By Rev. Luan-Vu “Lui” Tran, Ph.D.
I. Introduction
The U.S. Regional Conference is one of the most consequential structural developments in the history of The United Methodist Church since the 1968 union that created the denomination. It is the new constitutional and disciplinary body through which United Methodists in the United States may address matters that are particular to the mission, witness, governance, and ministry of the church in the United States, while remaining part of the one worldwide connection of The United Methodist Church.
Its creation is the centerpiece of the broader regionalization plan ratified by annual conferences worldwide after the 2020/2024 General Conference. Under this new structure, the United States and the former central conferences in Africa, Europe, and the Philippines become regional conferences with comparable authority to adapt portions of the Book of Discipline to their missional, cultural, and legal contexts. The purpose is not to create separate denominations, competing national churches, or independent ecclesial bodies. Rather, the purpose is to strengthen connectional unity by allowing regional contextualization within constitutional boundaries.
The U.S. Regional Conference therefore represents a new balance between unity and contextuality. It gives the United States a body comparable to those long available outside the United States, while preserving the General Conference as the denomination’s highest legislative body for matters distinctively connectional. Theologically, it reflects a connectionalvision of a church that is worldwide but not culturally uniform. Legally, it creates a regional lawmaking body whose authority is real but limited, constitutional but not supreme, and contextual but not independent.
II. Constitutional Foundation
The constitutional foundation for the U.S. Regional Conference begins with the amended conference structure of The United Methodist Church. The Constitution now provides that there shall be regional conferences for the work of the worldwide Church, and, if necessary, provisional regional conferences, with powers, duties, and privileges set forth in the Constitution. It also provides that no regional or jurisdictional conference may be based on any ground other than geographical division. Constitution, ¶ 10.
The United States Regional Conference is specifically identified in the regional conference provisions. The amended Constitution provides that there shall be a regional conference for the work of the Church in the United States of America that includes all of the areas that comprise the jurisdictional conferences identified in the constitutional boundary provisions. Constitution, ¶ 30.1(a). This means that the U.S. Regional Conference is not a voluntary association, advisory body, or merely programmatic committee. It is a constitutional conference of the Church.
The amended Constitution also establishes a general principle of conference autonomy. The General Conference, regional conferences, jurisdictional conferences, and annual conferences have autonomy of action within the limits fixed by the Constitution. Legislation enacted within the respective powers of a conference is not invalid merely because it overlaps with the powers of another conference, unless its purpose and substance are beyond the authority of the enacting body. Constitution, ¶ 14. This provision is important because regionalization necessarily creates overlapping areas of lawmaking. The constitutional question is not simply whether an issue touches more than one level of church life, but whether the enacting body has authority over the purpose and substance of the legislation.
The U.S. Regional Conference must therefore be understood as part of a layered constitutional system. General Conference retains full legislative power over matters distinctively connectional, subject to the limits fixed by the Constitution. Regional conferences exercise powers given by the Constitution and by General Conference in contextual matters. Jurisdictional conferences continue to function within the United States unless and until the Constitution is further amended. Annual conferences remain the fundamental bodies of the Church. Constitution, ¶¶ 12, 17, 33.
III. Why the U.S. Regional Conference Was Created
For many decades, central conferences outside the United States had authority to adapt parts of the Discipline to their own legal and missional circumstances. The United States, however, had no comparable regional body. As a result, many issues that were essentially U.S.-specific had to be addressed by the General Conference, a worldwide body. This contributed to a General Conference agenda heavily shaped by U.S. matters, even though The United Methodist Church had become increasingly global in membership, mission, and leadership.
Regionalization responds to that imbalance. It seeks to move the denomination from a U.S.-centered legislative structure toward a more equitable worldwide connection. The U.S. Regional Conference allows U.S. United Methodists to deliberate on U.S.-specific matters without requiring delegates from Africa, Europe, and the Philippines to spend General Conference time on issues that do not directly affect their regions. Conversely, it affirms that regions outside the United States should not have to conform automatically to U.S. assumptions, practices, legal frameworks, or cultural debates.
