title: Auguste Comte

text: It is through observation that humanity is able to gather knowledge. The only way within society to gather evidence and build upon what we do not already know to strengthen society is to observe and experience our situational surroundings. “In the positive state, the mind stops looking for causes of phenomena, and limits itself strictly to laws governing them; likewise, absolute notions are replaced by relative ones,” The imperfection of humanity is not a result of the way we think, rather our perspective that guides the way we think. Comte expresses the idea that we have to open our eyes to different ideas and ways to evaluate our surroundings such as focusing outside of the simple facts and abstract ideas but instead dive into the supernatural. This does not make mean that what is around us is not critical to look out for as our observations are critical assets to our thinking. The things that are "lost" or knowledge that is in the past are still relevant to recent knowledge. It is what is before our time that guides why things are the way they are today. We would always be relying on our own facts and would never hypothesize to reveal the supernatural if we do not observe. Observing strives to further our thinking processes. According to Comte, "‘The dead govern the living,’ which is likely a reference to the cumulative nature of positivism and the fact that our current world is shaped by the actions and discoveries of those who came before us," As this is true, the observations only relevant to humanity and not abstractly related to humanity are distinct and seen situationally. The situation leads to human observation as a reflection of the tension in society can be reviewed, overall helping to enhance knowledge development.


title: Auguste Comte

text: Upon our observation skills, our thinking shifts. As thinkers and observers, we switch from trying to identify truth and turn toward the rationality and reason nature brings, giving us the ability to observe. This distinct switch takes on the transition from the abstract to the supernatural. "Comte’s classification of the sciences was based upon the hypothesis that the sciences had developed from the understanding of simple and abstract principles to the understanding of complex and concrete phenomena." Instead of taking what we believe to be true we turn it around to use the phenomena of science and the observation of natural law to justify what we believe to be true within society.


title: Auguste Comte

text: The condensing and formulation of human knowledge is what Comte drives us toward to ultimately build the strongest society possible. If scientists do not take the chance to research why a certain animal species are going distinct and their facts researched by those in the past are no longer true of the present, how is the data supposed to grow? How are we to gain more knowledge? These facts of life are valuable, but it is beyond these facts that Comte gestures us to look to. Instead of the culmination of facts with little sufficiency, knowledge altogether takes on its role in the realm of science. In connection to science, Comte relates to science in two specific fields to rebuild the construction of human knowledge. As science is broad, Comte reveals this scientific classification for the sake of thinking and the future organization of society. "Comte divided sociology into two main fields, or branches: social statistics, or the study of the forces that hold society together; and social dynamics, or the study of the causes of social change,” In doing this, society is reconstructed. By reconstructing human thinking and observation, societal operation alters. The attention is drawn to science, hypothesis’, natural law, and supernatural ideas, allows sociology to be divided into these two categories. By combining the simple facts from the abstract to the supernatural and switching our thinking towards hypothetical observation, the sciences culminate in order to formulate sociology and this new societal division. “Every social system… aims definitively at directing all special forces towards a general result, for the exercise of a general and combined activity is the essence of the society,” Social phenomena Comte believed can be transferred into laws and that systemization could become the prime guide to sociology so that all can maintain knowledge to continue building a strong intellectual society.


title: Auguste Comte

text: To continue building a strong intellectual society, Comte believed the building or reformation requires intricate steps to achieve success. First, the new society must be created after the old society is destroyed because "without…destruction no adequate conception could be formed of what must be done,". Essentially a new society cannot be formed if it is constantly hindered by the ghost of its past. On the same terms, there will be no room for progress if the new society continues to compare itself to the old society. If humanity does not destroy the old society, the old society will destroy humanity.


title: Auguste Comte

text: Or on the other hand, if one destroys the old society, "without ever replacing it, the people march onwards towards total anarchy,".  If the society is continuously chipped away without being replaced with new ideal societal structures, then society will fall deeper back into its old faults. The burdens will grow deep and entangle the platforms for the new society, thus prohibiting progress, and ultimately fulfilling the cursed seesaw of remodeling and destroying society. Hence, according to Comte, to design a successful new society, one must keep the balance of reconstruction and deconstruction. This balance allows for progress to continue without fault.


title: Auguste Comte

text: Auguste Comte is well known for writing in his book "The Positive Philosophy" that people would never learn the chemical composition of the stars. This has been called a very poor prediction regarding human limits in science. In thirty years people were beginning to learn the composition of stars through spectroscopy.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church (UMC) is a worldwide mainline Protestant denomination based in the United States, and a major part of Methodism. In the 19th century, its main predecessor, the Methodist Episcopal Church, was a leader in evangelicalism. The present denomination was founded in 1968 in Dallas, Texas, by union of the Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church. The UMC traces its roots back to the revival movement of John and Charles Wesley in England, as well as the Great Awakening in the United States. As such, the church's theological orientation is decidedly Wesleyan. It embraces liturgical worship, holiness, and evangelical elements.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church has a connectional polity, a typical feature of a number of Methodist denominations. It is organized into conferences. The highest level is called the General Conference and is the only organization which may speak officially for the UMC. The church is a member of the World Council of Churches, the World Methodist Council, and other religious associations.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In 2015, Pew Research estimated that 3.6 percent of the US population, or 9 million adult adherents, self-identify with the United Methodist Church, revealing a much larger number of adherents than registered membership.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On January 3, 2020, a group of the church's leaders proposed a plan to split the United Methodist Church over issues of sexual orientation (particularly same-sex marriage) and create a new traditionalist Methodist denomination, which is called the Global Methodist Church, though before its establishment, some congregations already left to join the Free Methodist Church. Progressive members too announced the creation of a new denomination in November 2020, the Liberation Methodist Connexion.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The movement which would become the United Methodist Church began in the mid-18th century within the Church of England. A small group of students, including John Wesley, Charles Wesley, and George Whitefield, met at Oxford University. They focused on Bible study, methodical study of scripture, and living a holy life. Other students mocked them, saying they were the "Holy Club" and "the Methodists", being methodical and exceptionally detailed in their Bible study, opinions, and disciplined lifestyle. Eventually, the so-called Methodists started individual societies or classes for members of the Church of England who wanted to live a more religious life.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In 1735, John and Charles Wesley went to America, hoping to teach the gospel to the Native Americans in the colony of Georgia. Instead, John became vicar of the church in Savannah. His preaching was legalistic and full of harsh rules, and the congregation rejected him. After two years in America, he returned to England dejected and confused. While sailing on his original journey to America, he had been impressed with the faith of the German Moravians on board, and when he returned to England he spent time with Peter Böhler, a German Moravian who was passing through England and who believed that a person is saved solely through the grace of God and not by works. John had many conversations with Böhler about this topic. On May 25, 1738, after listening to a reading of Martin Luther's preface to the Epistle to the Romans, John came to the understanding that his good works could not save him and he could rest in God's grace for salvation. For the first time in his life, he felt peace and the assurance of salvation.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In less than two years, the "Holy Club" disbanded. John Wesley met with a group of clergy, and afterwards said "they appeared to be of one heart, as well as of one judgment, resolved to be Bible-Christians at all events; and, wherever they were, to preach with all their might plain, old, Bible Christianity." The ministers nonetheless retained their membership in the Church of England. Though not always emphasized or appreciated in the Anglican churches of their day, their teaching emphasized salvation by God's grace, acquired through faith in Christ. Three teachings they saw as the foundation of Christian faith were:


title: United Methodist Church

text: These clergymen quickly became popular, attracting large congregations. The nickname students had used against the Wesleys was revived; they and their followers subsequently became known as "Methodists".


title: United Methodist Church

text: The English preacher Francis Asbury arrived in America in 1771. He became a "circuit rider", taking the gospel to the furthest reaches of the new frontier as he had done as a preacher in England . The first official organization in the United States occurred in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1784, with the formation of the Methodist Episcopal Church at the Christmas Conference with Francis Asbury and Thomas Coke as the leaders.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Though John Wesley originally wanted the Methodists to stay within the Church of England, the American Revolution decisively separated the Methodists in the American colonies from the life and sacraments of the English Church. In 1784, after unsuccessful attempts to have the Church of England send a bishop to start a new church in the colonies, Wesley decisively appointed fellow priest Thomas Coke as Superintendent (the equivalent or a bishop) to organize a separate Methodist Society. Together with Coke, Wesley sent The Sunday Service of the Methodists, Methodism's first liturgical text and the Articles of Religion, which were received and adopted by the Baltimore Christmas Conference of 1784, officially establishing the Methodist Episcopal Church. The conference was held at the Lovely Lane Methodist Church, considered the mother church of American Methodism.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The new church grew rapidly in the young country as it employed circuit riders, many of whom were laymen, to travel the mostly rural nation by horseback to preach the Gospel and to establish churches until there was scarcely any village in the United States without a Methodist presence. With 4,000 circuit riders by 1844, the Methodist Episcopal Church rapidly became the largest Protestant denomination in the country.


