Over the last two years or so, about a quarter of the denomination's congregations have bolted over its increasingly unbiblical take on sexuality. Mark Tooley of The Institute for Religion & Democracy (The IRD) says the heresy will become official policy at the UMC annual meeting in May, when Bishop Tracy S. Malone takes the helm.
"In the next 10 days, the church's governing general conference meets in Charlotte, North Carolina and for the first time ever will liberalize the denomination's teachings on marriage and sexuality," Tooley reports.
The new president, he says, fully supports those changes.
"She would be conventionally institutionalist and theologically left of center and will be very comfortable when the church officially liberalizes its sexuality teachings," he asserts.
In a recent interview with The Christian Post, Malone voiced her desire to help the church become "more inclusive" and "grace-filled."
"Inclusive is the buzzword for sexually liberal," Tooley notes. "The irony and the tragedy is inclusive for church usually means less inclusive, less diverse, faster declining."
In that area, he laments that the UMC has already passed the point of no return.
"It used to be 11 million in the U.S.; now it's down to perhaps 4 million," The IRD president reports. "I would expect the denomination will not exist in its current form 10 years from now."
Malone has said the mass exit of theologically conservative congregations has left the remainder of the UMC with "a renewed sense of hope and excitement" and feeling like they can finally breathe.
