From Talking Points Memo, where Josh Marshall's dug up a screed from Tea Party leader Judson Phillips, who, like me, is a former United Methodist.
Unlike Phillips, I wish the United Methodist Church well, though I now worship with Quakers. In light of United Methodist advocacy for the DREAM Act, Mr. Phillips dreams of No More Methodist Church.
First, allow me to let Mr. Phillips know that there are a variety of Methodist churches; he would probably feel right at home in the Free Methodist Church of North America, which originally split from the Methodist Episcopal Church because it felt the MEC wasn't firm enough in its stand against slavery. It went on to become a very conservative branch of Methodism (a historical fact that should give people here pause in the midst of the piefights).
Phillips is annoyed with the United Methodist Church, which is the result of a 1968 merger of the Evangelical United Brethren Church and the Methodist Church. (The EUBC essentially lost its identity in the merger, and not saying "United Methodist" is a slight against the EUBC branch.)
The United Methodist Church is a big tent church, and consistent with much mainstream Protestantism, the leadership tends to be more progressive than the base. Still, Phillips complains that "Today, the Methodist Church is little more than the 'religious' arm of socialism." Not only is this claim ridiculous - I knew a few socialists among United Methodists, but we were a tiny minority - but it fails to recognize the historic commitment to progressive ideals among Methodists, seen in the 1908 platform of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Still, the big tent nature of United Methodism makes room for conservative voices, most prominently active in the Good News caucus. The United Methodist Church is home to the entire spectrum of political ideology.
Still, because of the ongoing invisibility of the religious Left, and continuous complaints that religious liberals don't do anything or raise their voices, I thought it was noteworthy that United Methodist advocacy for the DREAM Act was clear enough to raise a Tea Party call for the elimination of the entire denomination. If the official position of the denomination as a whole was enough to make Phillips call for its demise, I hate to think of what his reaction to the Methodist Federation for Social Action would be. As the progressive caucus in the United Methodist Church, its program priorities are Peace, People's Rights, Poverty, Progressive Initiatives, and Justice Within the UMC.