title: United Methodist Church

text: St. George's United Methodist Church, located at the corner of 4th and New Streets, in the Old City neighborhood of Philadelphia, is the oldest Methodist church in continuous use in the United States, beginning in 1769. The congregation was founded in 1767, meeting initially in a sail loft on Dock Street, and in 1769 it purchased the shell of a building which had been erected in 1763 by a German Reformed congregation. At this time, Methodists had not yet broken away from the Anglican Church and the Methodist Episcopal Church was not founded until 1784.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Richard Allen and Absalom Jones became the first African Americans ordained by the Methodist Church. They were licensed by Saint George's Church in 1784. Three years later, protesting racial segregation in worship services, Allen led most of the black members out of St. George's; eventually they founded the Mother Bethel A.M.E. Church and the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Absalom Jones became an Episcopal priest. In 1836, the church's basement was excavated to make room for a Sunday school. In the 1920s, a court case saved the church from being demolished to make way for the Benjamin Franklin Bridge. The case resulted in the bridge being relocated. Historic Saint George’s welcomes visitors and is home to archives and a museum on Methodism.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In the more than 220 years since 1784, Methodism in the United States, like many other Protestant denominations, has seen a number of divisions and mergers. In 1830, the Methodist Protestant Church split from the Methodist Episcopal Church over the issue of laity having a voice and vote in the administration of the church, insisting that clergy should not be the only ones to have any determination in how the church was to be operated. In 1844, the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church split into two conferences because of tensions over slavery and the power of bishops in the denomination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The two general conferences, Methodist Episcopal Church (the northern faction) and Methodist Episcopal Church, South remained separate until 1939. That year, the northern and southern Methodist Episcopal Churches and the Methodist Protestant Church merged to create The Methodist Church. The uniting conference took place at First Methodist Church (now First United Methodist Church) of Marion, Indiana.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On April 23, 1968, the United Methodist Church was created when the Evangelical United Brethren Church (represented by Bishop Reuben H. Mueller) and The Methodist Church (represented by Bishop Lloyd Christ Wicke) joined hands at the constituting General Conference in Dallas, Texas. With the words, "Lord of the Church, we are united in Thee, in Thy Church and now in The United Methodist Church" the new denomination was given birth by both churches which had distinguished histories and influential ministries in various parts of the world.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On January 3, 2020, the denomination's leadership released a proposal to split the Church over what it described as "fundamental differences" over homosexuality, particularly same-sex marriage (see § Homosexuality below). The proposal would need to be approved by the General Conference in order to take effect. The 2020 General Conference, originally scheduled to be held in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: United Methodist Church

text: A small group of the progressive wing announced the creation of a new denomination in November 2020, the "Liberation Methodist Connexion". It was launched on the First Sunday in Advent through an online service.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Meanwhile, the name Global Methodist Church for the traditionalist denomination was revealed March 1, 2021, along with a new website and logo. The next General Conference is set for 2024. At that time, delegates are expected to vote on the Protocol for Reconciliation and Grace through Separation. The conservative Transitional Leadership Council said the Global Methodist Church would be officially started, with individual churches or conferences able to join, when the General Conference adopts legislation implementing the Protocol, although the Council "will consider bringing the new church into existence without delay" "if it becomes apparent" that leaders "who covenanted to support the Protocol no longer do so." Not wanting to wait for the General Conference to occur, some conservative United Methodist congregations left the United Methodist Church to become a part of the Free Methodist Church, a traditionalist Methodist denomination aligned with the holiness movement. After the launch of the Global Methodist Church on May 1, 2022, a number of traditionalist United Methodist churches entered into the Global Methodist Church.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On May 10, 2022, the Judicial Council of the United Methodist Church ruled that annual conferences in the United States cannot leave the church for the Global Methodist Church. Only individual churches can do so. The Romania-Bulgaria Conference has left the UMC. The South Georgia and Northwest Texas conferences are making preparations to leave the UMC, but this would require UMC General conference legislation.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Early in 2022, according to the United Methodist News Service, the United Methodist Church approved 300 requests by individual churches to leave the denomination. The Wesleyan Covenant Association, which was helping congregations join the Global Methodist Church, said 1000 more churches were expected to have votes on leaving later in the year, and that 300 of 800 Western Pennsylvania Annual Conference churches were considering leaving. Methodist churches and congregations in Slovakia, Bulgaria, Croatia or Romania also expressed dissent and intentions to disaffiliate due to progressive tendencies in the American leadership of the UMC. Over 100 churches in Florida and North Carolina had filed or were considering lawsuits. Some of the largest churches in Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas were planning to leave. As of 2022, any church that disaffiliated would have to pay two years of apportionments and unfunded pension liabilities. Fifty-eight churches belonging to the Louisiana Annual Conference left the United Methodist Church, with 7 congregations being from Baton Rouge and 6 from the New Orleans. The disaffiliations from the conference will take into effect after December 31, 2022. St. Timothy, one of the largest Methodist church in Louisiana, voted for disaffiliation on November 1, 2022.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church seeks to create disciples for Christ through outreach, evangelism, and through seeking holiness, also called sanctification, by the power of the Holy Spirit. The flame in the church logo represents the work of the Holy Spirit in the world, and the two parts of the flame also represent the predecessor denominations, the Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren, united at the base symbolizing the 1968 merger.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church understands itself to be part of the holy catholic (or universal) church and it recognizes the historic ecumenical creeds, the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed; which are used frequently in services of worship. The Book of Discipline also recognizes the importance of the Chalcedonian Creed of the Council of Chalcedon. It upholds the concept of the "visible and invisible Church," meaning that all who are truly believers in every age belong to the holy Church invisible, while the United Methodist Church is a branch of the Church visible, to which all believers must be connected as it is the only institution wherein the Word of God is preached and the Sacraments are administered.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Some argue that the United Methodist Church can lay a claim to apostolic succession, as understood in the traditional sense. As a result of the American Revolution, John Wesley was compelled in 1784 to break with standard practice and ordain two of his lay preachers as presbyters, Thomas Vasey and Richard Whatcoat. Thomas Coke, already an Anglican priest, assisted Wesley in this action. Coke was then "set apart" as a Superintendent (bishop) by Wesley and dispatched with Vasey and Whatcoat to America to take charge of Methodist activities there. In defense of his action to ordain, Wesley himself cited an ancient opinion from the Church of Alexandria, which held that bishops and presbyters constituted one order and therefore, bishops are to be elected from and by the presbyterate. He knew that for two centuries the succession of bishops in the Church of Alexandria was preserved through ordination by presbyters alone and was considered valid by the Early Church. Methodists today who would argue for apostolic succession would do so on these grounds.


title: United Methodist Church

text: While many United Methodist congregations operate in the evangelical tradition, others reflect the mainline Protestant traditions. Although United Methodist practices and interpretation of beliefs have evolved over time, these practices and beliefs can be traced to the writings of the church's founders, especially John Wesley and Charles Wesley (Anglicans), but also Philip William Otterbein and Martin Boehm (United Brethren), and Jacob Albright (Evangelical Association). With the formation of the United Methodist Church in 1968, theologian Albert C. Outler led the team which systematized denominational doctrine. Outler's work proved pivotal in the work of union, and he is largely considered the first United Methodist theologian.


title: United Methodist Church

text: These Doctrinal Standards are constitutionally protected and nearly impossible to change or remove. Other doctrines of the United Methodist Church are found in the "Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church".


title: United Methodist Church

text: The key emphasis of Wesley's theology relates to how divine grace operates within the individual. Wesley defined the Way of Salvation as the operation of grace in at least three parts: Prevenient Grace, Justifying Grace, and Sanctifying Grace.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Prevenient grace, or the grace that "goes before" us, is given to all people. It is that power which enables us to love and motivates us to seek a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. This grace is the present work of God to turn us from our sin-corrupted human will to the loving will of the Father. In this work, God desires that we might sense both our sinfulness before God and God's offer of salvation. Prevenient grace allows those tainted by sin to nevertheless make a truly free choice to accept or reject God's salvation in Christ.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Justifying Grace or Accepting Grace is that grace, offered by God to all people, that we receive by faith and trust in Christ, through which God pardons the believer of sin. It is in justifying grace we are received by God, in spite of our sin. In this reception, we are forgiven through the atoning work of Jesus Christ on the cross. The justifying grace cancels our guilt and empowers us to resist the power of sin and to fully love God and neighbor. Today, justifying grace is also known as conversion, "accepting Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior," or being "born again." John Wesley originally called this experience the New Birth. This experience can occur in different ways; it can be one transforming moment, such as an altar call experience, or it may involve a series of decisions across a period of time.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Sanctifying Grace is that grace of God which sustains the believers in the journey toward Christian Perfection: a genuine love of God with heart, soul, mind, and strength, and a genuine love of our neighbors as ourselves. Sanctifying grace enables us to respond to God by leading a Spirit-filled and Christ-like life aimed toward love. Wesley never claimed this state of perfection for himself but instead insisted the attainment of perfection was possible for all Christians. Here the English Reformer parted company with both Luther and Calvin, who denied that a man would ever reach a state in this life in which he could not fall into sin. Such a man can lose all inclination to evil and can gain perfection in this life.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Wesleyan theology maintains that salvation is the act of God's grace entirely, from invitation, to pardon, to growth in holiness. Furthermore, God's prevenient, justifying, and sanctifying grace interact dynamically in the lives of Christians from birth to death.


