UMC Weighing “Transgender” Petitions

Spring and early summer serve as the season for the official meetings of church denominational bodies across the evangelical world and in recent years, issues of sexuality and gender have boiled on the front burner.

This year will most certainly be no exception as bodies such as the Southern Baptist Convention, the Presbyterian Church in America and various mainline meetings and synods convene to do their yearly business.

Some denominations such as the SBC and PCA presently have confessional statements that reflect a complementarian position.  Many other denominations, particularly the mainline churches, are debating issues such as the propriety of ordaining women, homosexuals and transgendered individuals.

Issues of human sexuality and gender are already under consideration by the United Methodist Church, leaders of which are meeting this week in Forth Worth for the UMC's quadrennial meeting. The UMC General Conference this year has before it two landmark petitions aimed at changing the church's current policy on homosexuality.

One petition seeks to define marriage as "the union of two loving adults," while another states that homosexuality "is a subject about which Christians disagree." The upshot of these petitions is an attempt by homosexual activist groups to gain the affirmation of "transgendered" persons serving in UMC pulpits and other roles within the church.

In the UMC at least, the momentum is already rolling toward full affirmation of the substance of these petitions.  As the meeting convened last week, young Methodists from the Mosaic Youth Network greeted delegates outside the Forth Worth Conference Center with a 24-hour "drumming and rally" in support of gay and "transgender" church members.

In 2006, the UMC's highest council affirmed the appointment of "transgender" minister Drew Phoenix as pastor of St. John's United Methodist Church in Baltimore, Md. The church court agreed that while the denomination bars self-avowed practicing gay clergy from ordination and does not support gay unions, the UMC Book of Discipline is silent on gender change.          

The team at CBMW wants to encourage complementarian delegates who hold to the Bible's teaching on God's good plan for men and women to stand firm at these denominational meetings. Standing by while such proposals pass allows Scriptural errors to be introduced and solidified into the church.  Let those who affirm God's clear teaching on these issues not shrink back in silence.

If you are not a delegate this year, please pray that God will give wisdom to the leaders and laypeople who are participating in these meetings. The church ultimately changes through the Holy Spirit opening blind eyes and unstopping deaf ears to the truth of His inspired Word.