Epworth United Methodist hosts historic vow renewal, wedding

Dottie Outland and Diane Meade have been a couple for almost 40 years, but they had never gotten married.

That changed Sept. 20. It was a historic night for them and for Epworth United Methodist Church in Rehoboth Beach.

Epworth became the first United Methodist Church in its regional conference – Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore – to perform a same-gender wedding.

They also held a vow renewal for 15 LGBTQ+ couples who had never been able to celebrate in a church before.

The ceremonies were allowed to happen after the United Methodist Church approved a landmark change to its rule book, called the “Book of Discipline,” at its general conference in Charlotte, N.C., earlier this year.

“The conference did away with prohibitions against clergy marrying, against weddings taking place in sanctuaries and the ordination of LGBTQ people,” said the Rev. Dr. Vicki Gordy-Stith, Epworth lead pastor.

She said it was the first wedding she has officiated in her four years at Epworth. Her husband, the Rev. Dr. Bo Gordy-Stith, also officiated. 

The pastor said the UMC general conference was dominated by younger, progressive church members and had a much different spirit than in the past.

“There was no sense of fear, no gauntlet of people you had to walk through yelling that homosexuality is a sin. There was none of that,” she said.

Vicki Gordy-Stith said the change does not force any church to perform weddings or to accept LGBTQ+ clergy.

She said she believes the United Methodist Church is in the middle of the pack of denominations when it comes to accepting the LQBTQ+ community.

Vicki Gordy-Stith said the general conference also changed the UMC’s definition of marriage to “either one man and one woman or between two consenting adults.”

She said the change allows the U.S.-based United Methodist Churches to operate under its laws, while the UMC in countries that might not embrace LGBTQ+ people can honor their cultures.

The pastor said once the UMC made the changes, it was a no-brainer for Epworth to get on board, given its history of accepting the LGBTQ+ community.

CAMP Rehoboth founders Murray Archibald and Steve Elkins were members of the congregation.

In the early 2000s, the church was the first in Delaware and Maryland’s Eastern Shore to join the UMC’s Reconciling Ministries Network, which declared that the church was open to all people, regardless of sexual orientation.

“I still have people who come to church for the first time who have been traumatized by church. They’ve been told all their lives that they are an abomination,” Vicki Gordy-Stith said. “This became a part of who we are. All means all.”

She said she hopes the next UMC general conference, to be held in 2028, will approve regionalization, which would allow the church’s five regions to make their own choices.

“The U.S. has had a majority that supported same-sex marriage for a long time, so it’s mostly been other people for whom that didn’t make sense in their context. If regionalization passes, the U.S. will be able to minister its own context, and I don’t think there will ever be a chance it will go backwards,” she said.

Vicki Gordy-Stith said she is scheduled to perform her next same-gender wedding at Epworth in November.