Our BELIEFS

The doctrinal standards of the MCCA are enshrined in our Constitution and Discipline. It states that:

(1) The doctrinal standards of the Church are:

The Methodist Church claims and cherishes its place in the Holy Catholic Church which is the Body of Christ. It rejoices in the inheritance of the Apostolic Faith and loyally accepts the fundamental principles of the historic creeds and of the Protestant Reformation. It ever remembers that in the Providence of God Methodism was raised up to spread Scriptural Holiness through the land by the proclamation of the Evangelical Faith and declares its unfaltering resolve to be true to its Divinely appointed mission.

The Doctrines of the Evangelical faith that Methodism has held from the beginning and still holds are based upon the Divine revelation recorded in the Holy Scriptures. The Methodist Church acknowledges this revelation as the supreme rule of faith and practice. These Evangelical Doctrines to which the Preachers of the Methodist Church both Ministers and Lay persons are pledged are contained in Wesley's Notes on the New Testament and the first four volumes of the sermons.

The Notes on the New Testament and the Forty-four Sermons are not intended to impose a system of formal or speculative theology on Methodist Preachers, but to set up standards of preaching and belief which should secure loyalty to the fundamental truths of the Gospel of Redemption and ensure the continued witness of the Church to the realities of the Christian experience of salvation.

Christ's Ministers in the Church are stewards in the household of God and Shepherds of His flock. Some are called and ordained to this sole occupation and have a principal and directing part in these duties but they hold no priesthood differing in kind from that which is common to the Lord's people and they have no exclusive title to the preaching of the gospel or the care of souls. These ministries are shared with them by others to whom also the Spirit divides His gifts severally as He wills.

It is the universal conviction of the Methodist people that the office of the Christian Ministry depends upon the call of God who bestows the gifts of the Spirit, the grace and the fruit which indicate those whom He has chosen.

Those whom the Methodist Church recognises as called by God and therefore receives into its Ministry shall be ordained by the imposition of hands as expressive of the Church’s recognition of the Minister's personal call.

The Methodist Church holds the doctrine of the priesthood of all believers and consequently believes that no priesthood exists which belongs exclusively to a particular order or class of persons but in the exercise of its corporate life and worship special qualifications for the discharge of special duties are required and thus the principle of representative selection is recognised.

The Preachers, itinerant and lay, are examined, tested and approved before they are authorised to minister in holy things. For the sake of Church Order and not because of any priestly virtue inherent in the office, the Ministers of the Methodist Church are set apart by ordination to the Ministry of the Word and Sacraments.

The Methodist Church recognises two sacraments, namely Baptism and the Lord's Supper, as of Divine Appointment and of perpetual obligation of which it is the privilege and duty of members of the Methodist Church to avail themselves.

(2) The Doctrinal Standards shall be unalterable, whether by the Connexional Conference or otherwise.

(3) The Connexional Conference shall be the final authority within the Church on all questions concerning the interpretation of the Doctrinal Standards.

(4) The foregoing provisions of this clause shall not limit or otherwise affect the powers of the Church to unite with other churches in accordance with the provisions of this Deed notwithstanding that the doctrinal standards of any united church formed under such powers may differ from the Doctrinal Standards.

Statements on various aspects of our faith and Christian life are published from time-to-time – please check the RESOURCES section.