THE rate of decline in membership of the Methodist Church is falling, but not enough to halt a "significant drop in church membership over the last ten years", the Church's report Statistics for Mission says. The report was expected to be debated by the Methodist Conference on Wednesday evening, after the Church Times had gone to press.

Over the past ten years, the number of church members had fallen by more than 31 per cent, from 304,971 in 2003 to 208,738 in 2013. Similarly, attendance at church services has fallen from 326,400 in October 2003 to 224,500 in October 2013.

The report shows that more people attend groups and outreach events (483,786) weekly than worship services; and that a further 38,483 people engage with Fresh Expressions each week.

The general secretary of the Methodist Church, the Revd Dr Martyn Atkins, said that the report "does not make for easy or comfortable reading. If ever we needed any encouragement to continue to focus on those things that make for an ever better Church which is a discipleship movement shaped for mission today, then these statistics provide that.

"As I travel around the Church, I sense a growing desire to reclaim evangelism as a crucial part of God's mission," Dr Atkins said.

"The main thing is not merely the survival of an institution - even a wonderful institution like our beloved Church. Rather, we are realising afresh that the best thing that anyone can do . . . is to become a disciple of Jesus Christ. And, consequently, seeking and finding apt, relevant, sensitive, and effective ways of presenting Jesus Christ to the world . . . is the critical task of the Church today."

Conference rejects plan for Wales

THE Methodist Conference has rejected proposals for a Uniting Church in Wales because it considered the proposed "act of reconciliation" (the laying on of hands of all ministers in the five covenanting Churches) to be a form of re-ordination, writes Gavin Drake.

The conference also expressed concern about how the two Welsh districts would relate to the Methodist Connexion if they became part of a United Church with a Methodist bishop at a time when the Methodist Church in the rest of Britain had not adopted episcopacy.

In a report to the Conference, the connexional ecumenical officer, the Revd Neil Stubbens, said that "there is insufficient support both in Wales and in the wider connexion for the Methodist Church to accept the invitation" for the five Churches to "think of themselves as the Church Uniting in Wales." But it welcomed proposals from the Commission of Covenanting Churches - not yet adopted by the Church in Wales - for ecumenical canons to be appointed to CiW cathedrals.

In response to memorials from the two Welsh synods of the Methodist Church, the Conference affirmed that "in the ordination of presbyters and deacons, the Methodist Church intends to ordain not to a denomination, but to the presbyterate in the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. It looks for the day when, in communion with the whole Church, such ministries are recognised and exercised in common."