![\"Screenshot](\"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/02\/Screenshot_20250208-202908.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
But<\/i>.<\/p>\n
It’s not Bethlehem United Methodist Church any longer. It hasn’t been, for almost two years. Bethlehem UMC is not Bethlehem Life Church, and they were one of the many<\/i> local UMC congregations that voted to leave the denomination<\/a>. I had something like nine UMC churches within five miles of my apartment. Today there are two. The others left. Some joined the schismatic Global Methodist Church. Others, like Dallastown’s Bethlehem or the two I drive past going to Lancaster, have gone the non-denominational route.<\/p>\n I’m not religious, but I grew up Methodist, and a bunch of bad faith actors tearing the denomination apart made me angry. Still makes me irritated.<\/p>\n It’s a pretty church. I’ve walked past it many times. I swear the stained glass is the same that Asbury in Harrisonburg, where I was confirmed almost forty years ago, has. I’ve had Christmas dinner there. I’ve taken many photographs of it. I might even have posted some photos of it here, but I can’t find any such posts off-hand. Were it full-time, and were the money a little better, I might have considered it.<\/p>\n But, under the present circumstances….<\/p>\n No, Indeed, not for ten thousand pennies an hour would I do this. It is folly<\/i>.<\/p>\n Bad match. Definitely<\/i> a bad match.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Oh, Indeed. You amuse me. You amuse me! I am exploring the job market for reasons outlined earlier, and yesterday evening I received a customized job alert for a local job. Very local. Like, a mile and a half from where I live. I could walk there. But. It’s not Bethlehem United Methodist Church anyContinue reading “A Bad Match”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[5211,4730],"class_list":["post-34357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life","tag-indeed","tag-methodism","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=34357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34357\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=34357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=34357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.allyngibson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=34357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}