Methodist Musings

I was browsing the Catholic Answers Forums today. I don't have an account or anything, but I like to lurk and pick up fun facts here and there. In the Non-Catholic Religions section, somebody asked which Protestant denominations approved of abortion. "Surely very few, if any," I thought to myself. Of course, among the Protestants and former Protestants, a bunch of Catholics who knew very little about Protestantism took that opportunity to weigh in with their misguided opinions. But there were a couple people who seemed to know their stuff, and one person said the United Methodist Church was partially pro-choice. And I was like, "What? That's false." But this person quoted the General Conference!

I did my own googling, and I found that the quote on the forums was from the 2004 General Conference, and that the 2008 General Conference (the most recent one) had moved the UMC's official stance in a more pro-life direction. This article shows the section on abortion and the changes that had been made to it from 2004 to 2008. It also points out that the UMC's ambivalence on the subject is basically one giant loophole.

Frankly, I was shocked when I read this today. I grew up in/around the UMC, and my former pastor is staunchly pro-life. I don't even know if he knows the church's official stance on the matter. This in itself kind of concerns me, because shouldn't the pastor of a church be in line with his denomination's teaching? (To be fair, the pastor's technically a Wesleyan, but tomato, tomahto, he's running a Methodist church.) Of course I don't fault him for his beliefs, because I share these particular ones (even though every time the subject comes up he seems to think I'm all for abortion, despite my assertions to the contrary). But I mean, what else did he preach about that wasn't in line with the UMC? And we just had a conversation about how it's so important to be properly catechized because one should know one's own faith, no matter what it is. That's what led me to the Catholic Church in the first place: I started reading about my denomination (I guess not far enough to get to the abortion thing) and realized the Catholic standpoint on just about everything made more sense once I understood it properly.

The Wednesday after Easter, less than four days after my confirmation, was the first time since my decision to join The Church that I had a proper theological discussion with my former pastor. He said to me, "So you like the worship service better, but I'm assuming you don't agree with the theology in the Catholic Church." Um...no. That's not the case at all. I explained my being confirmed and having used the words "believe and profess" in regards to what the Catholic Church teaches. I'm pretty sure he's just in denial, because I've been to the Methodist services all of three times in the last year, and only then because I was accompanying my brother. If it were a matter of simply enjoying the liturgy or church hopping, I wouldn't have resigned from all my posts and I probably would have come back at some point.

This isn't the first time I've been accused of taking such a big decision lightly. That's a rant for another day. But let's be clear: I'm very serious about my religion. It's only, you know, a case of everlasting life and death. Kind of a big deal, here.