The collapse of Mainline Protestantism was further evinced two weeks ago when the United Methodist Church derecognized evangelical Asbury Theological Seminary. Effectively, Asbury Seminary is no longer recognized to educate United Methodist ministers.
Asbury is America’s eighth largest seminary and the largest theologically Wesleyan seminary in the world, with nearly 900 full-time students from many denominations. (View data for America’s seminaries from the Association of Theological Schools here.) It had once hosted the largest number of United Methodist seminarians of any school in America. As recently as 2017, over 10 percent of United Methodist ordinands were Asbury graduates.
Founded in the 1920s in Wilmore, Ky., outside Lexington, Asbury Seminary originally emerged from Asbury College across the street, aligning with the Wesleyan Holiness Movement. That movement stressed personal sanctification. In subsequent decades, Asbury became the chief institution for evangelicals within Mainline Methodism, whose official seminaries had theologically liberalized in the early 20th century.
Evangelicals were always a 20th century minority within what in 1968 became The United Methodist Church, America’s largest Mainline denomination, and largest Protestant denomination until surpassed by the Southern Baptist Convention in 1967. But evangelicals in United Methodism were a vibrant and eventually a politically influential minority.
Continue reading at WORLD here.
Mark Tooley is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy and editor of IRD’s foreign policy and national security journal, Providence. Prior to joining the IRD in 1994, Mark worked eight years for the Central Intelligence Agency. A lifelong United Methodist, he has been active in United Methodist renewal since 1988. He is the author of Taking Back The United Methodist Church, Methodism and Politics in the 20th Century, and The Peace That Almost Was: The Forgotten Story of the 1861 Washington Peace Conference and the Final Attempt to Avert the Civil War. He attends a United Methodist church in Alexandria, Va.
More from IRD:
Asbury Theological Seminary Archived Articles
Comment by Skipper on July 7, 2026 at 12:52 pm
It’s sad the United Methodists adopted False Doctrine allowing same-sex marriage and everything that goes with it like Transgenderism. They can’t expect Asbury to put up with that; they had rather break off. J. Vernon McGee said, “False Doctrine leads to False Living.” The United Methodists are not concerned. They prefer their own way to God’s way. In breaking relations with Asbury, the United Methodists are losing one of their last remaining good influences.
Comment by Skipper on July 8, 2026 at 7:37 am
How many people have been deceived by United Methodism into thinking God approves of sexual perversion when the Bible is very clear?
Romans 1:24-28 ESV
24 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.
26 For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 28 And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done.”
God is waiting for them to turn back to Him. Mark 1:14 Jesus said, “Repent and believe the Good News!”
The Good News can change a person’s life. We are starting a new life and putting Jesus in charge. Our behavior is dramatically changed as God’s Holy Spirit reveals changes we need to make in our lifestyle. The Holy Spirit gives us power to break the bonds of self-destructive habits.
Comment by Debra K Hansen on July 8, 2026 at 9:02 am
I go to a United Methodist church, In a very rural area. I agree with Asbury Seminary and stand by their decision.
I do not claim to be Methodist. I like to consider myself non denominational. Man created denomination not God. But, if everyone leaves the United Methodist who will be their to stand up for what the bible really says about this issue. The church i go to is a large church in size, we had a full house every Sunday.
Now we are lucky to have 30 people because of the decision the United Methodist made so where did they go? To another church? Not going at all? I’d rather go there than nowhere. If anything this has got me studying the bible more. So i can stand for what is right in the eyes of GOD!! Not everyone left agress with me on this, but thats ok, I will stand my ground and pray to have continuous courage for what is right..
Comment by Qohelet on July 8, 2026 at 9:24 am
Since Donald Trump and Republicans took office, 600,000 people have died because of USAID cuts. This goes against the Bible.
Since Donald Trump and Republicans took office, 776,000 kids lost access to food stamps. This goes against the Bible.
Since Donald Trump and Republicans took office, they’ve started an unnecessary war that’s lead to thousands of deaths including most horrifically a school full of 115 children and 26 teachers. This goes against the Bible. They even decided to lecture the Pope on the concept of Just War when he pointed out this is wrong.
And the best the IRD can muster about any of this is…. a second week of articles mocking the UMC for dropping Asbury.
Why should anyone care about what you think about Jesus? Start following Him before you put the rest of us on blast.
