Methodist panel to hear appeal over gay wedding

A Methodist pastor who became a gay rights activist after he was disciplined for officiating at his son’s wedding to another man will soon find out whether he can remain an ordained minister in the nation’s second-largest Protestant denomination.

 

The Rev. Frank Schaefer was suspended and then defrocked last year following a church trial in southeastern Pennsylvania when he would not promise to uphold the Methodist law book, which bans clergy from performing same-sex marriages.

 

An appeals panel restored Schaefer’s pastoral credentials in June, and that decision was appealed to the United Methodist Church’s highest judicial body. The Judicial Council was to hear arguments Wednesday during a meeting in Memphis. The council is not expected to announce a decision until several days after its meeting concludes Saturday. Its decisions are final.

 

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