A decision on whether a section of The Book of Discipline dealing with church closures can be used for churches wishing to exit The United Methodist Church will be on the docket when the denomination’s Judicial Council meets Oct. 23-26 in Los Angeles.

Both the Kentucky and the Alabama-West Florida conferences are asking the council whether Paragraph 2549 or some other Discipline provision can be used for churches to separate with property. Kentucky’s request for a declaratory decision was made at their June Annual Conference.

Paragraph 2553, a provision instituted by the 2019 special General Conference, allowed churches to leave with property if they met certain financial and procedural obligations. It expired at the end of 2023, but instead of extending the measure, the General Conference – which met this spring for its quadrennial session – opted to eliminate it altogether. That has left some United Methodist conferences wondering how they should handle church exits going forward.

Here is the exact wording of Kentucky’s request: Motion that the Kentucky Annual Conference request a Declaratory Decision on the expiration of Paragraph 2553 and the action of the General Conference to remove that Paragraph from the Discipline, can our Conference utilize Paragraph 2549 or some other provision of the Discipline as a pathway for the exit of local churches from The United Methodist Church?

Once the ruling is announced, we will have a response and an update from our ¶2549 Task Team that has been preparing for the results of the Judicial Council’s work. Please continue to pray for the churches and pastors across the TWK as we live in faithful discipleship together.

A list of the full 11-item docket can be found here.