Comment by Skipper on July 8, 2026 at 10:10 am
Debra,
All Methodists except the United Methodists stand up for what the Bible says. Many (7000) have joined the new Global Methodist denomination. It stands for what is right. You might suggest your church join another denomination, but it won’t be easy. The United Methodists will take your property if you leave. You might work out a deal to buy your own building since it won’t be doing them any good vacant. Global and Congregation Methodists will let you leave if you want to and keep your property. But you will likely want to stay. A good denomination brings real accountability for both members and ministers.
Comment by Gary Bebop on July 8, 2026 at 1:09 pm
The Asbury revival effect has been transformative (and is well documented). Critics of this are detached from reality, and their lugubrious ravings against Asbury (and Mark Tooley for covering the phenomenon) have become more and more outlandish and hysterical. Preposterous claims are the trade goods of a hack.
Comment by Wilson R. on July 8, 2026 at 3:41 pm
There is a whole other perspective that you won’t get from intellectually dishonest commentators like Mark Tooley. I’m not suggesting that the liberal stances of mainstream denominations on LGBTQ acceptance haven’t contributed to membership declines. (Of course, Tooley is not honest enough to note that these declines have been happening since the 1970s, long before LGBTQ people were out of the closet in most places, and long, long before Episcopalians and United Methodists contemplated allowing same-sex weddings and LGBTQ pastors.)
But the other perspective is reflected in a forthcoming book by an author named Sarah Stankorb called “Damned If She Does: Why Women Quit the Church and What It Means for the Future of Religion.” Here’s a summary blurb from the blog of Kristen du Mez (from the Christian Reformed tradition):
“Ordinarily, women are more religious than men. But these are no ordinary times….In the past decade, 16 million women have left the church. Younger women are disaffiliating from religion faster than men. For some women, leaving is like a dramatic divorce; for others, as one woman tells Stankorb, it’s more like women and the church “stopped calling each other.”
Exploring trends from the 1980s to today, Damned If She Does is an intimate account of women whose stories got missed during the Christian Right’s headline-grabbing rise to power. Their exodus is marked by harm, disillusionment, and drift: from pastors’ wives and a national Christian TV show host, to girls whose horrific abuse gives another face to the Catholic sex abuse crisis. Some couldn’t stand by a church that cast out their queer friends. Others were maligned for who they loved. Churches with strong opinions on sexual purity and abortion stood beside men with histories of assault. With horror, women who loved the church watched the rise of Christian nationalism and saw their faith bastardized.”
Sixteen million left in just one decade. Let that soak in. Not all of them, of course, quit mainstream Protestant churches. But even if only 8 million of them left mainstream churches (and let’s count Catholic as mainstream if not mainstream Protestant), that’s a sizeable loss. And their reasons for leaving were exactly the opposite of the reasons cited by the people Mark Tooley points to.
Why doesn’t he include this other group of 16 million in discussing the decline of mainstream denominations? Well, I think you already know why.
Comment by Gary Bebop on July 8, 2026 at 4:19 pm
To claim that Mark Tooley is an “intellectually dishonest commentator” (as “Wilson R.” has) is evidence of a disreputable mind at work. Readers should reject such nonsense folded into the dough of comments at this site. There is a lot of malice at work in such characterizations. We see them for what they are, haughty words, filthy slanders, debased coinage. Obsessive trolling of Mark Tooley is not a sign of intellectual credentials.
Comment by Wilson R. on July 8, 2026 at 4:31 pm
The evidence supports the claim, which is not made idly.
Comment by Gary Bebop on July 8, 2026 at 7:55 pm
“The evidence supports the claim, which is not made idly.” Look what happened in that sentence: the author shifts to the passive form to make himself (as the agent) disappear from the claim. He fears being held responsible for his own words as an author. This is hilarious!
Comment by Wilson R. on July 8, 2026 at 9:44 pm
Gary, your reading comprehension may need some work. Just to make it crystal clear for you, I stand by the claim about Mark Tooley. This is a pattern I have observed for nearly two years now. I supported my claim with argument and information. Tooley is free to come here and engage with the argument. Think he will?
Comment by Gary Bebop on July 9, 2026 at 1:03 pm
Mark Tooley continues to demolish the devil’s work in every essay. He’s scrupulously honest in his reporting, but because he smashes idols (mainline delusions) in resisting the devil, he draws sniping from the weeds. These are not sharpshooters. They are people who influence nobody but the tiniest cult of online trolls. They huff and puff and make a big, bad face. That’s it. A childish farce.
Comment by Thomas on July 11, 2026 at 2:14 pm
Agreed, Gary. UMC is dying, like other aposte denominations. Their past claim of allowing “dual integrities” is nothing but a farse. GMC, by the opposite, is growing, in the United States and all over the world.