Just what exactly is a “conflicted” church?
By James V. Heidinger II

Until May 30, 2002, St. Paul United Methodist Church in Fairbanks, Alaska, was a part of the small body known as the Alaska Missionary Conference (AMC), under the oversight of Bishop Ed Paup, who also is the Episcopal leader of the Portland Episcopal Area.

St. Paul UM Church was launched in 1984. By 1994, members celebrated Christmas in their nearly-finished, mostly self-constructed sanctuary.

For 18 years, the St. Paul congregation worshipped, taught youth and adults in Christian beliefs, paid their conference apportionments in full every year, and supported a full-time pastor.  

On May 30, 2002, St. Paul was discontinued as a United Methodist congregation. At its annual conference on the above date, the AMC voted 61-1 for the “discontinuance of St. Paul United Methodist Church effective immediately.”

Many aspects of this unusual, almost unprecedented, action by an annual conference are deeply disturbing and need careful examination, even though St. Paul no longer exists as a United Methodist entity. (The matter is now in the civil courts as the congregation is fighting to retain its property.)

In thirty-five years of ministry, I have never heard of a church being discontinued—that is, shut down as part of the denomination—because it was described as “conflicted.” I have known of a few rural churches that ran off their pastors regularly, but they were never discontinued. 

I confess that a major concern I have about the discontinuance of St. Paul is that it was what might accurately be called a “conservative” congregation. These folks have real loyalty to the Wesleyan theological tradition. They feel an affinity with groups like Good News, the Confessing Movement, and UMAction. They have taken petitions to their annual conference—opposing partial-birth abortion, affirming the present Book of Discipline’s stance on homosexuality, etc.

The problem with the congregation, according to District Superintendent Rachel Lieder Simeon, was that the congregation was “conflicted.” Meaning, its pastors were not allowed the freedom and respect they needed to function, and pastoral families often became targets of the conflict. However, one wonders how serious this problem really was. The next to the last pastor appointed to St. Paul, Rev. Mike Munn, served from 1993 to 2001, one of the longer appointments in the AMC. Was there really a problem?

The St. Paul congregation might well argue that they had a “conflicted” district superintendent or cabinet, who didn’t seem to like them as a congregation. At the January 2001 All Church Conference, a small group, along with Rev. Lieder Simeon, tried to get their person elected as chair of the Administrative Council, but the majority did not support the effort. Rev. Lieder Simeon, visibly agitated by the vote, angrily predicted they would get new leadership, someone trained in conflict resolution. This began a chain of events leading to the departure of Rev. Munn and the appointment of Rev. Don Strait, a retired pastor from Colorado, as interim pastor at St. Paul.

The conference seemed determined to force leadership change at St. Paul. By December of 2001, Rev. Lieder Simeon sent a memo to St. Paul’s leadership asking that all current officers step down and remain out of office for three years. The leadership refused to comply and believed the request to be a violation of the Book of Discipline. Two months later, February 12, 2002,  St. Paul’s Administrative Council read a letter it had received from Rev. Lieder Simeon saying that anyone interested in the future of St. Paul should attend a March 12, 2002 meeting, at which time the bishop and three superintendents of the AMC would be present. At that meeting, the cabinet told the church it was being recommended for “discontinuance” at the May annual conference. Rev. Don Strait, the interim pastor, had been released the day before (March 11) to return to Colorado, leaving St. Paul without pastoral leadership during the Lenten Season.

The vote for “discontinuance” was May 30, 2002. In early June, St. Paul members found themselves locked out of their church and parsonage, with bank and other business accounts transferred to the AMC without contact with members. On July 21, St. Paul members re-keyed the locks and returned to worship in their church, finding most everything of value had been removed. On September 27, 2002, the AMC Trustees filed a lawsuit against St. Paul UM Church. At an eviction hearing, the judge ruled against the AMC and allowed St. Paul members to remain in their church until a trial is conducted.

The cabinet claimed it had done an 18-month assessment of St. Paul UM Church. The congregation claims it hadn’t and had received no substantive answers to questions of why it was being discontinued.

What we do know is that a church that loved the Wesleyan tradition has been “voted off the island.” And legal fees are soaring for both sides. Something is conflicted in all this. I’m not sure it’s the local church.

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