This does not weaken connectionalism. Properly understood, it strengthens connectionalism by distinguishing between what must be held in common and what may be adapted regionally. The one Church remains united by doctrine, mission, Constitution, episcopacy, general agencies, judicial oversight, and connectional covenant. But within that unity, regional conferences may make contextual decisions where the Constitution and General Conference allow adaptation.
IV. Relationship to the General Conference
The U.S. Regional Conference does not replace the General Conference. The General Conference remains the only body with full legislative power over all matters distinctively connectional, subject to the limits fixed by the Constitution. Constitution, ¶ 17. It retains authority to define and fix the powers and duties of conferences; define and fix the powers and duties of clergy and lay ministries; provide for the episcopacy; provide the judicial system; initiate and direct connectional enterprises; establish general boards and agencies; determine and provide for raising and distributing funds necessary to carry on the work of the Church; and enact other necessary legislation within constitutional limits. Constitution, ¶ 17.1-.17.
General Conference also retains authority to determine what is non-adaptable by regional conferences. The amended Constitution gives General Conference authority to legislate what is non-adaptable for regional conferences by a 60 percent majority vote, while respecting the constitutional powers given to regional conferences. Constitution, ¶ 17.17.
This means the U.S. Regional Conference may not treat itself as a national General Conference. It may not amend the Constitution. It may not alter doctrinal standards. It may not abolish episcopacy or undermine the plan of itinerant general superintendency. It may not override Judicial Council decisions. It may not legislate in areas that the Constitution or General Conference has reserved to the whole Church.
Judicial Council Decision 96 remains foundational in this respect. The Judicial Council declared that the Discipline is the official and authoritative book of law governing the life and work of the Church. JCD 96. Therefore, the U.S. Regional Conference exercises legal authority only within the Discipline and Constitution, not above them.
V. Relationship to Jurisdictional Conferences
The U.S. Regional Conference is not the same as the five jurisdictional conferences. The jurisdictional conferencescontinue to exist unless and until the Constitution is amended to change or eliminate them. The current jurisdictional conferences are the Northeastern, Southeastern, North Central, South Central, and Western Jurisdictions. Constitution, ¶ 39.
The jurisdictional conferences historically have had authority to elect bishops, promote the work of the Church within their boundaries, establish jurisdictional boards, determine annual conference boundaries subject to constitutional limits, make rules and regulations for the administration of work within the jurisdiction, and appoint committees on appeals. Constitution, ¶ 28. Under regionalization, jurisdictional conferences continue especially in relation to the election and assignment of bishops in the United States, unless a future constitutional amendment changes that structure.
Judicial Council Decision 128 remains historically significant because it recognized that jurisdictional conferences were constitutionally limited to the United States. JCD 128. Regionalization changes the larger worldwide framework by creating regional conferences, including one for the United States, but it does not by itself erase the existing jurisdictional system. It creates a U.S. Regional Conference above or alongside the jurisdictional structure for regional legislative purposes, while leaving the jurisdictional system in place for those functions still assigned to it.
This creates a complex but workable structure. The U.S. Regional Conference encompasses all five U.S. jurisdictions.Jurisdictional conferences remain geographical bodies within the U.S. region. The U.S. Regional Conference may address U.S.-wide adaptable matters, while jurisdictions continue to exercise their own constitutional and disciplinary responsibilities.
One of the important questions for the future is whether the United States should continue to have jurisdictions. Regionalization opens the door for further study of that question, but eliminating or fundamentally restructuring jurisdictions would require additional constitutional change.
VI. Composition and Delegates
The delegates to the U.S. Regional Conference are tied to the delegate system of the General Conference and jurisdictional conferences. The Constitution provides for clergy and lay representation and uses a two-factor basis for representation: the number of clergy members and the number of professing members in the annual conference or missionary conference. Constitution, ¶ 17.
In a regional conference with jurisdictions, the regional conference fixes the ratio of representation in its jurisdictional conferences from the annual conferences, missionary conferences, and provisional annual conferences on the same two-factor basis, and each annual conference, missionary conference, or provisional annual conference is entitled to at least one clergy and one lay delegate in the jurisdictional conference. The amended Constitution also provides that all general and regional conference delegates will be members of their respective jurisdictional conferences. Constitution, ¶ 17.