title: United Methodist Church

text: According to Wesleyan understanding, good works are the fruit of one's salvation, not the way in which that salvation was earned. Faith and good works go hand in hand in Methodist theology: a living tree naturally and inevitably bears fruit. Wesleyan theology rejects the doctrine of eternal security, believing that salvation can be rejected.<ref name="Weber/Kalberg-Conditional preservation of the saints"></ref> Wesley emphasized that believers must continue to grow in their relationship with Christ, through the process of Sanctification.


title: United Methodist Church

text: A key outgrowth of this theology is the United Methodist dedication not only to the Evangelical Gospel of repentance and a personal relationship with God, but also to the Social Gospel and a commitment to social justice issues that have included abolition, women's suffrage, labor rights, civil rights, and ministry with the poor.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Methodist theology stands at a unique crossroads between evangelical, holiness and sacramental, as well as between liturgical and charismatic, and between Anglo-Catholic and Reformed worship. It has been characterized as Wesleyan-Arminian theology with an emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit to bring holiness into the life of the participating believer. The United Methodist Church believes in "prima scriptura", seeing the Bible as the primary authority in the Church and using sacred tradition, reason, and experience to interpret it, with the aid of the Holy Spirit (see Wesleyan Quadrilateral). Therefore, according to "The Book of Discipline," United Methodist theology is at once "catholic, evangelical, and reformed."


title: United Methodist Church

text: Today, the UMC is generally considered one of the more moderate and tolerant denominations with respect to race, gender, and ideology, though the denomination itself includes a wide spectrum of attitudes. Comparatively, the UMC stands to the right of liberal and progressive Protestant groups such as the United Church of Christ and the Episcopal Church on certain issues (especially regarding sexuality), but to the left of historically conservative evangelical traditions such as the Southern Baptists and Pentecostalism, in regard to theological matters such as social justice and Biblical interpretation. The UMC is made up of a broad diversity of thought, and so there are many clergy and laity within the UMC that hold differing viewpoints on such theological matters.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In appealing for tolerance of diversity of theological opinions, John Wesley said, "Though we may not think alike, may we not all love alike?" The phrase "In essentials, unity; in non-essentials, liberty; in all things, charity" has also become a maxim among Methodists, who have always maintained a great diversity of opinion on many matters within the Church.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church allows for a wide range of theological and political beliefs. For example, former President George W. Bush (R-TX), former First Lady Laura Bush and former Attorney General of the United States, Jeff Sessions, are United Methodists, as are Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and former Senator Max Cleland (D-GA).


title: United Methodist Church

text: The Pew Research Center's 2014 US Religious Landscape Study concluded that the political preferences of US adult members of the United Methodist Church was 54 percent Republican / lean Republican, 35 percent Democrat / lean Democrat, and 11 percent independent / no lean / other.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The topic of abortion is complex for the United Methodist Church. The United Methodist Church affirms these two sentences in The Social Principles: "Our belief in the sanctity of unborn human life makes us reluctant to approve abortion. But we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother and the unborn child." (Book of Discipline ¶161.J). The denomination is committed to "assist[ing] the ministry of crisis pregnancy centers and pregnancy resource centers that compassionately help women find feasible alternatives to abortion." In 2016, the United Methodist General Conference voted to withdraw from the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice (RCRC), an organization in which it formerly held membership. Annual Conferences could still choose whether to remain a part of the RCRC locally. At the same General Conference, delegates voted to delete a four-decade-old statement from the Book of Resolutions which affirmed the "Roe v. Wade" Supreme Court decision on the legality of abortion. A new resolution was re-adopted 56–2 in a resolutions subcommittee, decrying gender-selective abortion while also describing abortion as "violent" and opposing abortions done for "trivial reasons." The resolution passed in the daily consent agenda with no debate. As an official organization, however, "the General Board of Church and Society continues to be an advocate for a full range of safe and legal reproductive health care – including, in certain cases, the option to safely and legally end a pregnancy."


title: United Methodist Church

text: Nevertheless, the United Methodist Church holds that "while we understand the need for women to have access to safe, legal abortions, we also 'mourn and are committed to promoting the diminishment of high abortion rates'." and they "are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother, for whom devastating damage may result from an unacceptable pregnancy. In continuity with past Christian teaching, we recognize tragic conflicts of life with life that may justify abortion, (in the eyes of God) and in such cases we support the legal option of abortion under proper medical procedures." The Church cautions that "Governmental laws and regulations do not provide all the guidance required by the informed Christian conscience." The Church emphasizes the need of a supportive ministry to women who have experienced abortions: "We further encourage local churches to make available contact information for counseling agencies that offer programs to address post-abortion stress for all seeking help."


title: United Methodist Church

text: Members of the United Methodist Church who identify with the anti-abortion position come mostly from the Confessing Movement within the denomination and have organized into the Taskforce of United Methodists on Abortion and Sexuality (TUMAS) to further their position within the denomination. On the other side, the Methodist Federation for Social Action and United Methodist Women continue to represent pro-choice views.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Historically, the Methodist Church has supported the temperance movement. John Wesley warned against the dangers of drinking in his famous sermon, "The Use of Money", and in his letter to an alcoholic. Today the United Methodist Church states that it "affirms our long-standing support of abstinence from alcohol as a faithful witness to God's liberating and redeeming love for persons." In fact, the United Methodist Church uses unfermented grape juice in the sacrament of Holy Communion, thus "expressing pastoral concern for recovering alcoholics, enabling the participation of children and youth, and supporting the church's witness of abstinence." Moreover, in 2011 and 2012, the United Methodist Church's General Board of Church and Society called on all United Methodists to abstain from alcohol for Lent.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church, along with some other Methodist churches, condemns capital punishment, saying that it cannot accept retribution or social vengeance as a reason for taking human life. The Church also holds that the death penalty falls unfairly and unequally upon marginalized persons including the poor, the uneducated, ethnic and religious minorities, and persons with mental and emotional illnesses. The United Methodist Church also believes that Jesus explicitly repudiated the "lex talionis" in – and abolished the death penalty in John 8:7. The General Conference of the United Methodist Church calls for its bishops to uphold opposition to capital punishment and for governments to enact an immediate moratorium on carrying out the death penalty sentence.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church, like many mainline Protestant denominations and the Roman Catholic Church, has determined that there is no conflict between faith and the theory of evolution. Some clergy have stated that "it's time for people of faith to accept evolution." Additionally, the UMC officially affirms the theory of evolution and "opposes introducing theories such as Creationism or Intelligent Design into public school curriculum." In 2016, the denomination denied approval for a creationist group to be officially represented at the church's General Conference.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church is opposed to euthanasia and assisted suicide. The official stance mentions that "The church has an obligation to see that all persons have access to needed pastoral and medical care and therapy in those circumstances that lead to loss of self-worth, suicidal despair, and/or the desire to seek physician-assisted suicide." It also states that "If death is deliberately sought as the means to relieve suffering, that must be understood as direct and intentional taking of life ... The United Methodist tradition opposes the taking of life as an offense against God's sole dominion over life, and an abandonment of hope and humility before God."


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church, represented by Bishop Scott Jones of the Texas Annual Conference, on behalf of the Houston Methodist Research Institute, and the Roman Catholic Church, represented by Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, of the Pontifical Academy for Life, signed a "Joint Declaration on the End of Life and Palliative Care", on 17 September 2018, reaffirming the common stance of both denominations in opposing euthanasia.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church opposes gambling, believing that it is a sin which feeds on human greed and which invites people to place their trust in possessions, rather than in God, whom Christians should "love ... with all your heart." It quotes the Apostle Paul who states: The United Methodist Church therefore holds that:


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church supports federal legislative efforts for strict gun control measures in the United States, and outright bans of most weapons in other nations.


