Methodist Church (USA)
The Methodist Church was the official name adopted by the Methodist denomination formed in the United States by the reunion on May 10, 1939, of the northern and southern factions of the Methodist Episcopal Church (which had split earlier in 1844 over the issue of slavery and the impending Civil War in America. During the War Between the States of 1861-1865, the denomination was known briefly as The Methodist Episcopal Church in the Confederate States of America) along with the earlier separated Methodist Protestant Church of 1828.[1]
Its book of liturgy used for the reunited denomination was "The Book of Worship for Church and Home", editions of which were published in 1945 and later revised in 1965. They had two official hymnals, the first being "The Methodist Hymnal", published in 1935 and 1939 by the same three church bodies that later became The Methodist Church. It was replaced in 1966 by "The Book of Hymns".
The Methodist Church then later merged with the Evangelical United Brethren Church on April 23, 1968, to form "The United Methodist Church" with its headquarters, offices and publishing houses in Nashville, Tennessee. Over the next few years most of the individual local congregations in the two bodies under the names of "Methodist Church" or "Evangelical United Brethren Church" changed the latter part of their name to: " ------ United Methodist Church". The new U.M.C. became one of the largest and most widely spread across the nation, denominations in America.[2]
References
- ↑ The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, 1984, page 10
- ↑ The Constitution of The United Methodist Church, Preamble footnote, as found in "The Book of Discipline" "of the United Methodist Church", 1984, page 20.