The United Methodist Church - Inside Religion

Paper Summary:

The writer explains that John Wesley and his brother, Charles, founded the movement as an alternative to the English Anglican Church. The paper shows how the Methodist Episcopal Church began its migration to the Colonies in approximately 1772, and how the Church began to take on radical changes from the doctrines of Wesleyan Methodism. Included in these changes was the renaming of the church to The United Methodist Church. In summation, in opposition to the original doctrine of the Church regarding centralized functioning, the paper shows that the majority of attendees feel that decisions made in the local church will be more effective.

Table of Contents:
Thesis Statement
The Movement in the Colonies and Westward
Organizing of the United Methodists
The Future of the United Methodist Church
Bibliography

From the Paper:

"At the same time as the Southern migration is occurring the Methodist movement is also moving Northward across the Ohio River, and into Indiana. This migration is taking place within a period a full fifteen years before Indiana becomes a State and creates for the Methodist Episcopal Church many contentious issues concerning the governance of the Church and its mission at this point in History. For example, with a Church population spreading so rapidly and far flung, how does the Methodist Episcopal Church provide "ministers," for their large and now scattered flock?
"Indiana ironically enough and to the displeasure of John and Charles Wesley becomes the center for control of the Church and from this organization of power comes the new organization known as the United Methodist Church. For American Methodism theology, doctrine, leadership, organization and worship models come directly from John Wesley's movement of the eighteenth century England. However, Wesley's appeal is to English Anglicans whose relationship to their church had been decidedly "luke-warm," and is lacking in the drive for a personal God-man relationship. It is the desire for a personal God-man relationship that the persons in the frontier of the rapidly expanding United States want most to aid and comfort them in the endurance of the hardships they face."

More papers on The United Methodist Church - Inside Religion:

• Research Paper # 73005 : "Holman United Methodist Church"
• Essay # 37061 : "The Role of Liturgy in the Pastoral Services of the Methodist Church"

APA Citation:

MLA Citation: