Who’s right in Methodist church split over gay marriage? Hindsight always shows

Officials of the United Methodist Church said last week it will probably split into two separate denominations, one conservative and the other progressive.

Methodist leaders see this compromise as the most practical way to end on ongoing internal fight over same-sex marriage. The United Methodist Church currently is the nation’s third-largest Christian sect.

Leaders said they had agreed to spin off a “traditionalist” denomination (yet to be named) that will oppose same-sex marriage and refuse ordination to LGBTQ clergy. The remaining United Methodist Church will permit same-sex marriage and LGBTQ clergy for the first time in its history, the Washington Post reported.

The plan must be approved at the denomination’s worldwide conference in May.

Except for the particular issues here — same-sex marriage and LGBTQ clergy — there’s not much unique about the Methodist split, except that it seems more amicable than most church divisions.

From its inception, Christianity has been marked by one schism after another.

Early Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians disagreed about whether the Gentiles had to become observant Jews as well as practicing Christians.

Centuries later, the Western and Eastern churches divided over other issues, and remain divided 1,000 years later.

Later still, Protestants — the word comes from “protesters” — rebelled against the Roman Catholic Church and went their own way.

Or went their own ways, we might say, because Protestants have been dividing and sub-dividing and sub-sub-dividing ever since.

In the United States in the 1800s, several large denominations split over slavery, the opposing factions all certain they’d heard the voice of God.

Denominations and individual churches have divided over social issues, how to observe communion, modes of baptism, the presence or absence of musical instruments — the list is endless, really. There’s no subject so vital or petty Christians can’t fight over it.

My own church sprang from the great Eastern Kentucky tradition of one faction falling out with another faction in the same congregation, then going off down the road a couple of miles to build its own house of worship.

I knew of a congregation that nearly split over which of two competing hymnals they’d use. Then the pastor’s wife secretly spirited away all the songbooks of the type she didn’t like and burned them in the church’s furnace, which somehow — I was never clear on the particulars — ended the argument. The church remained intact. Close call, though.

Back in ancient times, St. Paul told the divisive Christians at Corinth, “there must be factions among you, so that those who are approved may become evident among you.”

Boy, was he ever right. He was more than right. He was prophetic.

And as I mentioned, in every division nearly everyone involved thinks he or she has enlisted on the side approved by God. Those on the other side clearly are the heretics.

I don’t mean to make of light church splits. Sometimes the issues involved are trifles, but often they’re important.

Usually, those on both sides are mainly sincere people trying to discern God’s voice. For the most part it’s not a case of good people against bad people. Sometimes it’s two groups of good people who understand God in very different ways.

Consider the division among United Methodists.

One side opposes performing same-sex marriages in the church and ordaining LGBTQ clergy because they believe biblical pronouncements against sexual activity outside heterosexual marriage are binding upon all Christians, or at least upon Methodists.

That doesn’t automatically mean these traditionalists are hateful, as critics may charge.

Many traditionalists are kind and well-intentioned. Some may have little issue with same-sex marriage in secular society. But they believe the Scripture is the inspired word of God and that in church matters it must be the final authority, like it or not.

The progressive side isn’t evil, either. Its adherents believe just as strongly that the guiding principles of the Christian gospel are love, mercy and inclusion.

Thus, to them, unconditionally accepting LGBTQ people overrides other Christian considerations, even a passage in Leviticus or Romans.

A couple of closing observations might be worthwhile.

First, historically, who’s right and who’s wrong sometimes becomes clear only with the passing of time. We see the truth most clearly in our rearview mirrors.

Today, Christians agree you don’t have to convert to Judaism to become a member in good standing. In that early division, the Gentiles’ defenders were undeniably correct.

Similarly, we see now that slavery was an awful, wretched sin that had no place in the world, much less among Christians.

But neither of these truths was universally recognized as such in its own time. Common wisdom then was different from common wisdom today.

Second, to paraphrase what the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. said of justice, the long moral arc of the Lord’s truth seems mainly to bend toward the progressives.

The acceptance of blatant sinners such as the Gentiles, the rejection of slavery, the full inclusion of women, a willingness to forgive and embrace divorced people, you name it — what originally sounded like heresy often turns out to have been the voice of God’s radical grace.

This story was originally published January 9, 2020 at 1:17 PM with the headline "Who’s right in Methodist church split over gay marriage? Hindsight always shows."