What’s to Come
Yesterday, 130 missionaries from around the world gathered on Zoom for a “Missionary Town Hall” with the GBGM General Secretary, Roland Fernandes. One of the topics discussed was the proposed budget for 2025, which will be approved at General Conference in a few weeks. The proposed budget for GBGM and UMCOR shows a 52% reduction in World Service funding.
The World Service Fund is the primary avenue of support for the global mission and ministry of The United Methodist Church. By churches paying their apportionments - especially that to the World Service Fund - we are able to fund missionaries, GBGM staff, Global Health projects, UMCOR projects to address emergencies and disasters, UMCOR staff to coordinate and manage those projects, among many other ways we connect with the world..
Why such a drop in funding? As Roland explained, almost 25% of all US United Methodist Churches have disaffiliated since 2019. In addition, many of the churches remaining in the UMC are not paying their full apportionment to the World Service Fund. And so now, as the dust settles, the Boards and Agencies that help local churches reach out to our global brothers and sisters need to “right-size”. It is necessary. It is painful. and it sucks.
I know apportionments are high. I know it is difficult to pay, especially when local churches are struggling with aging buildings, aging congregations and limited funding. But I can’t help but think of all the ministry and mission we will not be able to do, the missionaries that will not be hired, the disasters to which we will not be able to respond.
For more information and data about disaffiliating churches, click on the link below for Research from the Lewis Center: