In a series of brief videos, Bishop Scott Jones of the Texas Annual Conference of the United Methodist Church explains the situation the denomination finds itself in, clarifies the essentials of the different main plans that will come before the February 2019 General Conference, and gives his opinion on how they will affect the church. We at IRD/UMAction are very grateful for Bishop Jones’s leadership in providing clear, succinct summaries of the decisions now facing the denomination.

We commend these videos to all United Methodists and other interested persons, and encourage you to share them with others. This is Part 2 of our series sharing Bishop Jones’ videos; for Part 1 post click here.

Real One Church Plan: Despite the name, the One Church Plan actually creates the most division of any plan. The arguments about human sexuality will continue by moving to the annual conference and local church level. If either the OCP or the Traditional Plan are adopted by the General Conference, expect significant number of United Methodist individuals, congregations, and even annual conferences to leave the denomination. In contrast, Bishop Jones describes the Connectional Plan as bringing the greatest degree of unity.

One Church: The One Church Plan seeks to shift the church’s teaching and rules in a progressive direction, and will cause conservative congregations or whole annual conferences to leave. It is a plan for continued conflict and is better called the Local Option Plan or Local Conflict Plan, because any congregation or annual conference with diversity of belief on human sexuality will eventually have to debate and vote.