UM News has reported that the actual voters at the U.S. Regional Conference will be the lay and clergy delegates elected by U.S. annual conferences to serve at General Conference and the jurisdictional conferences. That structure reflects both continuity and change: continuity because the same representative system of annual conference election is preserved; change because those delegates will now have a U.S. regional legislative forum distinct from the worldwide General Conference.
VII. Powers of the U.S. Regional Conference
The U.S. Regional Conference has authority to legislate and make rules and regulations for the administration of the work within its boundaries, including changes and adaptations of the General Discipline as conditions in the region may require, subject to the Constitution and to powers vested in the General Conference. Constitution, ¶ 31.5.
The regional conference powers include authority to establish and publish a regional Discipline with legislation and provisions pertaining to the regional, annual, district, and charge conferences within its boundaries. It may address qualifications and educational requirements of clergy and specialized lay ministries, forms of organization according to the laws of the country or countries, and standards of character and other qualifications for admission of lay members. Constitution, ¶ 31.5(a)-(c).
The regional conference may also establish and publish a regional hymnal and ritual of the Church, including rites such as marriage and burial, subject to the first and second Restrictive Rules. Constitution, ¶ 31.5(d). It may appoint a judicial court to determine legal questions arising from rules, regulations, and adapted or new regional disciplinary provisions enacted by the regional conference. Constitution, ¶ 31.6. It may also adopt rules of procedure governing the investigation and trial of clergy, bishops, and lay members, while preserving constitutional guarantees such as the right of clergy to trial by a clergy committee and lay members to trial by a duly constituted committee of lay members. Constitution, ¶ 31.7.
These powers are significant. In practical terms, the U.S. Regional Conference may address U.S.-specific questions regarding church organization, clergy credentialing standards, regional worship resources, marriage and burial rites, chargeable offenses and penalties where adaptable, and the regional administration of disciplinary provisions. However, these powers are not unlimited. They are bounded by the Constitution, the Restrictive Rules, the General Conference’s non-adaptable legislation, and the continuing authority of the Judicial Council.
VIII. What the U.S. Regional Conference Cannot Change
The U.S. Regional Conference cannot alter the core identity of The United Methodist Church. Paragraph 101 of the Discipline identifies the General Book of Discipline as an expression of the denomination’s unity in doctrine, discipline, and mission through the connectional covenant. It allows central, jurisdictional, or regional conferences to make changes and adaptations to more fruitfully accomplish the mission in various contexts, but it also identifies non-adaptable portions. Discipline, ¶ 101.
The non-adaptable portions include the Constitution, the General Book of Discipline paragraph itself, the Doctrinal Standards and Our Theological Task, The Ministry of All Christians, and the Social Principles. Discipline, ¶ 101. In addition, General Conference may designate other matters as non-adaptable under its constitutional authority. Constitution, ¶ 17.17.
The U.S. Regional Conference therefore cannot change the Articles of Religion, the Confession of Faith, the General Rules, the Constitution, or those aspects of the Church’s order that General Conference has properly reserved to the whole denomination. It cannot create a separate doctrine for the United States. It cannot create a separate episcopacy. It cannot convert the U.S. region into an autonomous Methodist church. It cannot act contrary to Judicial Council decisions. It cannot legislate in a manner that destroys the unity of the Church or violates the Restrictive Rules.
The most important principle is that regional adaptation is not regional sovereignty. The U.S. Regional Conferencereceives real lawmaking authority, but it remains a conference within The United Methodist Church.
IX. The Temporary United States Regional Committee
The printed 2020/2024 Discipline contains ¶ 507, establishing a United States Regional Committee. This committee is temporary and transitional. It is composed of all General Conference delegates representing annual conferences in the United States and has legislative function. It also includes one lay and one clergy General Conference delegate from each central conference, or regional conference outside the United States after ratification, with voice and vote. Discipline, ¶ 507.1.
The United States Regional Committee is assigned petitions pertaining to the operation, governance, witness, and ministry of The United Methodist Church in the United States that are adaptable by regional or central conferences according to the adaptation provisions and ¶ 101. Discipline, ¶ 507.1. Its provisions remain in effect only until a United States Regional Conference has been created and is functional, at which time the committee and its provisions expire. Discipline, ¶ 507.2.
This distinction is crucial. The United States Regional Committee is not the same as the U.S. Regional Conference. The committee is a transitional mechanism connected to General Conference legislative processing. The U.S. Regional Conference is the permanent regional body created under the amended Constitution and enabling legislation.
X. The Interim Committee on Organization
Following ratification of regionalization, the Council of Bishops named a 25-member Interim Committee on Organization to help launch the first U.S. Regional Conference. According to UM News and the Council of Bishops, the committee includes leaders from all five U.S. jurisdictions and is advised by representatives from regional conferences in Africa, Europe, and the Philippines. Bishop Cynthia Moore-Koikoi serves as convener.
The committee’s task is organizational, not legislative. It is charged with selecting the time and place for the first gathering of the U.S. Regional Conference, collaborating with the Secretary and Business Manager of the General Conference, recommending committees and officers needed for the effective functioning of the new regional body, and concluding its work at the close of the first gathering unless the U.S. Regional Conference authorizes it to continue for a defined purpose.
This interim committee is therefore a launch structure. It does not possess the legislative authority of the U.S. Regional Conference. Its importance lies in setting the tone, structure, procedure, and initial organizational framework for a body that has never before existed in The United Methodist Church.
XI. Judicial Council Constraints and the Episcopacy
The U.S. Regional Conference must operate within the Constitution’s doctrine of unified superintendency and episcopacy. The Constitution provides that a unified superintendency and episcopacy is created and established by those who are and shall be bishops of The United Methodist Church. Constitution, ¶ 46. Bishops are not regional officers in a purely diocesan sense. They are bishops of the whole Church, even though they are elected and assigned through particular constitutional structures.
Judicial Council Decision 1208 is especially important. In that decision, the Judicial Council held unconstitutional legislation that would have created a jurisdictional apportionment for the Episcopal Fund and shifted episcopal funding responsibility to jurisdictions. The Council reasoned that such a funding mechanism invaded and undermined the unified nature of the episcopacy. JCD 1208.
Judicial Council Decision 1523 reaffirmed and extended that principle in the post-2024 context. The Judicial Council held unconstitutional ¶¶ 404.2(d) and (e), which conditioned additional episcopal leadership on jurisdictional financial capacity and surety. The Council held that the Constitution does not permit access to episcopal leadership to be conditioned on a jurisdiction’s ability to pre-fund, guarantee, or demonstrate financial capacity. JCD 1523. It emphasized that the constitutional defect was not merely fiscal but structural: such provisions undermined the unified superintendency and episcopacy required by the Constitution and reallocated authority reserved to the General Conference.
Decision 1523 also drew on the principle of Decision 1499, where the Judicial Council rejected legislation that would have created two classes of bishops. JCD 1499. Together, Decisions 1208, 1499, and 1523 make clear that regionalizationdoes not authorize the U.S. region or its jurisdictions to fragment the episcopacy, create financial gatekeeping for episcopal leadership, or establish unequal categories of bishops.
For the U.S. Regional Conference, this means that any legislation touching episcopal leadership must be carefully tested against the Constitution. The U.S. Regional Conference may exist within a region that has jurisdictions, but it may not use regional authority to undermine the unity of the episcopacy or the General Conference’s constitutional authority over episcopal funding and connectional funds.
XII. Judicial Review
The Judicial Council remains the supreme judicial authority of The United Methodist Church. Under the amended Constitution, the Judicial Council has authority to determine the constitutionality of acts of the General Conference and acts of regional, jurisdictional, or central conferences upon proper appeal. It also has authority to determine the legality of actions by general, regional, jurisdictional, or central conference boards or bodies under the procedures established in the Constitution and Discipline. Constitution, ¶ 56.
This is another important safeguard. The U.S. Regional Conference may adopt legislation, but its legislation is not immune from review. If it exceeds its constitutional authority, violates non-adaptable provisions, conflicts with General Conference authority, or undermines connectional structures, its actions may be reviewed by the Judicial Council.
This judicial review function helps preserve unity in a regionalized church. Regionalization creates differentiated lawmaking; the Judicial Council ensures that differentiation remains constitutional.
