It was 1907 and the United States was transitioning rapidly from an agrarian society to an industrial one. Workers, for the most part, were underpaid, factories were hazardous, sweatshops exploited child labor. And a group of Methodists was outraged.
Fast forward 116 years to find the denomination’s top legislative body set to vote on the Revised Social Principles, the latest version of that early 20th century document called the Social Creed. Across more than a century of societal transformation, United Methodists remain committed to support and preserve God’s creation, both for the natural world and for the people who live in it.
The first Social Creed
The authors of the original Social Creed, officially adopted in 1908, involved some of America’s most prominent citizens, including Harry F. Ward, the first president of the American Civil Liberties Union; Frank Mason North, founder of the Methodist Federation for Social Service and co-organizer of the Federal Council of Churches; Herbert Welch, a Methodist Episcopal Church (M.E.C) bishop and president of Ohio Wesleyan University; Worth M. Tippy, who resigned as the highest paid pastor in the M.E.C. to become secretary in charge of social service in the Federal Council of Churches; and Elbert R. Zarin.
“They got together, and wrote what is essentially a Bill of Rights or 10 commandments for the social gospel,” explained the Rev. Dr. Darryl W. Stephens, a professor, author and advocate ordained in The United Methodist Church. “These were 10 economic issues they wanted the church to address.”
The M.E.C.’s approval of the Social Creed in 1908 and its subsequent inclusion in the Book of Discipline marked the first time a Christian denomination adopted such a concise public policy platform.
"Instead of addressing the behavior of church members, it was an outward facing witness," Stephens notes, "and it was a statement on multiple issues of public policy, rather than a single issue campaign."
Within a few years, other Protestant denominations espoused similar tenets.
By the 1930s, with President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and the formation of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), laws dictating 40-hour work weeks plus overtime pay, child labor regulations and other worker protections were in place.
“The first social creed was 10 points and within a few years, that expanded to 12 points and 15 points,” Stephens says, adding that the Social Creed was adopted officially by the Federal Council of Churches in America. “It became an ecumenical creed among Protestants, in particular, addressing not only economic justice, but also issues of public policy in many areas. It kept expanding as the churches decided to address these issues.”
Women’s rights, as well as war and peace, were addressed in subsequent versions.
By 1939, when the Uniting Conference brought together three Methodist denominations to form the Methodist Church, it was decided the Social Creed would be “a central part of our Discipline in perpetuity,” Stephens noted.
When the United Brethren Church and the Evangelical Association merged in 1946, each brought its support of the ecumenical Social Creed to the newly formed Evangelical United Brethren Church (EUB Church)."
By the 1960s, the EUB Church. would have its own document called the Moral Standards. Within a few years, the EUB and the Moral Standards would become an important part of the Methodist conversation.
“The difference,” Stephens points out, “is the Methodists were more public policy oriented and the EUB Moral Standards were more about church members’ behavior.”
Social Creed meets Moral Standards
In 1968 when the EUB Church merged with the Methodist Church at the Uniting Conference, the two documents – the Social Creed and the Moral Standards -- were “deemed compatible,” Stephens noted, and were printed together within the first United Methodist Church Book of Discipline.
That same year, Bishop James S. Thomas was named chairman of a group tasked with examining the two documents and to determine additions to the Social Creed. The new document, titled the Social Principles, was presented and adopted at the 1972 General Conference. The statement was revised in 1976 and by each successive General Conference through 2016.
(Note: The General Conference is set to meet April 2024 after the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic postponed the quadrennial gathering by four years.)
“Our current Social Principles are in some ways still the result of the Social Principles commission study of 1968, adopted in 1972 and then edited every four years since,” says John Hill, interim general secretary of the General Board of Church and Society (GBCS). “It doesn’t always make the clearest and easiest reading. And as much as General Conference tries to improve the Social Principles, oftentimes, they add language and it gets a little cluttered. Sometimes they have conflicting statements in different sections,” Hill adds.
Starting with a blank sheet of paper
In 2012, the General Conference voted for GBCS leaders to undertake a revision process that involved reviewing how the Social Principles resonate in their respective contexts throughout the connection. In 2016, based on GBCS’s findings, the General Conference tasked GBCS to work on a revision. The Revised Social Principles were presented at the Postponed 2020 General Conference, where they were approved for adoption.The revisions, Hill explains, are more than additions and subtractions from the existing document.
“We’ve been fighting over some of the same words since 1972,” Hill points out. “I think the beauty of this process is that we actually were informed by our history of social witness and all that came before, but we really started with a blank sheet and started writing new language. I’m a little biased, but I hope the General Conference sees this as a real gift to this next expression of United Methodism, (and) that we can, in fact, turn the page and have this new set of Revised Social Principles.”
Crystal Caviness works for UMC.org at United Methodist Communications. Contact her by email.
This story was published on February 8, 2024, and updated May 7, 2024.
For more information about the history of the Social Principles, listen to the Jan. 25, 2024, episode of "Un-Tied Methodism" podcast, where Dr. Ashley Boggan D. discusses the topic with the Rev. Dr. Darryl W. Stephens and John Hill.
