Harmony-Zelienople Methodist church among those that split from United Methodist Church
HARMONY — On Sunday, July 2, Harmony-Zelienople United Methodist Church will enter a new era in its 78-year history by shedding the “United” part of its name and officially joining the Global Methodist Church.
Just as many other Methodist churches all over the world, Harmony-Zelienople has severed its ties to the United Methodist Church and joined with the emerging Global Methodist Church. The split was made official last week, during the first day of Western Pennsylvania UMC’s annual convention in Erie on Tuesday, June 13.
Harmony-Zelienople is far from the only church in Western Pennsylvania to leave the fold — they are merely one of 298 members of the United Methodist Church that were given the OK to disaffiliate. Seven of these churches — Harmony-Zelienople (in Harmony), Bethel (in Eau Claire), Boyers (in Marion Township), Branchton (in Slippery Rock Township), Cabot (in Winfield Township), Hilliards (in Washington Township), and Zion (in Buffalo Township) — are in Butler County.
The Rev. Daniel Owens cited the church’s frustration with what he sees as the increasingly-liberal direction of the United Methodist Church as the main reason for its decision to pursue disaffiliation.
“The people who are designated to enforce our church laws were not and are not doing that,” Owens said. “We have a Book of Discipline, which contains our book of church laws, and when it comes to gay clergy and marrying a gay person, they have been negligent in enforcing those restrictions.”
The debate over LGBTQ rights within the United Methodist Church is at the heart of why thousands of churches have chosen to break off and join other denominations, such as the more conservative Global Methodist Church.
At the 2019 General Conference in St. Louis, the UMC narrowly voted to reaffirm its stance against homosexuality by upholding bans on same-sex marriage and the ordination of “self-avowed practicing homosexuals” as clergy. At the same conference, the church also added Paragraph 2553 to its Book of Discipline, allowing any church to exit the denomination if they fulfill certain criteria.
Due largely to COVID-19, the UMC’s General Conference has not been held since. Over that time, signs have pointed to a softening of the UMC’s stance against homosexuality, with the ordaining of its second-ever openly gay bishop, Cedrick Bridgeforth, in November.
“All indicators point to the denomination moving in a more liberal direction in the near future,” Owens said. “When it was obvious the direction of the denomination was continuing to go to the left … we decided to take advantage of this and pursue disaffiliation.”
Disaffiliating from the United Methodist Church is a long, multistep and costly process, as outlined by Paragraph 2553. First, a disaffiliating church must initiate conversations with the district superintendent. Then the church must set up a vote with its members, and that vote must be at least a two-thirds majority to go forward.
After that, the UMC makes the disaffiliating church aware of the financial obligations that come with leaving. These include paying the United Methodist Church 2% of its assessed property value along with two years worth of its apportionment. For the Harmony-Zelienople Methodist Church, this amounted to $288,000.
A second vote is then taken among the church members, which also must be a two-thirds majority.
The disaffiliation became official with the approval of the voting members at the Western Pennsylvania conference on Tuesday, June 13.
According to Owens, both votes among the church’s parishioners passed overwhelmingly.
“We had two votes that we were required to take to get us to this week, and both of those votes were like 98% favorable,” Owens said.
For Harmony-Zelienople, it was truly now or never to disaffiliate. Paragraph 2553 of the Book of Discipline gives churches a time limit of Dec. 31, 2023, to complete the disaffiliation process.
“We were given this one-time opportunity to leave the denomination, yet to keep our buildings and our land,” Owens said. “This was never offered before in the history of our denomination, and, so, our congregation took advantage of that.”
In Butler County, the Harmony-Zelienople church is the exception, rather than the rule. Most United Methodist member churches in the county, such as First UMC, Thorncreek UMC and Christ Community UMC in Butler, have opted to stay with the UMC during this turbulent period.
Nixon United Methodist Church in Penn Township took matters one step further and offered to act as a Lighthouse Congregation to attract those who wanted to stay with the United Methodist Church, even though their prior churches disaffiliated. As of Friday, there are 18 such Lighthouse Congregations in the Western Pennsylvania region.
