And so the fight for “justice” continues.

In an October 13 statement, the South Carolina Conference of The United Methodist Church announced that a circuit court judge intends to dismiss cases brought by the Conference and local United Methodist churches involving 70 churches seeking to separate from the denomination. According to the statement, the written orders have not yet been entered. The Conference nevertheless announced its intention to appeal.

For years, congregations seeking to leave The United Methodist Church over theological differences could do so with their property under a temporary provision in the Book of Discipline (Paragraph 2553). That window closed at the end of 2023. In the years since, some churches have continued to separate—often outside the processes allowed by church law—while annual conferences have sought to retain the properties under the denomination’s longstanding trust clause. The South Carolina cases are one result of that unresolved conflict.

Near the conclusion, Bishop Leonard Fairley said, “So, we will continue to seek justice faithfully, pursue the appropriate legal avenues available to us, and trust God with what lies ahead.”

It was the word justice that caught my attention. Just what constitutes justice in a situation like this? And who gets to define it?

Let me acknowledge my own perspective. I spent more than 28 years as a United Methodist pastor, including two years as a district superintendent. I now pastor Haughton Methodist Church, a congregation that chose to walk away from its former church property. I have a history here. I have convictions. I won’t pretend otherwise. 

But those experiences are precisely why I think the question deserves more than an assumption that justice means our side wins. Read alongside the announced intention to appeal, that language raises a question for me: Does seeking justice necessarily mean overturning the dismissal?

Who Has a Just Claim?

An Annual Conference can argue that church property belongs to a connection larger than any single congregation. Local churches have benefited from appointed pastors, denominational relationships and the contributions of those who came before the present membership. Some have also received financial assistance. Those things matter.

But generations of local people putting money in offering plates, paying mortgages, repairing roofs, mowing grass and keeping the lights on matter just as much. So do the sacrifices of people who believed they were providing a place where their children and grandchildren could worship and come to know Jesus. How does one weigh those contributions?

Where a Conference’s financial investment has been limited or nonexistent, what makes retaining the property morally just? Is the legal claim sufficient to settle the Christian question? And from the other direction, does the present congregation’s desire to leave erase every obligation to the connection or every intention of previous generations?

Those questions require actual answers. Calling our preferred outcome “justice” does not provide them. A court can determine legal rights. Christians still have to ask how we ought to exercise those rights.

What Does the Fight Cost?

The bishop’s statement also speaks of people hungry for the Gospel, communities needing healing and children needing to discover the love of Jesus. Amen. I couldn’t agree more. There is much ministry before us. That is part of what makes this so troubling.

What does it cost to continue these disputes? And I don’t mean only the attorney fees. What does it cost in pastoral attention? In congregational energy? In relationships? In the credibility of our witness to people watching from outside the church? What could the money accomplish if it were used to feed the hungry, clothe the naked or support ministries of care for the sick?

I get it: property has value, and protecting it can preserve resources for future ministry. Stewardship sometimes requires difficult decisions. But stewardship also requires asking whether the expense of securing an asset is consuming the very ministry that asset was supposed to serve.

That question applies to departing congregations, too. A congregation can become so determined to keep a building that keeping it becomes the organizing purpose of its life. At some point, both sides ought to ask: How much are we willing to spend to avoid losing? And what might we lose while insisting on winning?

The Scripture We Have to Face

Then there is Paul. 1 Corinthians 6 makes uncomfortable reading when Christians are taking one another to court. Paul confronts believers over their lawsuits and asks why they would not rather suffer wrong or accept being cheated.

I don’t believe a blog paragraph can settle every question about how that passage applies to every legal circumstance. But surely it requires more from us than a quick explanation of why our particular dispute deserves an exception.

Paul asks us to consider the possibility that accepting a loss might be more faithful than securing a victory. What are we supposed to do with that? Does it have any practical authority over our decisions? Can it change our course of action? Or do we affirm the authority of Scripture until Scripture threatens something we are determined to keep?

I ask that as someone who has preached plenty of difficult passages and then discovered how difficult they are to live. What sounds right when we read it in worship on Sunday can be harder to accept when we meet with an attorney on Monday.

Sometimes You Walk Away

At Haughton, our congregation walked away. I cannot mention that as though leaving church property behind were a small thing. A church building holds memories. People remember weddings, funerals, baptisms and the places where they sat beside someone they loved. You can’t pack any of that into a moving van.

We now worship in a storefront. There are limitations and inconveniences. The decision to walk away had consequences beyond the day we left. But there is still a congregation. There is still worship. There is still a Gospel to proclaim and a community to serve.

Our experience does not give me the right to prescribe the same decision for every other church. It does give me a reason to take Paul’s question seriously. Accepting loss is an actual possibility, with actual costs.

It also raises a question for the institution receiving what a congregation relinquishes. A congregation’s willingness to walk away does not automatically establish the justice of the Conference keeping the property, or the justice of the Conference continuing to fight for it. Accepting an outcome and declaring that outcome just are different things.

If we appeal to Scripture when asking a congregation to accept loss, we must also ask what Scripture might require the Conference to surrender. Otherwise, accepting loss becomes something we recommend exclusively to the other side.

Justice, Mercy and Humility

Micah 6:8 holds together doing justice, loving mercy and walking humbly with God. I need all three. So does the church.

Humility requires admitting that my interests can influence my definition of justice. Mercy requires taking seriously what my insistence on those interests will cost someone else. Neither makes justice unimportant, but both should shape how we pursue it.

I don’t know how the South Carolina appeals will unfold. The statement itself says the trial court’s written orders are still pending. I am not claiming to know how the legal questions should be resolved. I am asking whether we have given the Christian questions the attention they deserve.

What do we owe one another? What does our witness require? What are we willing to surrender for the sake of the Gospel? And, perhaps most importantly, can we recognize justice when it requires something of us?

The fight for “justice” continues. Meanwhile, the hungry still need food, the sick still need care, the poor still need help, and the orphan and widow still need someone to stand beside them. A world still needs Jesus. Those needs don’t settle the property question. But they ought to weigh heavily in how long we fight, how much we spend and what we are willing to surrender.

Justice. We all want justice. The problem is in knowing whose definition to use.

Until next time, keep looking up…

If any of my reflections encouraged or challenged you, follow Not the Perfect Pastor on Facebook for more conversations about faith, ministry, and becoming faithful disciples of Jesus.