United Methodists Overturn Ban on Homosexual Clergy

For forty years, the United Methodist Church (UMC) has banned the ordination of homosexual clergy. However, in April, the church overwhelmingly voted to overturn the ban by a landslide vote, 692 to 51 (BBC, May 2, 2024). As one UMC clergy member proudly observed following the vote, “With the approvals and acceptance of the things today... we’re beginning to see the unwinding, unravelling, dismantling of the heterosexism.” However, many within the UMC have been uncomfortable with the progressive agenda that is gaining ground within the denomination, and more than 7,600 congregations have disaffiliated from the UMC over the last few years. With many conservatives departing, the vote to overturn the ban on homosexual clergy was easily won.

The UMC has been viewed as more liberal in its theology than many other mainstream Christian denominations. Yet, prior to 2019, its governing body actually strengthened its conservative stance on certain issues of morality. The recent vote clearly demonstrates the increasingly immoral trajectory many nominal Christians are pursuing—and that is in keeping with Bible prophecy. Concerning the end-time condition of the nations descended from ancient Israel, the prophet Hosea warned, “They set their heart on their iniquity. And it shall be: like people, like priest... for the spirit of harlotry has caused them to stray, and they have played the harlot against their God” (Hosea 4:8–12). Not only are the peoples of the modern Israelite-descended nations rejecting God’s ways at an increasingly rapid rate, so are their so-called spiritual leaders. To learn more about where many Western nations are heading morally, read “A Society That Has Rejected God.”