Denominations

The Methodist pair

The United Methodist Church and Global Methodist Church, question by question, with each body's own sourced account beneath the answer.

One formed from the other. The Global Methodist Church launched in 2022, formed by congregations and clergy departing the United Methodist Church, and adopted its Book of Doctrines and Discipline in 2024. Both keep bishops, annual conferences and appointed clergy. The newer body declined the trust clause and the guaranteed appointment, and put freedom from the first into its constitutional articles.

Of 7 questions, they answer 4 the same way and 3 differently. That count is a description of the enum answers, not a measure of how alike the two bodies are — the prose under each question is where the real distance shows.

Who owns the building?

UMC The congregation, held in trust for the denomination
GMC The local congregation

UMC

Title is held by the local congregation's trustees, but held in trust for the whole denomination. The Discipline states that all properties of United Methodist local churches and other United Methodist agencies and institutions are held in trust for the benefit of the entire denomination, and that the trust is and always has been irrevocable except as the Discipline itself provides. A congregation may acquire, hold, maintain, improve, and sell property, but only for purposes consistent with the mission of the Church as the Discipline sets it out. Property can be released from the trust only to the extent the Discipline grants authority.

GMC

Local churches own all their property and assets, and the denomination states that they do so in perpetuity. There is no trust clause, and the denomination's own materials say it is "almost certain" never to adopt one — on the stated ground that congregations inclined to join it do not want to belong to a body that holds their property. This is the pivotal fact about the body, and it is deliberate rather than incidental. A congregation here holds what a United Methodist congregation holds subject to ¶2501, and the two are otherwise organised along recognisably similar lines: bishops, annual conferences, appointed clergy. The site's whole thesis is visible in the pair — polity vocabulary is nearly identical, and the answer to who owns the building is opposite.

How does a church get its pastor?

UMC Appointed
GMC Appointed

They agree here.

UMC

The bishop appoints. The Discipline empowers the bishop to make and fix all appointments in the episcopal area, and the appointment system is itinerant: open itineracy means appointments are made without regard to race, ethnicity, gender, colour, disability, marital status, sexual orientation, or age. Consultation with the pastor and the committee on pastor-parish relations is required in every annual conference and is explicitly more than notification, but it is consultation and not consent — neither congregation nor pastor holds a veto. Appointments are made with the expectation that a pastorate's length answers the long-term needs of charge, community, and pastor, and bishops are directed to work toward longer tenures.

GMC

The bishop appoints and the congregation does not vote, so this is an appointment system. But ¶610.7 makes the consultation substantially thicker than the United Methodist counterpart, in three specific ways worth naming. First, choice: "Whenever possible, churches may be given 2-3 pastoral candidates to choose from for potential pastoral interviews." Second, refusal: "Churches and pastors have the right to decline a proposed appointment without malice" — with the Discipline noting candidly that this may extend the time a church is served by pulpit supply. Third, and most striking, a congregation may run its own search: "a church may choose to lead their own search process for pastoral leadership upon the approval of the presiding elder and conference superintendent," with final interviews requiring the approval of the board of ministry, the presiding elder and the conference superintendent, and a cabinet representative present. Appointments are also meant to be durable rather than annual: ¶610.8 directs bishops and cabinets to "work toward multi-year (rather than annual) local church appointments." Open itinerancy is retained and defined at ¶610.2 as appointment without regard to race, tribal or ethnic origin, gender, disability, marital status or age — a list that, unlike its United Methodist counterpart, does not include sexual orientation. The net effect is an appointment system with a congregational veto and an optional congregational search. That is closer to a call than the enum can express, and further from one than the Presbyterian arrangement, where the congregation elects and a court concurs.

  • governing document Book of Doctrines and Discipline (GMC) 2024 ¶610.7, consultation in appointment-making
  • governing document Book of Doctrines and Discipline (GMC) 2024 ¶610.1-.2 and .8, appointment by the bishop, open itinerancy, multi-year appointments

Who is the pastor's employer?

UMC Split — the congregation pays, but does not hire
GMC Split — the congregation pays, but does not hire

They agree here.

UMC

The congregation does not hire its pastor, and that — rather than who signs the cheque — is the fact that distinguishes this arrangement. The bishop makes the appointment and the annual conference holds the credentials; the congregation receives the pastor it is sent, and cannot dismiss one. Payroll runs the other way, which is what makes the arrangement easy to misread. For tax purposes the local church is the employer: a United Methodist pastor is a common-law employee of the congregation and receives a W-2 from it, subject to the dual status under which clergy are treated as self-employed for Social Security and the church is barred from withholding or paying FICA. So the congregation carries every burden of employment — salary, benefits, reporting, liability — while holding none of the powers that ordinarily come with it.

GMC

The same three-way split as the United Methodist and Roman Catholic diocesan cases: the congregation pays, the bishop appoints, and the congregation cannot hire. The denomination makes the point explicitly in its own guidance, which states that employment contracts are invalid in the Global Methodist Church — the relationship is an appointment, not a contract between a church and a person it engaged. The qualification, again, is the shortlist. A congregation with a genuine choice among two or three candidates is closer to hiring than a United Methodist congregation is, without crossing the line.

What money leaves the congregation?

