Local Preachers Worldwide
The institution of local preachers spread from the original Wesleyan Methodist church to the other Methodist denominations that developed in Britain; and from Britain to Methodist churches in other countries, particularly those that were founded or supported by the UK Methodist church, such as the churches in India, Australia, New Zealand, the Caribbean, Fiji, and many countries in Africa. The title of "local preacher" was used historically in several Methodist denominations in North America, and local preachers there had the right to marry and bury people (though not to administer Communion) as well as to lead worship. But the role has more or less vanished from America to-day. Although the modern US United Methodist Church recognises an order of "lay speakers", they do not have the authority or the responsibility for leading worship in the same way as a local preacher in Britain. Within the last decade, the United Methodist Church began an order called "local pastors," which are appointed by a bishop to serve in one local charge and resemble the local preacher model.
Read more about this topic: Methodist Local Preacher
Famous quotes containing the words local and/or preachers:
“The local is a shabby thing. There’s nothing worse than bringing us back down to our own little corner, our own territory, the radiant promiscuity of the face to face. A culture which has taken the risk of the universal, must perish by the universal.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)
“Taking men into the union is just the kindergarten of their education and every force is against their further education. Men who live up those lonely creeks have only the mine owners’ Y.M.C.As, the mine owners’ preachers and teachers, the mine owners’ doctors and newspapers to look to for their ideas. So they don’t get many.”
—Mother Jones (1830–1930)