Links
- The United Methodist Church
- Centrální konference Evangelické církve metodistické ve střední a jižní Evropě
- Evanjelická cirkev metodistická na Slovensku – zbory
- The Methodist Church in Britain
- Wesleyan Covenant
- Česká biblická společnost – Dům Bible
- Ekumenická rada církví v České republice
Ecumenical cooperation
Christian unity is based on theological recognition, that we are through our faith the members of one Christ’s body. The Christian unity is not just another option, but it is a gift, which is to take and live. As United Methodists we apply theological, biblical and practical mission to seek the unity of all Christians in doing so in local, national and global levels. In various ways we try (by mutual acknowledge of churches, members and ministrants) to find the possibility for common celebration of Eucharist with all members of God’s people. Although we know, that the loyalty to the our own church is always subordinated to life in the church of Jesus Christ, we heartily rejoice in the rich experience of responsible superiors of our United Methodist Church, as we meet it in bilateral and multilateral conversations, but also in other forms of ecumenical contact, which helps to amend the relations between churches and nations. We can see how the Holy Spirit acts, that the unity between the Christians is more visible.
We as humans, who are on this planet dependent on each other, see the necessity to reflect our own heritage in a critical way and to value other traditions conscientiously. By these meetings it is not our goal to reduce doctrinal differences to the smallest religious denominator, but to raise all these relations to the highest possible level of human community and understanding. With God’s mercy we seek together the salvation, wellbeing and peace for all humans. In respectful conversations and practical cooperation we confess our faith in Jesus Christ and we try to show clearly, that Jesus is the life and hope for the world.
The United Methodist Church in Czech Republic is
- founding member of Ecumenical Church Council in Czech Republic
- member of the Community of Protestant Churches in Czech Republic
- member of the Czech Biblical Association
- member of the Evangelical Alliance
- member of the Conference of European Churches
- participant in ecumenical worships and other common projects
What we believe
United Methodists share a common heritage with Christians of every age and nation. This heritage is grounded in the apostolic witness to Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord, which is the source and measure of all valid Christian teaching. We are based on the canon of Christian scripture and we adopt ecumenical creeds such as the formulations of Nicaea and Chalcedon. These statements of faith, along with the Apostles’ Creed, contain the most prominent features of our ecumenical heritage. Many distinctively Protestant teachings were transmitted into United Methodist understanding through doctrinal formulations such as Articles of religion of the church of England and the Heidelberg Catechism of the Reformed tradition.
With Christians of other communions we confess belief in the triune God – father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We hold in common with all Christians a faith in the mystery of salvation in and through Jesus Christ. We share the Christian belief that God’s redemptive love is realized in human life by the activity of the Holy Spirit, both in personal experience and in the community of believers. This community is the church, which the Spirit has brought into existence for the healing of the nations. With other Christians we recognize that the reign of God is both present and future reality. The church is called to be that place where the first signs of the reign of God are identified and acknowledged in the world.
We share with many Christian communions recognition of the authority of scripture in matters of faith, the confession that our justification as sinners is by grace through faith, and sober realization that the church is in need of continual reformation and renewal. We affirm the general ministry of all baptized Christians who share responsibility for building up the church and reaching out in mission and service to the world.
With other Christians, we declare the essential oneness of the church in Christ Jesus. This rich heritage of shared Christian belief finds its expression in our hymnody and liturgies. Our unity is affirmed in the historic creeds as we confess one holy, catholic, and apostolic church. it is also experienced in joint ventures of ministry and in various forms of ecumenical cooperation.
Nourished by common roots of this shared Christian heritage, the branches of Christ’s church have developed diverse traditions that enlarge our store of shared understandings. Our avowed ecumenical commitment as United Methodists is to gather our own doctrinal emphases into the larger Christian unity, there to be made more meaningful in a richer whole. If we are to offer our best gifts to the common Christian treasury, we must make a deliberate effort as a Church to strive for critical self-understanding. It is as Christians involved in ecumenical partnership that we embrace and examine our distinctive heritage.
Our mission
The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ. Local Churches provide the most significant area through which disciple-making occurs.
The mission is our grace-filled response to the Reign of God in the world. God’s grace is active everywhere, at all times, carrying out this purpose as revealed in the Bible. It is expressed in God’s covenant with Abraham and Sarah, in the Exodus of Israel from Egypt, and in the ministry of the prophets. It is fully embodied in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is experienced in the ongoing creation of a new God’s people by the Holy Spirit.
Whenever United Methodism has had a clear sense of mission, God has used our Church to save persons, heal relationships, transform social structures and spread scriptural holiness, thereby changing the world. In order to be truly alive, we embrace Jesus’ mandate to love God and neighbors and to make disciples of all peoples.
The Process for Carrying Out Our Mission
We make disciples as we
- proclaim the gospel, seek, welcome and gather persons into the body of Christ;
- lead persons to commit their lives to God through baptism and profession of faith in Jesus Christ;
- nurture persons in Christian living through worship, the sacraments, spiritual disciplines, and other means of grace;
- send persons into the world to live lovingly and justly as servants of Christ by healing the sick, feeding the hungry, caring for the stranger, freeing the oppressed, and working to develop social structures that are consistent with the gospel.