The United Methodist Church will gather April 23 to May 2 for its General Conference. It will consider, among other things, a resolution “to affirm and implement a Full Communion Relationship between” The Episcopal Church and the United Methodist Church. According to the proposal’s rationale, “This resolution is the fruit of decades of dialogue and reflects the unique history of this relationship.” The United Methodist-Episcopal Church dialogue has been at work since 2002. The dialogue committee’s proposal for full communion, entitled “A Gift to the World,” is the theological foundation for this full-communion proposal.
This General Conference will be the denomination’s first since the COVID-19 pandemic began. According to David Field, the UMC’s ecumenical staff officer for faith and order and theological dialogue, there is some concern that the General Conference will not give ecumenical resolutions priority as it tackles legislation focused on internal denominational issues.
Field calls the UMC-TEC resolution “a priority,” and asks for prayer “that within all that will be going on at General Conference [the UMC-TEC full-communion proposal] receives the attention it deserves. We are not anticipating significant opposition to the agreement, but General Conference is unpredictable.”
To learn more about the United Methodist Church’s upcoming General Conference, click here.