Church signs across the commonwealth will need to be updated after more than 280 United Methodist Churches in Kentucky – eight in Warren County – received official approval this week to leave the denomination.

Hundreds of clergy and lay members descended on Owensboro this week for the Kentucky Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church’s 2023 session. An important item on this year’s agenda was the approval of churches’ votes to disaffiliate from the United Methodist Church.

According to United Methodist News, the UMC has seen over 4,800 congregations depart since 2019. That was the year the General Conference adopted a new law into its Book of Discipline that provides a limited right for churches to disaffiliate.

Paragraph 2553 provides churches the ability to leave “for reasons of conscience regarding a change in the requirements and provisions of the Book of Discipline related to the practice of homosexuality.”

The Book of Discipline explicitly forbids LGBTQ+ persons from holding positions of leadership within UMC. Its qualifications for ordination reads: “Therefore self-avowed practicing homosexuals are not to be certified as candidates, ordained as ministers, or appointed to serve in The United Methodist Church.”

Despite this rule, the UMC’s Western Jurisdiction elected the Rev. Cedrick D. Bridgeforth as a bishop in late 2022. Bridgeforth is the first openly gay, Black bishop in the UMC. The same jurisdiction elected the Rev. Karen Oliveto, a lesbian, as the UMC’s first-ever openly gay bishop in 2016.

John Lomperis, the United Methodist Director for the Institute on Religion and Democracy and a United Methodist General Conference delegate, said this disregard of written doctrine is a point of frustration for traditionalist congregations.

“Fundamentally, people who are leaving the denomination feel like the leadership has not had the integrity and trustworthiness to follow their own rules and uphold their own doctrine,” he said.

While the issue of sexual orientation is present in the UMC divide, Lomperis said there are other foundational disagreements driving a wedge, “namely about the authority of scripture and beliefs about Jesus Christ.”

A 2019 survey of UMC beliefs, conducted by United Methodist Communications, found that 38% of respondents believed Christ committed earthly sin and 11% of respondents said they do not believe in the “bodily resurrection of Christ from the dead.”

Just 6% of respondents who identified as “progressive-liberal” said that Scripture is the “most authoritative source in personal theology,” compared to 41% of those who identified as “conservative-traditional.”

“That’s a pretty basic point for people who consider themselves more theologically orthodox traditionalists,” Lomperis said. “That Scripture needs to be our primary authority and not history, our own personal experiences or other sources.”

In order to disaffiliate, a church congregation must hold a vote where a two-thirds majority of professing members present vote to leave. The church also has to pay “any unpaid apportionments” for the year prior to disaffiliation on top of an additional 12 months of apportionments.

Per paragraph 2553, those votes to leave must then be ratified by a simple majority at a “duly-called session of Annual Conference,” like the one in Owensboro. However, paragraph 2553 and the options it grants won’t be around forever – it is set to expire Dec. 31.

The Daily News reached out to the Kentucky Annual Conference, asking if Bishop Leonard Fairley expects to call special sessions later in the year for churches wanting to disaffiliate before the end of paragraph 2553.

“Including the June 2023 regular session of our Annual Conference, we have provided five opportunities for churches to disaffiliate under the paragraph 2553 process,” Fairley said in a statement. “Therefore, after prayerful and careful consideration, no further special sessions will be called in Kentucky.”

Christ Church, a UMC congregation on Cave Mill Road, voted 137-24 to disaffiliate. Church leadership declined to speak with the Daily News about the vote.

Faith United Methodist Church on Veterans Memorial Lane voted 56-12 to disaffiliate. The Daily News reached out to pastor Mark Rogers for comment on the vote but did not receive a response.

Other Warren County congregations leaving the UMC are Smiths Grove United Methodist (47-3), Bethel United Methodist (37-0), Greenhill United Methodist (28-0), Mt. Pisgah United Methodist (13-0), Flat Rock United Methodist (10-0) and Rays Branch United Methodist (4-0).

Marc Clark, pastor of Greenhill Church, said he will remain in contact with his friends in the UMC and that a shared belief in Christ trumps any rifts that may exist between local Methodists.

He said Greenhill, newly non-denominational, will be taking a look at putting together a membership covenant and “staying traditional in a sense.”

“Greenhill is a loving church,” Clark said. “This has been painful for all of us.”