bodily from the dead after being crucified by the Romans on Good Friday. Whether the Resurrection occurred, they say, is ultimately unimportant compared with Christ’s message.

But to myriad Christians—who each Sunday profess faith in Jesus’ Resurrection and, ultimately, their own—that’s heresy. Now, a conservative theologian is backing their viewpoint with a new book.

The Rev. N.T. “Tom” Wright, who will be consecrated in July as bishop of Durham, the fourth-highest Church of England post, has just produced the most monumental defense of the Easter heritage in decades.

Wright, 54, a prolific writer of both scholarly and popular books, is currently canon theologian of Westminster Abbey and a former university instructor at Cambridge, Oxford and McGill in Montreal. He often visits the United States, lecturing in his strong baritone.

Wright’s 817-page The Resurrection of the Son of God (Fortress Press) marches through a clearly organized case that confronts every major doubt about Easter, ancient and modern.

He disputes those who think the Resurrection is “beyond history.” There’s a historical question, Wright insists, that is inescapable: Why did Christianity emerge so rapidly, with such power, and why did believers risk everything to teach that Jesus really rose?

He concludes the best explanation is that the earliest Christians held two strong convictions that worked in tandem: Jesus’ tomb was discovered empty on Easter morning. Jesus then appeared to his followers alive in bodily form. In other words, they held the convictions that make up the unvarnished New Testament story.

Wright carefully sifts the New Testament and adds to that his circumstantial and logical arguments. The best history can provide with ancient events is a “high probability” they occurred, he says. The Easter story qualifies as true because all proposed alternatives fail to explain the early power of Christianity.

The oldest alternative, mentioned in Matthew 28:12-15, was the claim Jesus’ body was stolen from the tomb. Wright notes the New Testament writers presented that possibility even at the risk of “putting ideas into people’s heads.” They did so, he says, precisely because skeptics were trying to explain why the tomb was empty.

Some argue modern science has taught us the Resurrection was impossible, as were other miracles. To Wright, it’s silly to think first-century Christians were “ignorant of the fact that dead people stayed dead.” They knew this, but were convinced Jesus was the one exception.

Wright dismisses claims that Christian belief echoed the dying-and-rising gods of ancient pagan farmers on grounds that Jews avoided paganism and that Jesus’ Resurrection was a one-time occurrence totally unlike the annual, ceremonial rising of gods and crops.

Another standard challenge is that the Easter stories in the four Gospels conflict with one another: Different people arrive at the tomb, they meet different people and Jesus’ first appearances are in different locations.

Wright turns that inside out. If the accounts were concocted, he said, “you’d expect a better effort to have stories come into line with each other. No, this is the rough sort of way it came out” in the four independent accounts preserved in the Gospels.

He also thinks the Gospel reports about women as the first witnesses argue against fiction: The Gospel writers wouldn’t have made this up because the ancients discounted women’s testimony.

Wright also contests the many modern attempts to explain away the disciples’ belief as human error or mass psychosis. But that still doesn’t exhaust all the Easter imponderables.

By the Gospel accounts, Jesus’ resurrected body was like no other. He mysteriously appeared and disappeared (Luke 24:31,36 and John 20:19,26). Also, his friends did not always recognize him (Luke 24:16, John 20:14, 21:4).

“I have been very puzzled how to make sense of the stories,” Wright said in an interview. “It is puzzling for the New Testament writers themselves.” In the New Testament portrayal, Jesus rose with a different, glorified body, which is promised to all believers as part of the Easter hope.

Wright’s acceptance of that point runs into objections from Alan F. Segal, a Jewish historian at Barnard College who is completing a major work titled Life After Death covering Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

Segal and Wright agree on many basic issues, including that the Gospels teach a material, physical concept of resurrection. But Segal opposes Wright’s contention that first-century Jews and Christians all meant the same thing when they spoke about resurrection.

According to Segal, they “all talk about a bodily resurrection but not all believe it is physical,” and the Apostle Paul conceived of a “spiritual” body in the pivotal passage, 1 Corinthians 15, written about 20 years after the Easter events.