title: United Methodist Church

text: According to The United Methodist Book of Discipline (a new edition of which is usually approved by the United Methodist General Conference every four years), the Church "affirm[s] that all persons are individuals of sacred worth, created in the image of God" and encourages United Methodists to be in ministry with and for all people. In accordance with its view of Scripture, the Church considers "the practice of homosexuality (to be) incompatible with Christian teaching." It states that "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" cannot be ordained as ministers, and supports "…laws in civil society that define marriage as the union of one man and one woman." However, this official position remains controversial and hotly debated within the denomination; for instance, the Western Jurisdiction of the UMC voted to elect the denomination's first openly gay bishop. According to polling from Pew Research, the majority of United Methodists in the US support the inclusion of homosexual persons, 60 percent of United Methodists said "homosexuality should be accepted by society", and 40 percent supported same-sex marriage.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church prohibits same-sex unions. Clergy are officially prohibited from overseeing the vows or signing the union or marriage license, but clergy can offer the premarital counseling, prayers, the homily at the wedding, or read the scriptures. It also forbids any United Methodist board, agency, committee, commission, or council to give United Methodist funds to any gay organization or group, or otherwise use such funds to promote the acceptance of homosexuality. Jimmy Creech was defrocked after a highly publicized church trial in 1999 on account of his participation in same-sex union ceremonies. Other ministers have been defrocked for officiating at same-sex weddings and several trials of others are scheduled. Frank Schaefer, who was defrocked and penalized because he had officiated his son's same-sex wedding, was in 2014, re-instated as "the denomination's top court upheld a June decision by a regional appeals committee to reinstate Schaefer's ministerial credentials." Other clergy, who officiated at same-sex marriages, have avoided trials. In 2016, it was announced that Val Rosenquist "will avoid a church trial and keep her job after she co-officiated with retired Bishop Melvin Talbert at the April same-gender wedding of two church members." In 2016, the Judicial Council further ruled against mandatory penalties for clergy leaving the current options in place. Nevertheless, the United Methodist Church "implore[s] families and churches not to reject or condemn lesbian and gay members and friends" and commits itself to be in ministry with all persons, affirming that God's grace, love, and forgiveness is available to all. Also, while "clergy cannot preside over the wedding ceremony...bishops say, clergy can assist same-gender couples in finding other venues for their wedding; provide pre-marital counseling; attend the ceremony; read Scripture, pray or offer a homily." The denomination also, for non-ordained employees, decided that "now same-sex spouses of some church employees can receive church benefits" if the state or country allows same-sex marriage.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In 1971, Gene Leggett was defrocked for being homosexual in southern Texas. In 1987, a United Methodist church court in New Hampshire defrocked Methodist minister Rose Mary Denman for openly living with a same-sex partner. In 2005, clergy credentials were removed from Irene Elizabeth Stroud after she was convicted in a church trial of violating church law by engaging in a lesbian relationship; this conviction was later upheld by the Judicial Council, the highest court in the denomination. The Judicial Council also affirmed that a Virginia pastor had the right to deny local church membership to a man in an openly gay relationship. This affirmation, however, was based upon a senior pastor's right to judge the readiness of a congregant to join as a full member of the church. On the other hand, hundreds of United Methodist ministers have openly defied the official position of the United Methodist Church and have publicly revealed their "lesbian, gay or bisexual" sexual orientation, an action that could result in their suspension. The official website of the United Methodist Church reported that "Retired United Methodist Bishop Melvin Talbert, for the second time, has defied church law to officiate at a ceremony celebrating the union of two men." One Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church, the New York Annual Conference, has voiced disagreement with the denomination's official stance on homosexuality and "announced it would not consider sexual orientation in evaluating a clergy candidate." The New York body also ordained the first openly gay and lesbian clergy. In addition, the Baltimore-Washington Conference of the UMC approved the appointment of an openly partnered lesbian to the diaconate. In 2016, the Western Jurisdiction elected the denomination's first openly and partnered lesbian bishop. While not elected, the UMC reported that the North Central Jurisdiction considered the nomination of an openly gay pastor for bishop. Additionally, the Northeastern Jurisdiction passed a resolution calling for change to The Book of Discipline.


title: United Methodist Church

text: However, two United Methodist bishops "voided two resolutions in the Northeastern United States that called for defying church restrictions." Similarly, the United Methodist Bishops of the Central Conferences of Africa unanimously called for "unreserved commitment to the Holy Bible as the primary authority for faith and practice in the Church" and proclaimed that "sexual relations are affirmed only within the covenant bond of a faithful monogamous, heterosexual marriage, and not within same-sex unions or polygamy." At the same time, the Alabama-West Florida Conference" passed resolutions upholding the denomination's rules on homosexuality" and the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference "approved a resolution that urges the conference to demand clergy accountability to the Discipline's 'rules of our common covenant,' and to call upon clergy to challenge those rules only 'through legitimate channels of holy conferencing, rather than breaking that covenant.'" The Southeastern Jurisdiction also voted to maintain the current language in The Book of Discipline.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Although there is no official policy, the Judicial Council of the UMC ruled, in 2008, that ordained transgender pastors could serve in congregations within the denomination. In particular, the first openly transgender pastor within the UMC received overwhelming support from his congregation. In 2016, the South Carolina Annual Conference passed a resolution urging support for non-discrimination protections for transgender people. In 2017, the Northern Illinois Conference commissioned M Barclay as a Deacon and became the first openly non-binary trans person commissioned in the denomination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On April 28, 2017, the Judicial Council ruled that consecrating a bishop in a same-sex marriage or partnership is a violation of church law and that public marriage records could be considered as evidence of self-avowed homosexuality. In regards to the specific case of Bishop Karen Oliveto, the denomination's first openly gay bishop, the Judicial Council ruled that she "remains in good standing" pending the outcome of any administrative or judicial processes initiated within the Western Jurisdiction, since the Judicial Council itself does not have jurisdiction to review Bishop Oliveto's status. The Judicial Council also ruled that Boards of Ordained Ministry must evaluate all candidates regarding issues of sexuality.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On May 7, 2018, the Council of Bishops in the United Methodist Church proposed allowing individual pastors and regional church bodies to decide whether to ordain LGBT clergy and perform same-sex weddings. However, on February 26, 2019, a special session of the General Conference rejected this proposal, and voted to strengthen its official opposition to same-sex marriages and ordaining openly LGBT clergy. The vote was 53 percent in favor of the Traditional Plan, the plan maintaining and strengthening the official position, to 47 percent opposed. The Judicial Council had already ruled some parts of the Traditional Plan to be unconstitutional. The delegates also voted to send the plan for further review by the Judicial Council. In March 2019, the German Central Conference announced that it would not be imposing the Traditional Plan. While the US jurisdictions and regional bodies are unable to adapt the Book of Discipline like the Central Conferences, the Western Jurisdiction declared their disagreement with the Traditional Plan and vowed to maintain LGBTQ inclusive policies. In April 2019, the Judicial Council ruled on the 17 petitions of the Traditional Plan, upholding 10 as valid and rejecting 7 as unconstitutional.


title: United Methodist Church

text: On January 3, 2020, some denominational leaders along with various advocacy groups submitted a plan called, “Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace through Separation,” to split the church over what it described as "fundamental differences" over issues pertaining to sexual orientation and gender identity, particularly same-sex marriage. The “Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace through Separation” plan would create a new traditionalist Methodist denomination, with the existing church moving to more acceptance of non-heterosexual and gender-nonconforming identities. The church's General Conference was expected to vote on the plan in May 2020. The plan would have needed to be approved in May 2020 by the General Conference. It would grant the new denomination $25 million and would allow local churches to vote to affiliate with the new denomination and keep their assets if they leave. The vote was later postponed to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Progressives too announced the creation of a new denomination in November 2020, the Liberation Methodist Connexion. In 2022, the Western Jurisdiction elected a second openly gay bishop, Cedrick Bridgeforth.


title: United Methodist Church

text: According to "The Book of Resolutions of The United Methodist Church", "The United Methodist Church calls upon all who choose to take up arms or who order others to do so to evaluate their actions in accordance with historic church teaching limiting resort to war, including questions of proportionality, legal authority, discrimination between combatants and noncombatants, just cause, and probability of success..."


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church opposes conscription as incompatible with the teaching of Scripture. Therefore, the Church supports and extends its ministry to those persons who conscientiously oppose all war, or any particular war, and who therefore refuse to serve in the armed forces or to cooperate with systems of military conscription. However, the United Methodist Church also supports and extends its ministry to those persons who conscientiously choose to serve in the armed forces or to accept alternative service. The church also states that "as Christians they are aware that neither the way of military action, nor the way of inaction is always righteous before God."


