Reynolds Rap

It's Not a Prediction, It's Basic Math!
THE FIRST OF SEVERAL MAJOR RELIGIOUS DENOMINATIONS MOST LIKELY TO SHUT ITS DOORS

Please, don’t get the wrong idea, this editorial is not against religion, or against LGBT+, so relax.

If you didn’t know, the United Methodist Church is, yet again, going to split, this time into the Global Methodist Church AND other related religious entities. Some of these religious entities will adhere to religious scripture and will not support LGBT+ and other gender identifications. The problem? Either you adhere to your principles, whatever they might be, or you don’t, and historically Methodists consistently pick-and-choose whatever is socially and politically popular over scripture. How do you trust people who don’t adhere to their own beliefs? You can’t, you shouldn’t. As a fifth generation preacher’s kid of Methodist clergy, I’ve personally observed and been the recipient of the hypocrisy of Methodism.

My father, Rev. Dr. Everett S. Reynolds (1928-2011) said to me, “Well, let me tell you about my religious position, for as many have said, the church, including the United Methodist, Baptist, Catholic and all others are racist in practice though not in belief.” Common sense.

As published in the 1984 Discipline of the United Methodist Church, John Wesley, a biblical purist, chartered the first Methodist Church in the United States in 1784, by 1786, there were 1,569 Methodists in the United States of America; all were Black except for only two-(2) White members.   Then, in 1816, Richard Allen, an emancipated slave and Methodist preacher who was mistreated because of his race, left the church and organized the African Methodist Episcopal Church (A.M.E.).

Then, in 1792, James O’Kelly founded the Republican Methodists Church (RMC) because he believed bishops held to much authority over local pastors. The RMC eventually became the United Church of Christ (UCC).

My grandfather, Rev. Dr. Clarence C. Reynolds, Sr. (1903-1961) said, “There can be no improvement in race relations, until there is an acceptance of the Christian ideal of humanity.” Credibility.

Due to continued discrimination, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church (A.M.E.Z.) was begun in 1821; and in 1870 even more Black people left to escape the blatant racism and hypocrisy of "White-privilege-based-religion" to create the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church (C.M.E.). The C.M.E. Church is 94% Black.

Even after the Civil War, and without regard to geographic location, all Black Methodists were confined in its Central Negro Conference, its “religious reservation,” and continued to be so confined EVEN after the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1960, Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Not until after passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1968 did Methodists "officially" end their segregation, their incarceration of "negroes" in their “religious reservation."

However, churches were still segregated, and the lily-Whiteness continues to this very day.

With Methodists you can consistently expect the following:

1. They will always take your money.

2. They will always re-imagine, re-interpret, and cherrypick whatever scripture has defined and established as the inspired word of God.

3. They will always function as divisive, and perpetually splinter into even smaller divisions of "Methodism."

As represented by the graphic images below, such Methodist divisions only "practice what they preach" after again re-imagining, re-interpreting, and cherrypicking whatever they unilaterally determine scripture has defined and established as the inspired word of God. For many Methodists, God's word (including common sense) is ALWAYS open to interpretation until it's been "re-defined" to meet human values, desires, and objectives.

We embrace the inspired word of God and Jesus
as documented in the Bible for thousands of years.

We're "progressive" and we embrace LGBT+
and where ultimately anything goes!

CLICK IMAGE TO LINK TO WEB SITE CLICK IMAGE TO LINK TO WEB SITE

HOLD UP, WAIT A MINUTE! DON'T FORGET ABOUT US!

My great-grandfather, Rev. Abraham Lincoln Reynolds, Sr. (1873-1965) witnessed his two brothers, John and Harry, sold on the slave block, after the Civil War, and never saw them again; and he hated White people, and never allowed a White person in his house, or let a White person to set foot to his pulpit. My father watched, in 1939, when his grandfather said to five visiting White bishops, “You can come to this church and sit out there, but you can not put your foot in this pulpit.” Rev. A.L. Reynolds, Sr., stood there and waited until the bishops sat down, and then he directed the congregation to sing the hymn. Character.

Nothing prohibits LGBT+ individuals from writing their own Bible or creating their own church. Conversely, the overwhelming majority of Black people left the United Methodist Church because it consistently discriminated against Black people. Point of fact, the overwhelming majority of people leading the LGBT+ movement within Methodism are White, and the upcoming split of the church in support of LGBT+ is funded by the UMC! Black Methodists were never compensated for leaving the Methodist Church. Oh, the hypocrisy.

Unfortunately, when dealing with many "religious" people, it's their demonstrated practice to "wordsmith," to dance around subjects without ever getting to the point, to literally use thousands of "interpretations" and "re-interpretations" of the Bible, Quran, Tora, etc., because the concept of right vs. wrong, or the concept of good vs. evil, is too complex, too difficult for laity to understand. You'll never get a concise response if you ask a Christian, a Jew, a Muslim, a Jehovah Witness, a Mormon, and a Quaker the "meaning" of the "Ten Commandments," because the concept of a "commandment" is just too complex for them to explain (yes, the sarcasm is intentional).

When you examine the UMC’s Great Plains Conference, which includes Nebraska, you’ll discover churches are constantly closing because memberships continue to drop as more people die than join, and more pastors retire than are ordained.

Given the constantly diminishing percent of White Christians in every U.S. state, and the failure to attract "new blood" from the ever burgeoning legal and illegal Latino population, is it possible the LGBT+ community, which is primarily White, is being targeted as a potential "growth market" for the UMC?

Surely, the UMC would never be that . . . deceitful?

CLICK THE IMAGE ABOVE TO DOWNLOAD THE BROCHURE

So does this latest split finally signal the end of Methodism? Nope, and here’s why. Historically, you can count on Methodists to consistently pick-and-choose whatever is socially and politically popular over scripture, because as validated in the seminar "The End of the Methodist Church," pictured above, “principles” such as character, credibility, and common sense don’t matter.

THE END OF THE METHODIST CHURCH
IT'S NOT A PREDICTION, IT'S BASIC MATH.

Schedule a seminar to be enlightened. Amen.



I welcome your feedback.

Trip Reynolds
trip.reynolds@yahoo.com

First Amendment to the United States Constitution - Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.