Reconciling Congregation FAQs
For more than 175 years, Community United Methodist Church has been a welcoming presence in downtown Naperville, a place where people from all walks of life can experience Christ’s love in action.
In 2006, we formally expanded our welcoming statement:
As a congregation with open hearts, open minds, and open doors, we fervently live into the words of John Wesley: “If thou lovest God and all humankind, I ask no more; give me thine hand.”
As a congregation with open hearts, open minds, and open doors, our welcome knows no boundaries of age, race, ethnicity, culture, gender, marital status, sexual orientation, gender identity, economic condition, physical or mental ability.
But does that welcome statement fully describe the Community UMC of today? Or, like the people of Community, is it continuously expanding and evolving?
In the summer of 2014, a Core Team formed to lead an exploration of what it would mean for CUMC to formally identify itself as a Reconciling Congregation – one fully welcoming of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer persons. It was a lay initiative, supported by our pastors, in the context of providing ministry to all beloved children of God. In May 2016, we formally voted to become a Reconciling Congregation!
This Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page helps answer questions you might still have.
If you have other questions not answered here or would like to talk to someone privately, feel free to talk to any of us individually (contact information is in your church directory) or by sending an email to LGBTQ@onecumc.net.
Your team: Carol Craig, Alexander Dungan, Carl Gilmore, June Green (chair), Mary Catherine Long, Nancy Schroeder, Susan Keaton, Clyde Uebele, Tyler Ward (now a seminary student in Atlanta), Jennifer Weddle, Nancy Whittington, Mary Wu and Amanda Zigterman.
Frequently Asked Questions

To formally identify itself as a Reconciling Congregation, Community expanded its welcoming statement to include people of all gender identities. We make an annual donation to join the Reconciling Ministries Network, a movement of tens of thousands of United Methodists committed to making the entire denomination more welcoming of LGBTQ people.
RMN lists CUMC on its website, and we use a rainbow logo on our church signs, publications and website, identifying ourselves in a way recognizable to the community at large.
More specifics on RMN’s mission and goals can be found on this page of its website.
But we already welcome everybody, why do we need an official designation?
What does LGBTQ stand for?
What is sexual orientation, and what do the different terms mean?
- Heterosexual (or straight) refers to a person who is attracted to and falls in love with someone of another gender.
- Homosexual (or gay man or lesbian woman) refers to a person who is attracted to and falls in love with someone of the same gender.
- Bisexual people are attracted to both men and women, and may not be equally attracted to both sexes.
- Asexual people lack sexual attraction to anyone, or have low to no interest in sexual activity. The term refers to a person’s sexual orientation, not to a person who willfully abstains from sexual activity.
What is gender identity, and what does it mean to identify as transgender, gender fluid or intersex?
What does queer mean?
Isn't queer an insult?
What does the United Methodist Church say about this issue?
Can we become a Reconciling Congregation and still be United Methodist?
A local church . . . may not identify or label itself as an unofficial body or movement. Such identification or labeling is divisive and makes the local church subject to the possibility of being in conflict with the Discipline and doctrines of The United Methodist Church.
However, the ruling clarifies that an annual conference has the right to correct actions by local churches that violate the decision. Our annual conference, the Northern Illinois Conference, has never asked a congregation to remove itself from affiliation with the Reconciling Ministries Network, and, in fact, it appears no annual conference ever has.
RMN lists more than 700 reconciling congregations or other worship communities on its website. Our neighbor at Center Street and Franklin Avenue, Wesley UMC, is one of them, as are four other churches within 10 miles of us: Bethany of Fox Valley UMC (Aurora); First UMC (Downers Grove); Winfield UMC; and Wesley UMC in Aurora.
The issue of homosexuality was first openly debated in the UMC at the 1972 General Conference, four years after the Methodist and Evangelical United Brethren churches joined to form the denomination. Issues related to sexuality have continued to be debated at General Conference gatherings since then.
After the 2012 General Conference, many church members and leaders adopted practices of ecclesial disobedience to church laws they consider discriminatory and unjust. Retired Bishop Melvin Talbert named this movement Biblical Obedience. As a result, we have seen a dramatic increase in church members and pastors openly defying the church’s official stand on homosexuality.
On October 25, 2013, Talbert officiated at the union of two United Methodist gay men near Birmingham, Ala., even though the North Alabama presiding bishop had asked him not to do it. Charges were brought against Talbert for officiating at the ceremony and for undermining the ministry of a colleague. In January 2015, the issue was settled in a just resolution that allowed Talbert to retain his credentials and not face a church trial.
The resolution expressed regret over harm to gay and lesbian sisters and brothers, and all those involved, through the complaint process and urged the Council of Bishops to do more study on the issue and how the church can be in ministry to all. Northern Illinois Bishop Sally Dyck has written about discussions with Northern Illinois clergy and also about the bishops’ subsequent statement on human sexuality.
The 2016 General Conference in Portland, Ore., will consider petitions on the topic, including one from the NIC asking it to delete Book of Discipline language saying homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching and to remove restrictive language on marriage.
Doesn't the Bible say homosexuality is a sin?
For many years, some Bible verses have been interpreted to say that same-gender sexual behavior is sinful. For the past 30 or 40 years, though, biblical scholars have been challenging those interpretations. Many point out that Jesus never spoke about homosexuality at all, instead calling on us to love one another.
The Rev. Edwin Womack of Cottonwood, Ariz., a Methodist pastor for 60 years, gives his thoughts on the biblical interpretations here.
We have assembled other resources that address this issue (under the resources question below), and members of the Core Committee are willing to lead a book study on any of the books we have gathered if anyone is interested (write us at LGBTQ@onecumc.net).
Does this mean we agree to gay weddings in our building?
Not automatically, although this is one question we’ll need to consider as we determine how to live out our commitment to welcoming all of God’s beloved children.
Even though the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled gay marriages are legal in every state, the UMC Book of Discipline still prohibits them from being held in United Methodist Church facilities. Many of the congregations who have affiliated with RMN still abide by that prohibition. Other congregations have come to different conclusions on how to carry out their ministry. For example, here are the Marriage Equality policy from First United Methodist Church, Chicago, and a pastoral letter on marriage equality from Foundry UMC in Washington, D.C.
One factor in determining how we carry out our commitment could be if the General Conference changes the Book of Discipline language. The General Conference has been petitioned to consider removing the prohibition on gay marriages in church facilities. The next General Conference is May 10-20, 2016.