In light of the United Church of Christ’s decision to approve gay marriage at its General Synod last month in Atlanta, USA, one activist within the Protestant denomination says despite the fact that the UCC has been "going liberal" for many years, not all support the latest move.
According to David Runyon Bareford, a member of Biblical Witness Fellowship (BWF), a group which seeks evangelical renewal within the UCC, many delegates who voted yes to the same-sex marriage resolution were unlikely to vote differently at the Synod, given their appointment by liberal-leaning governing bodies.
Bareford said, although 80 per cent of delegates might vote in favour of same-sex marriage, it "does not mean that 80 per cent of the membership of the United Church of Christ is in favour of that."
More conservative congregations within the Church, particularly from the Northeast, Ohio, and the Southwest, proposed a different resolution in opposition which supported traditional marriage. The resolution, however, failed.
According to Bareford, these conservative congregations have been attempting to tone-down the liberal force within the UCC since 1977, when the BWF was founded. He said, although the resolution supporting traditional marriage failed, "we’re not despondent about the possibilities, at least for the local churches."
"We continue [to be] hopeful that we will make inroads, if not at the denominational level, certainly at the local level church and we are seeing hundreds of formerly moribund UCC congregations come back to strong, evangelical life and become wonderful evangelical churches."
Bareford speculated that successful adoption of the same-sex marriage resolution will lead to many more of those conservative, evangelical congregations being likely to consider voting to leave the UCC.
The UCC is, according to the renewal advocate, losing more members than any other denomination. The BWF website cited the Church’s losses at more than a quarter-million members and 500 congregations since 1990.