In this crucial and rather technical argument, Wright insists that what Paul meant by “spiritual” was that after Resurrection the body is “animated by the spirit,” not that it is a nonmaterial body.

Wright says Christianity has always believed that after death and an undefined period in the presence of God, each individual will receive a resurrection body like that of Jesus.

What difference does it make whether resurrection involves material bodies?

First, Wright says, because the church should teach what the first Christians believed. Second, the physical reality of a future world after death shows “the created order matters to God and Jesus’ Resurrection is the pilot project for that renewal.”

Richard N. Ostling, a religion writer for the Associated Press, was formerly a senior correspondent for Time magazine, where he wrote 23 cover stories and was the religion writer for many years. Reprinted with permission of the Associated Press.

 

Liberal UM activists publish new book on “conservative renewal groups”

As United Methodists prepare for the 2004 legislative session that will determine future directions of the denomination, an ad hoc group of clergy and lay leaders has released a book addressing their concerns about attempts to restrict theological and social diversity.

The book, United Methodism at Risk: A Wake-up Call, was published this spring by the Information Project for United Methodists, an unofficial group led by retired United Methodist Bishop C. Dale White and Beth Capen, a layperson from Kingston, New York. Financial sponsor was Hennepin Avenue United Methodist Church in Minneapolis. Leon Howell, former editor of Christianity and Crisis magazine, is the author.

White provided copies of the book to the denomination’s Council of Bishops during the council’s April 28-May 2 meeting in Dallas. He told United Methodist News Service that he wanted his fellow bishops to know exactly what information the book contained.

Focusing on “conservative renewal movements related to the United Methodist Church,” the book outlines the history, funding sources, strategies and tactics of the renewal groups. Specifically named are Good News, Renew, the Mission Society for United Methodists, Lifewatch, the Confessing Movement, the Association for Church Renewal, A Foundation for Theological Education, Transforming Congregations, and the Coalition for United Methodist Accountability.

The book’s study guide, written by White and the Rev. Scott Campbell, pastor of Harvard-Epworth United Methodist Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, notes, “The leaders of the conservative renewal groups operate with a narrowly focused theological and socio-political agenda. Many receive large grants from non-church organizations with a distinct political and ideological agenda unrelated to making disciples of Christ.”

Although the critique is not meant to question the integrity of the “sincere, faithful Christians” who support these groups, White and Campbell write, those Christians need to make “informed decisions about what it is they are supporting.”

The Rev. James V. Heidinger II, president and publisher of Good News, called the book a third-rate attempt at an expose designed to prop up a liberal viewpoint that is, in his opinion, fading across the church.

“The book is a sustained attack from the old-guard denominational establishment whose views have been dominant for the past 30 or more years, during which time our church has lost nearly 3 million members,” he said in a statement to United Methodist News Service. He also objected to the distribution of a book published by an unofficial group at the Council of Bishops meeting.

White said he hopes the book’s release in late April would allow time “for people to do some critical thinking” as the denomination prepares for its top legislative body, the 2004 General Conference. The church’s annual (regional) conferences are electing delegates to General Conference as they meet this spring and summer.

One concern, for example, is the attempt to challenge “freedom of theological inquiry” and set up structures “to police the pulpits of Methodism,” White said.

The book’s preface calls upon “those who share our convictions” to insist that General Conference delegates consider the good of the whole church in their decisions and be able to “approach that gathering with open minds and open hearts.”

The theological conflict in the United Methodist Church needs to be addressed “from a perspective that’s broader than that of the conservative renewal groups,” the bishop explained. “We really wanted people to understand where these groups originated and what is the source of their funding and support.”

White said he doesn’t question the right of such groups to advocate for their particular theological positions. But he added that he does question their methods and what he and others consider attempts “to spread fear and mistrust through the denomination” through intimidation and character assassination.

In Heidinger’s view, the renewal groups under criticism in the book “are attempting to speak for mainstream United Methodists across the church. To be sure, we’ve not always done that perfectly. But this sweeping assault, under the cloak of scholarship, seems little more than an attempt to marginalize and silence groups speaking for the church’s mainstream.”

United Methodist News Service



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