XIII. Practical Significance
The U.S. Regional Conference will likely reshape how U.S. United Methodists deliberate and legislate. Many matters that formerly consumed General Conference time may be routed to a U.S. regional body. This could allow General Conference to focus more clearly on doctrine, mission, global connectional matters, general agencies, episcopal support, constitutional amendments, and churchwide legislation.
For U.S. annual conferences, clergy, laity, and local churches, the practical effects may be substantial. The U.S. Regional Conference may eventually shape U.S. provisions on clergy qualifications, regional organization, chargeable offenses and penalties where adaptable, marriage and burial rites, regional judicial structures, and other matters of governance and ministry that are not reserved to the whole Church.
At the same time, the U.S. Regional Conference will need to proceed carefully. Because it is new, many procedural questions must be resolved: how petitions will be submitted and assigned; how committees will be structured; how the regional Discipline will be drafted and harmonized with the General Discipline; how the U.S. regional court will be organized; how legislation will take effect; and how the U.S. Regional Conference will coordinate with the General Conference, jurisdictional conferences, annual conferences, and general agencies.
The first session will be more than an ordinary legislative gathering. It will be constitution-making in a practical sense, though not in the formal sense of amending the Constitution. The body will need to establish habits, procedures, norms, and patterns of holy conferencing that will shape U.S. regional governance for decades.
XIV. Key Issues for the First U.S. Regional Conference
Several issues are likely to be central at the first gathering.
First, the U.S. Regional Conference will need rules of order and procedures that fit its constitutional role. It cannot simply copy General Conference procedures without considering its own scope, size, agenda, and relation to jurisdictional conferences.
Second, it will need to determine committee structures and officers. These structures should reflect the diversity of the U.S. church, the continuing role of jurisdictions, and the need for efficient legislative processing.
Third, it will need to begin the work of a U.S. regional Discipline. This will require careful separation of adaptable and non-adaptable provisions. The work must avoid accidental conflicts with the Constitution, the General Discipline, and Judicial Council decisions.
Fourth, it must clarify the relationship between the U.S. Regional Conference and the temporary United States Regional Committee under ¶ 507. The temporary committee expires when the U.S. Regional Conference is created and functional, but the transition from one structure to the other must be orderly.
Fifth, it must preserve connectional unity. Because regionalization emerged partly from a desire to de-center U.S. dominance, the U.S. Regional Conference should not become a new center of ecclesial self-absorption. Its role is to handle U.S. matters faithfully so that the whole Church can flourish.
XV. Theological Assessment
The U.S. Regional Conference is not merely an administrative reform. It expresses a theological claim about unity, diversity, and catholicity. The Church is one body in Christ, but the body has many members. A worldwide church cannot be governed faithfully by assuming that one region’s legal conditions, cultural debates, or institutional habits should define the whole.
Regionalization reflects a Wesleyan and connectional instinct: discipline matters, but discipline exists for mission. Law serves grace when it orders the Church for faithful witness. The U.S. Regional Conference gives the United States a structure to order its own contextual matters while remaining accountable to the whole connection.
This structure will succeed only if it is practiced with humility. The United States must learn to be one region among others, not the default center of United Methodism. Likewise, all regions must learn to trust one another with contextual authority while remaining bound together by doctrine, mission, episcopacy, and covenant.
XVI. Conclusion
The U.S. Regional Conference is a historic development in United Methodist constitutional law. It creates a new regional body for the United States with authority to adapt portions of the Book of Discipline for U.S. mission and ministry. It also places the United States on more equal footing with other regions of the worldwide Church.
Yet, its authority is carefully bounded. It remains subject to the Constitution, the Restrictive Rules, the General Conference’s authority over connectional matters, the non-adaptable provisions of ¶ 101, and the continuing authority of the Judicial Council. Jurisdictional conferences continue to exist unless future constitutional amendments provide otherwise. The episcopacy remains unified. The Discipline remains the Church’s official book of law.
The promise of the U.S. Regional Conference is that it can make The United Methodist Church less U.S.-centered and more genuinely worldwide, while giving U.S. United Methodists a faithful place to address U.S.-specific matters. Its success will depend not only on legal precision, but also on humility, restraint, mutual trust, and a renewed commitment to the connectional covenant of The United Methodist Church.