United Methodists’ generosity in 2022 brought a ray of sunshine to the denomination’s cloudy budget outlook.
However, the denomination’s financial leaders still worry about storms ahead.
Overall, the finance agency collected about $113.9 million in 2022 apportionments — requested shares of church giving that support denomination-wide ministries. That’s up from about $113.7 million in 2021.
While only a slight increase, the 2022 receipts= halt a three-year downward trend in apportionment collections and indicate a stabilization in giving.
The small boost also comes as the denomination is grappling with a mounting number of church disaffiliations
Ministry is made possible, he added, “through giving by our members who believe in our ability to transform the world because of Jesus Christ,” the Rev. Moses Kumar, the finance agency’s top executive, told the board
However, total apportionment collections are still notably lower than 10 years ago when people were still recovering from a global recession.
Apportionments are what sustain United Methodist ministry beyond the work of individual congregations. Denomination-wide ministries receive apportionments from annual conferences, regional church bodies that in turn receive apportionments from local churches. About 90% of the offering remains in the local church.
U.S. onferences distribute their apportionments among seven general-church funds. Each fund supports a different category of ministry: the World Service Fund that supports the work of most general agencies, bishops, ministerial education, general administration, the Black College Fund, Africa University and ecumenical work.
Central conferences — church regions in Africa, Europe and the Philippines — also pay apportionments but only to the Episcopal and General Administration funds.
The pandemic has played a significant role in diminished apportionment receipts in recent years, not least in postponing General Conference, the denomination’s top lawmaking assembly, from 2020 to now 2024.
U.S. apportionment collections — which fund the bulk of denomination-wide ministries — were up overall in 2022.
If the coming General Conference approves returning to a full allotment of 66 bishops, he added, “You’ll start to deplete the reserves at a very high rate.”
General Conference also has received legislation to add five more bishops in Africa — a plan that has long been in the works.
Bill Brownson, a GCFA board member and the West Ohio Conference’s treasurer, suggested the agency look at different scenarios for reducing the number of bishops. He also suggested that the agency look for ways to decouple the discussion of the Episcopal Fund from the rest of the denominational budget.
“I don’t propose it’s easy, and it’s not, of course, how we’ve done it before,” he said.
As things stand, Brownson said, the rest of the denomination’s budget is “a derivative of the Episcopal Fund budget.”
The Rev. Steve Wood, who chairs the board committee that deals with the general church budget, said Brownson raised an interesting idea.
excerpt from a story by Heather Hahn, assistant news editor for UM News
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