UMC Assessed by formula
GMC Assessed by formula

They agree here.

This question is derived from each body's whole set of money flows rather than a single provision; see the money sections of UMC and GMC.

Who oversees the congregation?

UMC A bishop, holding office for life
GMC A bishop, elected for fixed terms

UMC

Bishops, and their tenure is fixed in the Constitution itself: "bishops elected by the jurisdictions of The United Methodist Church shall have life tenure." A bishop is elected by a jurisdictional conference rather than by the general church or by the annual conference they will serve, and holds the office until retirement — there is no re-election, and no periodic decision by anyone about whether they continue. Accountability runs through review rather than through re-election. Each jurisdictional conference elects a standing committee on episcopacy, one clergy and one lay delegate from each annual conference, which reviews the bishops' work. The office is described as a special ministry rather than a separate order of ministry.

  • governing document Book of Discipline 2024 ¶51 (Constitution), life tenure of bishops and the committee on episcopacy
  • governing document Book of Discipline 2024 ¶¶401-403, the task of superintending; office not a separate order

GMC

Bishops, elected for terms and subject to re-election — the deliberate counterpart to the life tenure of the body its founders left. A bishop may serve up to two six-year terms, after which he returns to local ministry or other general church service. The selection process is unusually distributed for an episcopal body. In the twelve months before a General Conference each annual conference delegation nominates up to one clergy from within its own conference and up to one from outside it, excluding serving bishops; a Global Episcopacy Committee compiles and publishes the list of nominees at least ninety days ahead, together with a list of bishops eligible and willing to stand again. Area episcopacy committees then interview candidates and produce ranked shortlists matched to each area's needs, and the General Conference elects. Episcopal areas are themselves redrawn before each General Conference, guided by six to eight annual conferences per area, and need not be geographically contiguous.

  • governing document Book of Doctrines and Discipline (GMC) 2024 ¶604, Election of Bishops
  • governing document Book of Doctrines and Discipline (GMC) 2024 ¶¶601-603 and 605-606, nature of superintendency, the Global Episcopacy Committee and the Assembly of Bishops
  • the body's own statement Global Methodist Church, FAQ — two six-year terms, then return to local ministry (accessed 2026-07-31) — self-description

Who owns the church's name?

UMC The denomination, licensed to the congregation
GMC The denomination, licensed to the congregation

They agree here.

UMC

The finance agency maintains the registrations of the name "United Methodist" and supervises the official insignia, the Cross and Flame, which is a registered trademark. Official United Methodist bodies, local churches among them, may use the insignia to identify United Methodist work; commercial use requires written authorisation from an officer of the agency. In practice the name and mark are the quietest of the denomination's levers and the one most often overlooked in departure disputes, since a congregation that leaves cannot take them along.

GMC

The denomination controls its name and logo. ¶1004 provides that "Global Methodist Church" is not to be used as, or as part of, a trade name, trademark, or the name of any business or organisation, except by local churches, conferences, corporations and business units created for work undertaken directly by the denomination, and charges the Connectional Council with supervising and registering both the name and the logo. So the arrangement matches the United Methodist one closely — the name is used by congregations by virtue of belonging, and control sits with a general church body — even though the property arrangements are opposite. A congregation that disaffiliates under ¶1003 keeps its building and its assets, and gives up the name. For a denomination with no property lever, the name is a larger share of what it holds than it is for the body its founders left.

  • governing document Book of Doctrines and Discipline (GMC) 2024 ¶1004, Registration of the Name

How does a congregation leave?

UMC The governing documents provide no path
GMC Through a defined process, with conditions

UMC

There is presently no general disciplinary path for a congregation to leave with its property. From 2019 the Discipline carried a temporary paragraph allowing disaffiliation over the denomination's disagreements about sexuality, on stated terms: a two-thirds vote of the professing members present at a church conference, payment of any unpaid apportionments for the prior twelve months plus a further twelve months, and settlement of a pro rata share of aggregate unfunded pension obligations — with the departure taking effect only when the annual conference approved it by simple majority. That paragraph expired on 31 December 2023 by its own terms and was deleted by the 2024 General Conference. More than 7,600 US congregations used it while it was open.

GMC

The Discipline provides a standing right of departure, in one sentence: "After at least a 90-day period of discernment and prayer, a congregation of the Global Methodist Church may disaffiliate from the denomination by a majority vote of its church conference." Set beside the provision this denomination's founders used to leave, the differences are the whole story. The United Methodist ¶2553 required a two-thirds vote of professing members present, payment of unpaid apportionments for the prior twelve months plus a further twelve, settlement of a pro rata share of aggregate unfunded pension obligations, and approval by a simple majority of the annual conference — and it expired at the end of 2023 and was deleted in 2024. Here the threshold is a simple majority, the only condition is ninety days of discernment, no payment is specified, no higher body's approval is required, and the provision is permanent rather than time-limited. "With conditions" is the accurate value only because of the waiting period; in every other respect this is the least encumbered exit of any body on this site that has a formal procedure at all. Whether a right of departure this easy strengthens a connection by making membership voluntary, or weakens it by making it costless, is precisely the disagreement that produced this denomination.

Other pairs

All bodies, side by side