Who are United Methodists?
United Methodists in America are more than 8,500,000 members strong, making it the second largest Protestant denomination in the country and one of the largest and fastest growing Protestant bodies in the world. In the U.S. the denomination is made up of 36,500 local churches, operates 106 universities and colleges, 65 hospitals, 225 retirement homes, and the largest Protestant publishing house (Cokesbury). The woman’s organization, the United Methodist Women, is also the largest woman’s organization in the world. United Methodism is organized into “conferences”, starting at the top with the General Conference, a democratic body whose members gather every four years to superintend the general operation of the church, make its laws, and set the operating budget for the denominations’s national and international ministeries. Next smaller in size are the Jurisdictional Conferences whose members meet every two years to superintend regional operations and elect persons to the office of Bish