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church maintains that war is incompatible with Christ's message and teachings. Therefore, the Church rejects war as an instrument of national foreign policy, to be employed only as a last resort in the prevention of such evils as genocide, brutal suppression of human rights, and unprovoked international aggression. It insists that the first moral duty of all nations is to resolve by peaceful means every dispute that arises between or among them; that human values must outweigh military claims as governments determine their priorities; that the militarization of society must be challenged and stopped; that the manufacture, sale, and deployment of armaments must be reduced and controlled; and that the production, possession, or use of nuclear weapons be condemned. Consequently, the United Methodist Church endorses general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church, like many Mainline Protestant denominations in the U.S., has a long tradition of providing ordained military chaplains who serve in all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church teaches that pornography is "about violence, degradation, exploitation, and coercion" and "deplore[s] all forms of commercialization, abuse, and exploitation of sex." The "Sexual Ethics Task Force of The United Methodist Church" states that "Research shows it [pornography] is not an 'innocent activity.' It is harmful and is generally addictive. Persons who are addicted to pornography are physiologically altered, as is their perspective, relationships with parishioners and family, and their perceptions of girls and women."


title: United Methodist Church

text: The UMC supports federal funding for research on embryos created for "in vitro" fertilization that remain after the procreative efforts have ceased, if the embryos were provided for research instead of being destroyed, were not obtained by sale, and those donating had given prior informed consent for the research purposes. The UMC stands in "opposition to the creation of embryos for the sake of research" as "a human embryo, even at its earliest stages, commands our reverence." It supports research on stem cells retrieved from umbilical cords and adult stem cells, stating that there are "few moral questions" raised by this issue.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church includes a variety of approaches to public worship. The common pattern of worship is found in the official liturgies of the church, while the practices of congregations across the denomination are quite diverse.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The common pattern comes from John Wesley, who wrote that "there is no Liturgy in the world, either in ancient or modern language, which breathes more of a solid, scriptural, rational piety, than the Common Prayer of the Church of England." When the Methodists in America were separated from the Church of England, John Wesley himself provided a revised version of The Book of Common Prayer called "The Sunday Service of the Methodists; With Other Occasional Services". Wesley's "Sunday Service" has shaped the official liturgies of the Methodists ever since.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Like other historic Christian churches, the United Methodist Church has official liturgies for services of Holy Communion, baptism, weddings, funerals, ordination, anointing of the sick and daily office prayer services. Some clergy offer healing services, while exorcism is an occasional practice by some clergy in The United Methodist Church in Africa. These services involve the laying on of hands and anointing with oil. Along with these, there are also special services for holy days such as All Saints Day, Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil. These services are contained in "The United Methodist Hymnal" and "The United Methodist Book of Worship (1992)". Many of these liturgies are derived from the Anglican tradition's Book of Common Prayer. In most cases, congregations also use other elements of liturgical worship, such as candles, optional use of incense at evening prayer, vestments, paraments, banners, and liturgical art.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Many larger United Methodist congregations have incorporated more contemporary styles of music and audio-visual technology into some of their worship services, though these churches generally also offer more traditional services.


title: United Methodist Church

text: As John Wesley advocated outdoor evangelism, revival services are a traditional worship practice of Methodism that are often held in United Methodist churches, as well as at outdoor camp meetings and at tent revivals.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The chancel of United Methodist churches usually features a lectern and baptismal font on one side of the altar table and a pulpit on the other side. The chancel also features the Christian Flag and sometimes, a processional cross. The chancel is often delimited by chancel rails, sometimes with a mourner's bench in front of it.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church's understanding of a "saint" is not unique among Protestants, yet differs significantly from the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, and Lutheran views. Methodists do not have a process for electing people to sainthood. They do not pray to saints, nor do they believe that saints serve as mediators to God. The denomination considers all faithful Christians to be saints.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Methodist institutions may be named after a biblical figure (e.g., "St. James UMC"). Methodists also honor notable heroes and heroines of the Christian faith and look to these prominent saints as providing examples of holy living and commitment to Christ that are worthy of imitation (see ). Such exemplary saints include martyrs, confessors of the Faith, evangelists, or important biblical figures such as Saint Matthew. Lutheran theologian and martyr to the Nazis Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Salvation Army Founder William Booth, African missionary David Livingstone and Methodism's revered founder John Wesley are among many cited as Protestant saints.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Article XIV of "The United Methodist Articles of Religion" explicitly rejects "invocation of saints" (praying to saints). The text reads "—Of Purgatory—The Romish doctrine concerning purgatory, pardon, worshiping, and adoration, as well of images as of relics, and also invocation of saints, is a fond thing, vainly invented, and grounded upon no warrant of Scripture, but repugnant to the Word of God."


title: United Methodist Church

text: The church is decentralized with the General Conference being the official governing body. However, administratively the church has a governing structure that is similar to that of the United States government:


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church is organized into conferences. The highest level is called the "General Conference" and is the only organization which may speak officially for the church. The General Conference meets every four years (quadrennium). Legislative changes are recorded in "The Book of Discipline" which is revised after each General Conference. Non-legislative resolutions are recorded in the "Book of Resolutions", which is published after each General Conference, and expire after eight years unless passed again by a subsequent session of General Conference. The most recent General Conferences were held in Portland, Oregon in 2016, and St. Louis, Missouri, in 2019. The event is currently rotated between the US jurisdictions of the church. Bishops, councils, committees, boards, elders, etc., are not permitted to speak on behalf of the United Methodist Church as this authority is reserved solely for the General Conference in accordance with the "Book of Discipline".


title: United Methodist Church

text: The plenary session is presided over by an active bishop who has been selected by a committee of delegates to the conference. It is not uncommon for different bishops to preside on different days. The presiding officer is usually accompanied by parliamentarians.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The church had planned for a conference outside of the United States for the first time in history in 2024. These plans were established in 2015 for the first meeting. However, these plans were cancelled because organizers were unable to find a convention space that would be available for two weeks to host the global gathering. Sara Hotchkiss, business manager for the Commission on General Conference stated:"No one has done anything wrong, or there’s no reason not to go. It’s just simply when we did a bid process, the facilities needed for the length of our conference were not available,"


title: United Methodist Church

text: Subordinate to the General Conference are the jurisdictional and central conferences which also meet every four years. The United States is divided into five jurisdictions: Northeastern, Southeastern, North Central, South Central and Western. Outside the United States the church is divided into seven central conferences: Africa, Congo, West Africa, Central & Southern Europe, Germany, Northern Europe and Eurasia, and the Philippines. The main purpose of the jurisdictional and central conferences is to elect and appoint bishops, the chief administrators of the church. Additionally, central conferences may limitedly adapt the church law to the needs of their areas. Bishops thus elected serve "episcopal areas", which consist of one or more "annual conferences".


title: United Methodist Church

text: In the US, decisions in-between the four-year meetings are made by the Mission Council (usually consisting of church bishops). One of the most high-profile decisions in recent years by one of the councils was a decision by the Mission Council of the South Central Jurisdiction which in March 2007 approved a 99-year lease of at Southern Methodist University for the George W. Bush Presidential Library. The decision generated controversy in light of Bush's support of the Iraq War which the church bishops have criticized. A debate over whether the decision should or could be submitted for approval by the Southern Jurisdictional Conference at its July 2008 meeting in Dallas, Texas, remains unresolved.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The Judicial Council is the highest court in the denomination. It consists of nine members, both laity and clergy, elected by the General Conference for an eight-year term. The ratio of laity to clergy alternates every eight years. The Judicial Council interprets the "Book of Discipline" between sessions of General Conference, and during General Conference, the Judicial Council rules on the constitutionality of laws passed by General Conference. The Council also determines whether actions of local churches, annual conferences, church agencies, and bishops are in accordance with church law. The Council reviews all decisions of law made by bishops The Judicial Council cannot create any legislation; it can only interpret existing legislation. The Council meets twice a year at various locations throughout the world. The Judicial Council also hears appeals from those who have been accused of chargeable offenses that can result in defrocking or revocation of membership.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The annual conference, roughly the equivalent of a diocese in the Anglican Communion and the Roman Catholic Church or a synod in some Lutheran denominations such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, is the basic unit of organization within the UMC. The term "annual conference" is often used to refer to the geographical area it covers as well as the frequency of meeting. Clergy are members of their annual conference rather than of any local congregation, and are appointed to a local church or other charge annually by the conference's resident bishop at the meeting of the annual conference. In many ways, the United Methodist Church operates in a connectional organization of the annual conferences, and actions taken by one conference are not binding upon another.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Annual conferences are further divided into districts, each served by a district superintendent. The district superintendents are also appointed annually from the ordained elders of the annual conference by the bishop. District superintendents, upon completion of their service as superintendent, routinely return to serving local congregations. The annual conference cabinet is composed of the bishop and the district superintendents.


title: United Methodist Church

text: "The Book of Discipline" is the guidebook for local churches and pastors and describes in considerable detail the organizational structure of local United Methodist churches. All UM churches must have a board of trustees with at least three members and no more than nine members and it is recommended that no gender should hold more than a 2/3 majority. All churches must also have a nominations committee, a finance committee and a church council or administrative council. Other committees are suggested but not required such as a missions committee, or evangelism or worship committee. Term limits are set for some committees but not for all. The church conference is an annual meeting of all the officers of the church and any interested members. This committee has the exclusive power to set pastors' salaries (compensation packages for tax purposes) and to elect officers to the committees.


title: United Methodist Church

text: There is no official headquarters of the UMC although many of its biggest administrative offices are in Nashville, Tennessee, and are physically located near Vanderbilt University (which has historic Methodist ties but is no longer associated with the church).


title: United Methodist Church

text: While the General Conference is the only organization that can officially speak for the United Methodist Church as a whole, there are 13 agencies, boards and commissions of the general church. These organizations address specific topic areas of denomination-wide concern with administrative offices throughout the United States.


