Global Christianity is thriving, with one out of every 3 people
on earth professing Christian faith, according to a Pew study
released last month. But Christianity is shifting south. Two
percent of global Christians 100 years ago lived in sub-Saharan
Africa. Today, nearly a quarter do, equal to Europe’s percentage,
and soon surely to surpass it.
Insulated secular elites in the U.S. remain largely
clueless about thriving religion even in America, much less
globally. To the extent they notice domestic religion, it is often
the echoing voices of liberal Protestant elites who preside over
increasingly empty churches.
The Presbyterian Church (USA) and the Episcopal Church,
both of which are now likely below 2 million members, will have
their governing conventions this summer. They will probably
solidify their liberal trends, especially in deconstructing
traditional marriage. United Methodism, unique among the major
liberal Mainline denominations for having not compromised its
sexual teaching, will convene its General Conference in late April
in Tampa. Its U.S. membership of 7.6 million is shrinking, while is
overseas membership of 4.5 million, mostly in Africa, is
surging.
Meeting at the same convention center where Republicans
will nominate their presidential candidate a few months later, the
United Methodists perhaps will offer a little more excitement than
the GOP. Church liberals, as they have for 40 years, hope they will
finally overturn the denomination’s prohibition against same-sex
unions and clergy sexually active outside heterosexual marriage.
But 30 percent of the nearly 1000 delegates this year will come
from Africa, and another 10 percent from the Philippines, Europe,
and elsewhere overseas. The overseas churches, especially Africa,
are overwhelmingly conservative.
Liberals will need over 80 percent of U.S. delegates to
win. But about 200 of the 600 U.S. delegates are believed to be
evangelical, making the odds almost insurmountable. The U.S.
church’s only growing areas are in the relatively more conservative
South, while the U.S. church as a whole loses 50,000 to 70,000
members annually. The liberal West Coast and Northeast regions that
are most adamant about “full inclusion” are the fastest declining.
This year, the whole West Coast and Rocky Mountain region will have
only 32 delegates, or only about 3 percent of the total. The
Democratic Republic of the Congo will by contrast send 136. African
churches gained more than 1 million members since the last General
Conference, while the U.S. church lost about 300,000.
At over 12 million members and fast approaching 13
million, the United Methodist Church is now possibly the ninth
largest denomination in the world. And arguably it is the largest
global Protestant church. Catholics number over 1 billion, the
Russian Orthodox Church reputedly has 125 million, the Ethiopian
Church (Oriental Orthodox) has 48 million, the Church of England
claims 25 million, Germany’s Evangelical Church (Lutheran) reports
24 million, the Romanian Orthodox cites 23 million, the Church of
Nigeria (Anglican) has 18 million, and the U.S. Southern Baptist
Convention has over 16 million.
All of the larger Protestant churches are mostly national
churches. In contrast to a typical Southern Baptist governing
convention or a Church of England synod, United Methodism’s
uniquely international General Conference will sometimes appear
schizoid. Nigerians will denounce homosexuality as an abomination,
while U.S. transsexuals will insist on the holiness of cross
dressing and sex change operations. At a pre-General Conference
news briefing last week in Tampa, a liberal Minnesota bishop
presided over a panel on “holy conferencing” about civil
disagreement. But the panel ended with an angry lesbian activist
complaining she had been denied ordination 3 times and insisting
the time for dialogue was over. The time for justice is
now!
The Minnesota bishop, along with the briefing program,
described the chief political issues before United Methodism as
anti-Israel divestment, liberalized immigration, environmentalism,
and opposing the Afghanistan War, including nuclear disarmament.
The General Conference will focus especially on “repentance and
healing” over mistreatment of American indigenous people. One
church official described how Tampa was a “deportation center” for
Cherokees and other tribes during the early 19th century’s “Trail
of Tears.” He also bemoaned how an ancient Indian mound once blocks
away from the convention center had been destroyed a century ago to
extend Tampa’s Jackson Street, named for the president who deported
eastern tribes westward.
Meanwhile, an anti-Israel caucus invited participants at
the United Methodist briefing in Tampa to attend a session on
divestment proposals targeting companies that profit from Israel’s
“occupation,” such as Motorola, Caterpillar and Hewlett Packard. A
divestment spokeswoman faulted “campaign donations” and “arms
sales” for bolstering pro-Israel policies in the U.S. The briefing
was poorly attended, but the anti-Israel divestment proposal, aimed
at the church’s huge pensions fund, comes from the denomination’s
official lobby office. United Methodism already has officially
denounced the “occupation,” the spokeswoman pointed out, and its
bishops have opposed U.S. arms sales to Israel.
Focusing on the historic crimes of America and Western
Civilization, both real and perceived, is a favorite theme for
politically correct U.S. church bureaucrats. But these mostly
leftist themes will not resonate with most international delegates.
For Nigerians and other Africans, discussing the threat of radical
Islam would be more relevant to their own current situation. For
U.S. church liberals, any conversation potentially negative about
aspects of even political Islam would be anathema.
When African churches soon become a majority within the
once all U.S. denomination, overshadowing U.S. liberals, the
chronic debate about sex will finally recede. So too will the
preoccupation with U.S. political themes. The increasingly global
United Methodist Church will then confront new controversies. But
at least it will then reflect the concerns of millions of
Christians around the world, rather than the obsessions of a
cloistered, elite few in the U.S.
