Merging Methodists

A major denominational merger is about to create the nation's largest Protestant church. Meeting separately in Chicago last week, the general conferences of the Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren approved a formal constitution for their long-discussed union. If, as expected, the constitution is ratified by the annual regional conferences of both churches, the United Methodist Church--amalgamating 10.3 million Methodists and 750,000 members of the E.U.B.--will come into being in the spring of 1968. (The Southern Baptist Convention, currently the nation's largest Protestant faith, has 10.8 million members.)

It is something of a wonder that the merger did not take place long ago. As early as 1803, one denominational precursor of the Wesleyan-spirited E.U.B. held tentative merger consultations with the Methodists; in 1871, another E.U.B. progenitor, the Evangelical Association, approved by one vote a union with the Methodists that was never consummated.

One reason why the talks have dragged on since 1956 is the belief of many churchmen within both groups that the spirit has been that of a corporation merger rather than one of genuine Christian renewal. To these critics, the architects of the merger have muffed the chance to work out a new creed expressing the Wesleyan faith for modern times, failed to provide for an interlocking of Methodist and E.U.B. structures at the local level, and ignored the fundamental insights about the real nature of ecumenism that have been achieved by other church groups.

Instead, the talks have been devoted to the painstaking resolution of the minor ecclesiastical differences between the churches. The Methodists elect bishops for life, the E.U.B. for renewable four-year terms. Methodist district superintendents are appointed by bishops; E.U.B. superintendents are elected by the annual conferences. In the end, the E.U.B. voted to accept the Methodist practices in these areas.

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