title: United Methodist Church

text: United Methodist Volunteers in Mission (UMVIM) is the short-term mission arm of the United Methodist Church. UMVIM coordinates mission projects for over 100,000 United Methodist volunteers every year. UMVIM coordinates over 400 international development projects.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Throughout its history, the United Methodist Church has placed great emphasis on the importance of education. As such, the United Methodist Church established and is affiliated with around one hundred colleges and universities in the United States, including American University, Syracuse University, Boston University, Emory University, Duke University, Drew University, University of Denver, University of Evansville, and Southern Methodist University. Most are members of the International Association of Methodist-related Schools, Colleges, and Universities. The church operates three hundred sixty schools and institutions overseas.


title: United Methodist Church

text: There are 13 United Methodist seminaries. The United Methodist Church among Christian churches has a highly educated membership, with 37% of members holding graduate or post-graduate degrees. The church also claims a disproportionate share of high-income earners.


title: United Methodist Church

text: United Methodist clergy consist of elders, local pastors, associate members and deacons. They hold membership in the annual conference and not in the local church. Additionally provisional clergy hold membership in the annual conference while they are under appointment to a local church or extension ministry. There are several offices of ministry within the United Methodist Church.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Certified lay ministers may also be appointed to serve a church but under the supervision and direction of an elder.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The first Methodist clergy were ordained by John Wesley, a priest of the Church of England, because of the crisis caused by the American Revolution which isolated the Methodists in the States from the Church of England and its sacraments. Today, the clergy includes men and women who are ordained by bishops as elders and deacons and are appointed to various ministries. Elders in the United Methodist Church itinerate and are subject to the authority and appointment of their bishops. They generally serve as pastors in local congregations. Deacons are in "service" ministry and may serve as musicians, liturgists, educators, business administrators, and a number of other areas. Elders and deacons are required to obtain a master's degree (generally an M.Div.), or another equivalent degree, before "commissioning" and then ultimately ordination. Elders in full connection are each a member of their Annual Conference Order of Elders. Likewise each deacon in full connection is a member of their Annual Conference Order of Deacons.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The Methodist Church has allowed ordination of women with full rights of clergy since 1956, when Maud K. Jensen was ordained and admitted into full connection in the Central Pennsylvania Annual Conference. This action was based upon its understanding of biblical principles. The United Methodist Church, along with some other Protestant churches, holds that when the historical contexts involved are understood, a coherent Biblical argument can be made in favor of women's ordination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: All clergy appointments are made and fixed annually by the resident bishop on the advice of the Annual Conference Cabinet, which is composed of the Area Provost/Dean (if one is appointed) and the several district superintendents of the districts of the Annual Conference. Until the bishop has read the appointments at the session of the Annual Conference, no appointments are officially fixed. Many Annual Conferences try to avoid making appointment changes between sessions of Annual Conference. While an appointment is made one year at a time, it is most common for an appointment to be continued for multiple years. Appointment tenures in extension ministries, such as military chaplaincy, campus ministry, missions, higher education and other ministries beyond the local church are often even longer.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Elders are called by God, affirmed by the church, and ordained by a bishop to a ministry of Word, Sacrament, Order and Service within the church. They may be appointed to the local church, or to other valid extension ministries of the church. Elders are given the authority to preach the Word of God, administer the sacraments of the church, to provide care and counseling, and to order the life of the church for ministry and mission. Elders may also be appointed to extension ministry to serve as district superintendents, and they are eligible for election to the episcopacy. Elders serve a term of 2–3 years as provisional elders prior to their ordination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Deacons are called by God, affirmed by the church, and ordained by a bishop to servant leadership within the church.They are ordained to ministries of word, service, compassion, and justice. They may be appointed to ministry within the local church or to an extension ministry that supports the mission of the church. Deacons give leadership, preach the Word, contribute in worship, conduct marriages, bury the dead, and aid the church in embodying its mission within the world. Deacons assist elders in the sacraments of Holy Communion and Baptism, and may be granted sacramental authority if they are appointed as the pastor in a local church or as their extension ministry requires, upon approval of the bishop. Deacons serve a term of 2–3 years as provisional deacons prior to their ordination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: At the 1996 General Conference, the ordination order of transitional deacon was abolished. This created new orders known as "provisional elder" or "provisional deacon" for those who seek to be ordained in the respective orders. The provisional elder/deacon is a seminary graduate who serves at least two years in full-time appointments after being commissioned. During this period, the provisional elder may be granted sacramental ministry in their local appointment. For the first time in its history non-ordained pastors became a normal expectation, rather than an extraordinary provision for ministry.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Local pastors are called by God, affirmed by the church, and appointed by a bishop to a ministry of Word, Sacrament, Order and Service within the church. The local pastors are given the authority to preach the Word of God, administer the sacraments of the church, to provide care and counseling, and to order the life of the church for ministry and mission, but are not ordained. When elders are not available to be appointed to a local church, either through shortage of personnel or financial hardship of a pastoral charge, the bishop may appoint a "local pastor" to serve the pastoral appointment. Local pastors are often bi-vocational, living out their ministerial call in the local church and in their field of employment. Full-time and part-time licensed local pastors under appointment are clergy and hold membership in the annual conference and not in the local church. A local pastor's official title is licensed local pastor and is appointed as clergy to the local church where they preach, conduct divine worship and perform the regular duties of a pastor. The licensed local pastor has the authority of a pastor only within the context and during the time of the appointment and shall not extend beyond it. Local pastors are not required to have advanced degrees but are required to attend licensing school and continue education by attending an approved course of study at an approved United Methodist seminary or course of study school, or enroll in M.Div studies at an approved United Methodist seminary. To continue towards associate membership in the annual conference, they must successfully complete written and oral examinations, and appear before the District Committee on Ministry and the Conference Board of Ordained Ministry, as well as meet certain age and service requirements. They also may continue towards ordination if they complete their bachelor's degree, requirements of their particular Conference Board of Ordained Ministry, as well as an advanced course or study or prescribed seminary courses at an approved seminary. Upon retirement, or when no longer appointed to a local church, local pastors return to a charge conference as lay members.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church (UMC) practices infant and adult baptism. Baptized Members are those who have been baptized as an infant or child, but who have not subsequently professed their own faith. These "Baptized Members" become "Professing Members" through confirmation and sometimes the profession of faith. Individuals who were not previously baptized are baptized as part of their profession of faith and thus become "Professing Members" in this manner. Individuals may also become a "Professing Member" through transfer from another Christian denomination.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Unlike confirmation and profession of faith, Baptism is a sacrament in the UMC. The "Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church" directs the local church to offer membership preparation or confirmation classes to all people, including adults. The term confirmation is generally reserved for youth, while some variation on "membership class" is generally used for adults wishing to join the church. The "Book of Discipline" normally allows any youth at least completing sixth grade to participate, although the pastor has discretionary authority to allow a younger person to participate. In confirmation and membership preparation classes, students learn about Church and the Methodist-Christian theological tradition in order to profess their ultimate faith in Christ.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Lay members are extremely important in the UMC. The Professing Members are part of all major decisions in the church. General, Jurisdictional, Central, and Annual Conferences are all required to have an equal number of laity and clergy.


title: United Methodist Church

text: In a local church, many decisions are made by an administrative board or council. This council is made up of laity representing various other organizations within the local church. The elder or local pastor sits on the council as a voting member.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Another position in the United Methodist Church is that of the lay servant. Although not considered clergy, lay servants often preach during services of worship when an ordained elder, Local Pastor, Associate Member or deacon is unavailable. There are two categories of lay servants: "local church lay servant", who serve in and through their local churches, and "certified lay servants", who serve in their own churches, in other churches, and through district or conference projects and programs. To be recognized as local church lay servant,


title: United Methodist Church

text: they must be recommended by their pastor and Church Council or Charge Conference, and complete the basic course for lay servant. Each year they must reapply, reporting how they have served and continued to learn during that year. To be recognized as certified lay servant, they must be recommended by their pastor and Church Council or Charge Conference, complete the basic course and one advanced lay servant course, and be interviewed by the District or Conference Committee on Lay Speaking. They must report and reapply annually; and they must complete at least one advanced course every three years.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The 2004 General Conference created another class of ministry, the certified lay minister (CLM). CLMs are not considered clergy but instead remain lay members of the United Methodist Church. A Certified Lay Minister (CLM) is a qualified United Methodist layperson called to congregational leadership as part of a ministry team under the supervision an ordained minister. Paragraph 271 in the 2012 Book of Discipline explains Certified Lay Ministry, requirements, and service distinction.


title: United Methodist Church

text: A person wishing to become a CLM enters the certification process, which includes training, support, supervision, and accountability to the District Committee on Ordained Ministry. CLMs are laypeople serving out their call as disciples of Jesus Christ.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Methodism is one tradition within the Christian Church. The United Methodist Church is active in ecumenical relations with other Christian groups and denominations. It is a member of the National Council of Churches, the World Council of Churches, Churches Uniting in Christ, and Christian Churches Together. In addition, it voted to seek observer status in the National Association of Evangelicals and in the World Evangelical Fellowship. However, there are some in the United Methodist Church who feel that false ecumenism might result in the "blurring of theological and confessional differences in the interests of unity."


title: United Methodist Church

text: In April 2005, the United Methodist Council of Bishops approved "A Proposal for Interim Eucharistic Sharing." This document was the first step toward full communion with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). The ELCA approved this same document in August 2005. At the 2008 General Conference, the United Methodist Church approved full communion with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The ELCA approved this document on August 20, 2009 at its annual churchwide assembly.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The United Methodist Church has since 1985 been exploring a possible merger with three historically African-American Methodist denominations: the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, and the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church. A "Commission on Pan Methodist Cooperation and Union" formed in 2000 to carry out work on such a merger. In May 2012, The United Methodist Church entered into full communion with the African Methodist Episcopal Church, African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, African Union Methodist Protestant Church, Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, and Union American Methodist Episcopal Church, in which these Churches agreed to "recognize each other's churches, share sacraments, and affirm their clergy and ministries."


title: United Methodist Church

text: There are also a number of churches such as the Evangelical Methodist Church in Argentina, Evangelical Church of Uruguay, and Methodist Church in India (MCI), that are "autonomous affiliated" churches in relation to the United Methodist Church.


title: United Methodist Church

text: The UMC is a member of the Wesleyan Holiness Consortium, which seeks to reconceive and promote Biblical holiness in today's Church, and many United Methodist congregations are members of the Christian Holiness Partnership, with ten percent of local church membership in the Christian Holiness Partnership being from the United Methodist connexion. It is also active in the World Methodist Council, an interdenominational group composed of various churches in the tradition of John Wesley to promote the Gospel throughout the world. On July 18, 2006, delegates to the World Methodist Council voted unanimously to adopt the "Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification", which was approved in 1999 by the Vatican and the Lutheran World Federation.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Like many other mainline Protestant denominations in the United States, the United Methodist Church has experienced significant membership losses in recent decades. At the time of its formation, the UMC had about 11 million members in nearly 42,000 congregations. In 1975, membership dropped below 10 million for the first time. In 2005, there were about 8 million members in over 34,000 congregations. Membership is concentrated primarily in the Midwest and in the South. Texas has the largest number of members, with about 1 million. The states with the highest membership rates are Oklahoma, Iowa, Mississippi, West Virginia, and North Carolina.


title: United Methodist Church

text: By the opening of the 2008 General Conference, total UMC membership was estimated at 11.4 million, with about 7.9 million in the US and 3.5 million overseas. Significantly, about 20 percent of the conference delegates were from Africa, with Filipinos and Europeans making up another 10 percent. During the conference, the delegates voted to finalize the induction of the Methodist Church of the Ivory Coast and its 700,000 members into the denomination. Given current trends in the UMC—with overseas churches growing, especially in Africa, and US churches collectively losing about 1,000 members a week—it has been estimated that Africans will make up at least 30 percent of the delegates at the 2012 General Conference, and it is also possible that 40 percent of the delegates will be from outside the US. One Congolese bishop has estimated that typical Sunday attendance of the UMC is higher in his country than in the entire United States.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Contributions to the local church not only benefit the local congregation, but also have regional, national, and international impact through the United Methodist Church's connectional giving system. The power of this collective giving enables the church to educate clergy, encourage cooperation with other faith communions, fund General Conference, nurture historically black colleges and Africa University, and support bishops.


title: United Methodist Church

text: Individuals may also choose to give to the church by naming the Permanent Fund for the United Methodist Church as beneficiary in their estate plans. The Permanent Fund provides a permanent source of funding for the ministries of the United Methodist Church.


title: Glycemic index

text: The glycemic (glycaemic) index (GI; ) is a number from 0 to 100 assigned to a food, with pure glucose arbitrarily given the value of 100, which represents the relative rise in the blood glucose level two hours after consuming that food. The GI of a specific food depends primarily on the quantity and type of carbohydrate it contains, but is also affected by the amount of entrapment of the carbohydrate molecules within the food, the fat and protein content of the food, the amount of organic acids (or their salts) in the food, and whether it is cooked and, if so, how it is cooked. GI tables, which list many types of foods and their GIs, are available. A food is considered to have a "low GI" if it is 55 or less; "high GI" if 70 or more; and "mid-range GI" if 56 to 69.


title: Glycemic index

text: The term was introduced in 1981 by David J. Jenkins and co-workers. It is useful for quantifying the relative rapidity with which the body breaks down carbohydrates. It takes into account only the available carbohydrate (total carbohydrate minus fiber) in a food. Glycemic index does not predict an individual's glycemic response to a food, but can be used as a tool to assess the insulin response burden of a food, averaged across a studied population. Individual responses vary greatly.


title: Glycemic index

text: The glycemic index is usually applied in the context of the quantity of the food and the amount of carbohydrate in the food that is actually consumed. A related measure, the glycemic load (GL), factors this in by multiplying the glycemic index of the food in question by the carbohydrate content of the actual serving.


title: Glycemic index

text: The glycemic index of a food is defined as the incremental area under the two-hour blood glucose response curve (AUC) following a 12-hour fast and ingestion of a food with a certain quantity of available carbohydrate (usually 50 g). The AUC of the test food is divided by the AUC of the standard (either glucose or white bread, giving two different definitions) and multiplied by 100. The average GI value is calculated from data collected in 10 human subjects. Both the standard and test food must contain an equal amount of available carbohydrate. The result gives a relative ranking for each tested food.


title: Glycemic index

text: Foods with carbohydrates that break down quickly during digestion and release glucose rapidly into the bloodstream tend to have a high GI; foods with carbohydrates that break down more slowly, releasing glucose more gradually into the bloodstream, tend to have a low GI.


title: Glycemic index

text: A lower glycemic index suggests slower rates of digestion and absorption of the foods' carbohydrates and can also indicate greater extraction from the liver and periphery of the products of carbohydrate digestion.


title: Glycemic index

text: The current validated methods use glucose as the reference food, giving it a glycemic index value of 100 by definition. This has the advantages of being universal and producing maximum GI values of approximately 100. White bread can also be used as a reference food, giving a different set of GI values (if white bread = 100, then glucose ≈ 140). For people whose staple carbohydrate source is white bread, this has the advantage of conveying directly whether replacement of the dietary staple with a different food would result in faster or slower blood glucose response. A disadvantage with this system is that the reference food is not well-defined, because there is no universal standard for the carbohydrate content of white bread.


title: Glycemic index

text: More importantly, the glycemic response is different from one person to another, and also in the same person from day to day, depending on blood glucose levels, insulin resistance, and other factors.


title: Glycemic index

text: The glycemic index only indicates the impact on glucose level two hours after eating the food. People with diabetes have elevated levels for four hours or longer after eating certain foods.


title: Glycemic index

text: GI values can be interpreted intuitively as percentages on an absolute scale and are commonly interpreted as follows:


title: Glycemic index

text: A low-GI food will cause blood glucose levels to increase more slowly and steadily, which leads to lower postprandial (after meal) blood glucose readings. A high-GI food causes a more rapid rise in blood glucose level and is suitable for energy recovery after exercise or for a person experiencing hypoglycemia.


title: Glycemic index

text: The glycemic effect of foods depends on various factors, such as the type of starch (amylose versus amylopectin), physical entrapment of the starch molecules within the food, fat and protein content of the food and organic acids or their salts in the meal. The presence of fat or soluble dietary fiber can slow the gastric emptying rate, thus lowering the GI. In general, coarse, grainy breads with higher amounts of fiber have a lower GI value than white breads.


title: Glycemic index

text: Many modern diets rely on the glycemic index, including the South Beach Diet, Transitions by Market America and NutriSystem Nourish Diet. However, others have pointed out that foods generally considered to be unhealthy can have a low glycemic index, for instance, chocolate cake (GI 38), ice cream (37), or pure fructose (19), whereas foods like potatoes and rice have GIs around 100 but are commonly eaten in some countries with low rates of diabetes.


title: Glycemic index

text: Dietary replacement of saturated fats by carbohydrates with a low glycemic index may be beneficial for weight control, whereas substitution with refined, high glycemic index carbohydrates is not. A Cochrane review found that adoption of low glycemic index (or load) diets by people who are overweight or obese leads to more weight loss (and better fat control) than use of diets involving higher glycemic index/load or other strategies. Benefits were apparent even with low glycemic index/load diets that allow people to eat as much as they like. The authors of the review concluded that "Lowering the glycaemic load of the diet appears to be an effective method of promoting weight loss and improving lipid profiles and can be simply incorporated into a person's lifestyle."


