Posted under Christianity & Religion
A liberal “Methodists” seminary, apparently not satisfied with limiting itself to the heresy of liberal Christianity, is now becoming multi-faith.
As I said before, poor John Wesley must be rolling in his grave. What did he ever do to deserve having the once orthodox denomination he founded dragged through the mud in such a way?
Have any of these characters who are dragging the UMC leftward ever read any of John Wesley’s sermons, much less the Bible? Hint: the man was no theological liberal and even our Calvinist partisans who would vehemently object to Wesley’s Arminianism should acknowledge that.
In the name of decency and intellectual honesty, why don’t these folks officially disaffiliate themselves from the Wesleyan tradition? Why the UMC long ago didn’t disaffiliated them is a separate but related question.
“Methodist” Seminary to go Multi-Faith | Conservative Heritage Times - Christian IBD on 18 Jun 2010 at 8:11 pm #
[...] A liberal Methodists seminary, apparently not satisfied with limiting itself to the heresy of liberal Christianity, is now becoming multi-faith. As I. View full post on methodist – Google Blog Search [...]
Bruce on 19 Jun 2010 at 10:57 am #
Every Methodist I’ve ever known has been a liberal. Years ago I walked into a Methodist Church around Christimas to listen to carols. As I walked out after the program a woman “mininster” greeted me by placing her tiny little hand in mine to shake. That little soft, smooth delicate thing didn’t feel like a pastor’s hand to me.
Believer on 20 Jun 2010 at 3:52 pm #
They might as well accept other faiths, the fundamentals of the Christian faith have long been forgotten by the Methodists. From
accepting Homosexuality as a lifestyle to believing in Darwinism, the
Methodist faith has lost its own faith. Jesus said that he would spew
out of his mouth the lukewarm Christian, and i think the Methodists
would fit that catagory very well.
Marcus on 15 Mar 2011 at 7:21 pm #
I happened upon this site in a computer search
As a conservative UM. I believe that most of the criticisms of the church listed here are correct. I do wish that the UMC as a whole would not be judged by its liberal seminaries such as Claremont and St. Paul. Liberalism is not a self sustaining theology and it ultimately dies out because liberalism is not conducisve to church growth.
A few observations of mine that may give hope to those outsiders who have left the UM church to rot.
1. The confessing movement is quite strong within the UM church and a strong group of influential voices are involved in what is seen as the renewal of the mainline movement within the UM church. These influential voices who are theologically conservative or some would may say moderate include Thomas C. Oden, Adam Hamilton, and William J. Abrahams.
2. The largest UM Church is the Church of the Resurrection in KC, which holds to the historic doctrines of the Christian faith and their pastor Adam Hamilton is recognized as one of the most influential evangelicals who releases study material that affirm orthodox Christian teaching like the bodily ressurrection of Jesus Christ (see 24 Hours that Changed the World).
3. The UMC does not consider homosexuality a valid Christian lifestyle and the Dean of Duke’s Divinity School and top NT scholar Richard Hays shows how the NT backs this up in his book the Moral Vision of the New Testament.
4. Wheaton University has many evangelical UMs in teaching positions in its theology and biblical studies department. Fuller Theological Seminary does as well. Wheaton, also, has strong relationship with Garrett-Evangelical Seminary, a more moderate seminary.
5. The conservative Wesleyan seminary, Asbury, is a major player in the UM educational senate and is producing many conservative UM pastors everyday. Duke Divinity School (be careful to not include the school’s secular religion department) is quite moderate as well and has many scholars committed to the Wesleyan tradition and keeiping it alive in the 21st century.
While I share your dread about the liberalism in mainline churches that kill those branches of the Christianity; I would hope that you will see that the UMC may just turn the ship around yet.
I leave you with a link to the foreword by JI Packer in Thomas Oden’s book After Modernity…. What?
Marcus on 15 Mar 2011 at 7:21 pm #
http://books.google.com/books?id=4E6qTcqV9o0C&printsec=frontcover&dq=after+modernity…+what&hl=en&ei=frt_TdbqOMKhtwfUlZnwCA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false