The boat be sinking

When the truth beats back a full bout with fear and doubt (whew, that's a mouth-full,) and love defeats the lingering doubts and even the fringes of fear, the truth wallops the ones that ... oh, you get the picture.

The numbers are what the numbers are. They are stark, and they sing a sad song, as Sir Elton John has written.

According to the most recent data, The United Methodist Church has lost 116,063 members – the stark equivalent to losing a 318-member local church every day of the year.

The recently released statistics are from the denomination’s  General Council on Finance and Administration. (GCFA) 

The loss from 2013 to 2014 reflected a 1.6 percent drop in total U.S. membership. The percentage of decline has accelerated over 1.3 percent of decline in 2013.

Total United Methodist membership in the United States stands at 7.2 million. There are an additional 5.2 million United Methodists outside the United States, primarily in Africa.

Only four of the 56 U.S. annual conferences experienced growth in membership. Two missionary annual conferences, Alaska and Oklahoma Indian, led the way in membership gains. The North Carolina and Texas Annual Conferences also saw slight gains.

This is the one that gets me the most, I reckon. The greatest membership decline was in the Central Texas Annual Conference, where a loss of 12,908 members resulted in a nearly 8 percent drop. The Yellowstone, Pacific-Northwest, Wisconsin, and Detroit areas all lost more than 4 percent.

In other words, the Central Texas Annual Conference got up and left, at a rate of 8 percent. The Alamo packed it in. Sam Houston has refused to circle the wagons, and heck, they're aflame.

The Western Jurisdiction continued leading the decline in U.S. membership with a 2.6 percent drop for a loss of 8,780 members. Two annual conferences, North Georgia (361,834 members) and Virginia (327,706 members) out-number the eight annual conferences in the Western Jurisdiction where total membership now stands at 322,939, so the question about progressive versus conservative is mute. Both fighters have been knocked out.

Friends, church, folks, whomever is out there and whomever is dropping out at the rate we're listing, we've got to do something entirely different or the boat is going to not only sink but the boat wreckage is never going to be found.

A 318-member church is about to list. Like they say where I come from: whatcha gone do about it? The boat be sinking. Quickly.