title: Glycemic index

text: In clinical management of obesity, diets based on a low glycemic index/load appear to provide better glycemic and inflammatory control than ones based on a high glycemic index/load (and therefore could potentially be more effective in preventing obesity-related diseases). In overweight and obese children, adoption of low glycemic index/load diets may not lead to weight loss but might potentially provide other benefits.


title: Glycemic index

text: Depending on quantities, the number of grams of carbohydrate in a food can have a bigger impact on blood sugar levels than the glycemic index does. Consuming less dietary energy, losing weight, and carbohydrate counting can be better for lowering the blood sugar level. Carbohydrates impact glucose levels most profoundly, and two foods with the same carbohydrate content are, in general, comparable in their effects on blood sugar. A food with a low glycemic index can have a high carbohydrate content or vice versa; this can be accounted for with the glycemic load (GL) where .


title: Glycemic index

text: While the glycemic index of foods is used as a guide to the rise in blood glucose that should follow meals containing those foods, actual increases in blood glucose show considerable variability from person to person, even after consumption of identical meals. This is in part because glycemic index does not take into account other factors besides glycemic response, such as insulin response, which is measured by the insulin index and can be more appropriate in representing the effects from some food contents other than carbohydrates. In particular, since it is based on the area under the curve of the glucose response over time from ingesting a subject food, the shape of the curve has no bearing on the corresponding GI value. The glucose response can rise to a high level and fall quickly, or rise less high but remain there for a longer time, and have the same area under the curve.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Microsoft Windows was announced by Bill Gates on November 10, 1983. Microsoft introduced Windows as a graphical user interface for MS-DOS, which had been introduced two years earlier. The product line evolved in the 1990s from an operating environment into a fully complete, modern operating system over two lines of development, each with their own separate codebase.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: The first versions of Windows (1.0 through to 3.11) were graphical shells that ran from MS-DOS. Windows 95, though still being based on MS-DOS, was its own operating system, using a 16-bit DOS-based kernel and a 32-bit user space. Windows 95 also had a significant amount of 16-bit code ported from Windows 3.1. Windows 95 introduced many features that have been part of the product ever since, including the Start menu, the taskbar, and Windows Explorer (renamed File Explorer in Windows 8). In 1997, Microsoft released Internet Explorer 4 which included the (at the time controversial) Windows Desktop Update. It aimed to integrate Internet Explorer and the web into the user interface and also brought many new features into Windows, such as the ability to display JPEG images as the desktop wallpaper and single window navigation in Windows Explorer. In 1998, Microsoft released Windows 98, which also included the Windows Desktop Update and Internet Explorer 4 by default. The inclusion of Internet Explorer 4 and the Desktop Update led to an antitrust case in the United States. Windows 98 included USB support out of the box, and also plug and play, which allows devices to work when plugged in without requiring a system reboot or manual configuration. Windows Me, the last DOS-based version of Windows, was aimed at consumers and released in 2000. It introduced System Restore, Help and Support Center, updated versions of the Disk Defragmenter and other system tools.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: In 1993, Microsoft released Windows NT 3.1, the first version of the newly developed Windows NT operating system. "NT" is an acronym for "New Technology". Unlike the Windows 9x series of operating systems, it is a fully 32-bit operating system. NT 3.1 introduced NTFS, a file system designed to replace the older File Allocation Table (FAT) which was used by DOS and the DOS-based Windows operating systems. In 1996, Windows NT 4.0 was released, which includes a fully 32-bit version of Windows Explorer written specifically for it, making the operating system work like Windows 95. Windows NT was originally designed to be used on high-end systems and servers, but with the release of Windows 2000, many consumer-oriented features from Windows 95 and Windows 98 were included, such as the Windows Desktop Update, Internet Explorer 5, USB support and Windows Media Player. These consumer-oriented features were further extended in Windows XP in 2001, which included a new visual style called Luna, a more user-friendly interface, updated versions of Windows Media Player and Internet Explorer 6 by default, and extended features from Windows Me, such as the Help and Support Center and System Restore. Windows Vista, which was released in 2007, focused on securing the Windows operating system against computer viruses and other malicious software by introducing features such as User Account Control. New features include Windows Aero, updated versions of the standard games (e.g. Solitaire), Windows Movie Maker, and Windows Mail to replace Outlook Express. Despite this, Windows Vista was critically panned for its poor performance on older hardware and its at-the-time high system requirements. Windows 7 followed in 2009 nearly three years after its launch, and despite it technically having higher system requirements, reviewers noted that it ran better than Windows Vista. Windows 7 removed many applications, such as Windows Movie Maker, Windows Photo Gallery and Windows Mail, instead requiring users to download separate Windows Live Essentials to gain some of those features and other online services. Windows 8, which was released in 2012, introduced many controversial changes, such as the replacement of the Start menu with the Start Screen, the removal of the Aero interface in favor of a flat, colored interface as well as the introduction of "Metro" apps (later renamed to Universal Windows Platform apps), and the Charms Bar user interface element, all of which received considerable criticism from reviewers. Windows 8.1, a free upgrade to Windows 8, was released in 2013.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: The following version of Windows, Windows 10, which was released in 2015, reintroduced the Start menu and added the ability to run Universal Windows Platform apps in a window instead of always in full screen. Windows 10 was generally well-received, with many reviewers stating that Windows 10 is what Windows 8 should have been.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: The latest version of Windows, Windows 11, was released on October 5, 2021. Windows 11 incorporates a redesigned user interface, including a new Start menu, a visual style featuring rounded corners, and a new layout for the Microsoft Store, and also included Microsoft Edge by default.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: The first independent version of Microsoft Windows, version 1.0, released on November 20, 1985, achieved little popularity. The project was briefly codenamed "Interface Manager" before the windowing system was implemented—contrary to popular belief that it was the original name for Windows and Rowland Hanson, the head of marketing at Microsoft, convinced the company that the name "Windows" would be more appealing to customers.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Windows 1.0 was not a complete operating system, but rather an "operating environment" that extended MS-DOS, and shared the latter's inherent flaws.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: The first version of Microsoft Windows included a simple graphics painting program called Windows Paint; Windows Write, a simple word processor; an appointment calendar; a card-filer; a notepad; a clock; a control panel; a computer terminal; Clipboard; and RAM driver. It also included the MS-DOS Executive and a game called Reversi.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Microsoft had worked with Apple Computer to develop applications for Apple's new Macintosh computer, which featured a graphical user interface. As part of the related business negotiations, Microsoft had licensed certain aspects of the Macintosh user interface from Apple; in later litigation, a district court summarized these aspects as "screen displays".


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: In the development of Windows 1.0, Microsoft intentionally limited its borrowing of certain GUI elements from the Macintosh user interface, to comply with its license. For example, windows were only displayed "tiled" on the screen; that is, they could not overlap or overlie one another.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: On December 31, 2001, Microsoft declared Windows 1.0 obsolete and stopped providing support and updates for the system.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Microsoft Windows version 2.0 (2.01 and 2.03 internally) came out on December 9, 1987 and proved slightly more popular than its predecessor.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Much of the popularity for Windows 2.0 came by way of its inclusion as a "run-time version" with Microsoft's new graphical applications, Excel and Word for Windows. They could be run from MS-DOS, executing Windows for the duration of their activity, and closing down Windows upon exit.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Microsoft Windows received a major boost around this time when Aldus PageMaker appeared in a Windows version, having previously run only on Macintosh. Some computer historians date this, the first appearance of a significant "and" non-Microsoft application for Windows, as the start of the success of Windows.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Like prior versions of Windows, version 2.0 could use the real-mode memory model, which confined it to a maximum of 1 megabyte of memory. In such a configuration, it could run under another multitasker like DESQview, which used the 286 protected mode. It was also the first version to support the High Memory Area when running on an Intel 80286 compatible processor. This edition was renamed Windows/286 with the release of Windows 2.1.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: A separate Windows/386 edition had a protected mode kernel, which required an 80386 compatible processor, with LIM-standard EMS emulation and VxD drivers in the kernel. All Windows and DOS-based applications at the time were real mode, and Windows/386 could run them over the protected mode kernel by using the virtual 8086 mode, which was new with the 80386 processor.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Version 2.1 came out on May 27, 1988, followed by version 2.11 on March 13, 1989; they included a few minor changes.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: In Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp., version 2.03, and later 3.0, faced challenges from Apple over its overlapping windows and other features Apple charged mimicked the ostensibly copyrighted "look and feel" of its operating system and "embodie[d] and generated a copy of the Macintosh" in its OS. Judge William Schwarzer dropped all but 10 of Apple's 189 claims of copyright infringement, and ruled that most of the remaining 10 were over uncopyrightable ideas.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: On December 31, 2001, Microsoft declared Windows 2.x obsolete and stopped providing support and updates for the system.


title: Microsoft Windows version history

text: Windows 3.0, released in May 1990, improved capabilities given to native applications. It also allowed users to better multitask older MS-DOS based software compared to Windows/386, thanks to the introduction of virtual memory.