Can't live with'em, can't schism...

I mean, it's just a movie,
lighten up. Have a sandwich.

...or can you? Schism, I mean. Turns out, you can. That's what's going on right now in the Methodist Church, America's second largest protestant denomina-huh? What do you mean what's their deal? I don't know, what am I, like a religion expert? But if I were to take a stab at it, I'd say that they center their theological world view on the teachings of Konstantin Stanislavski, inventor of method acting and the reason Christian Bale nearly starved himself for The Machinist.

It's just a name...

-The UMC's future slogan

But that's not important right now, what is is that in May the United Methodist Church is going to vote on whether or not to break up into two separate factions. One that will allow the ordination of LGBTQ+ clergy and same-sex marriages and another which will stubbornly cling to their own prejudiced, backwards worldview about how even though Jesus never mentioned homosexuality once in the entire Bible, they're pretty sure he's agin' it.

"How 'bout that baby Yoda, huh? Right?
So uh, let's open our hymnals to..."

Sorry, that was a bit salty...but not untrue. Not being particularly religious, I really have no dog in this hunt but I mean, c'mon, it's 2020 and church attendance is plummeting. Sure, there're all kinds of reasons for this. People are busy and have Disney + now and of course science is like super popular but when you come right down to it, calling people deviants and sodomites isn't the way to claw your way back to relevancy. So the UMC decided to join the twenty-first century and allow LGBTQ+ and same sex weddings.

"Show me Carol, show me the part
where I said I have a problem with gays.
 No? Nothing? Yeah, that's what I thought."

But a not insignificant portion of Methodists however aren't having it, hence the proposal to split the church in two. Proponents feel that once freed of the baggage of...what's the phrase I'm looking for? More traditional elements? No, that's not right. Homophobes. Once freed of homophobes, the church can get back to more Christian values like charity, peace and loving your fellow man-which, hello, right? Meanwhile, the other branch, who will call themselves the Traditionalist Methodists, will be free to stew in their own bitterness secure in the knowledge that no one's going to get the gay all over them at church.

See what I did there Tom?
About a wall? Because your name.
C'mon buddy, I'm on your side here.

Building an entire denomination on prejudice seems like not the best solution, but according to Methodist pastor Tom Berlin in an interview with NPR, it's the only way to move forward:

"If this actually passes, it will be a great relief. What this proposal allows us to do is to be a more inclusive United Methodist Church."

-Rev. Tom Berlin, on 

building that figurative wall

Yikes, I mean, that's got to be exhausting, right? Constantly fighting with half your population about something so fundamental as acceptance that you'd think everyone would be on board with, but here you are, listening to incoherent screeds from traditionalists unwilling to recognize the basic equality of people. It's got to feel like they're holding you back. Dragging you down with them. Maybe sometimes just going your separate ways is for the best.

Huh? Oh, this? What's this doing here?