June 27, 2024
By Rev. Dr. Scott Field
AfricaNOW: The Missional Focus 
AfricaNOW is a short-term, laser-focused initiative of the Wesleyan Covenant Association to provide financial support to African Methodists for information development and distribution, advocacy, and networking opportunities as momentum builds there for separation from the UMC. African Methodists are rising up in response to recent decisions by the United Methodist Church which refute biblical standards by affirming same-sex weddings, as well as LGBTQIA+ pastors and bishops.
Help us partner with them to release their capacity to contend for the Lord, defend the faith, and chart their course for the future.
AfricaNOW: A Timely Response to Transitions Already Underway
For several years the WCA has had an African VP of strategy living and working in Africa. He has had remarkable success in building a network of knowledgeable and effective African leaders. The fruit of this effort is clearly visible in the building wave of African UMC Annual Conferences making the move now toward denominational disaffiliation from the UMC.
The decisions by the UMC General Conference in Charlotte, NC (April-May 2024) have now gotten the attention of United Methodist laity across the African continent. A rising tide of concern amidst denominational misinformation and episcopal stonewalling requires accurate information, advocacy on behalf of United Methodists seeking a pathway of discernment and as needed, departure, and a network to support the continuing development of leadership and relationships across annual conferences.
The WCA AfricaNOW initiative seeks to provide the funds needed for the development of print and digital resources in the prominent languages of the African UMC Annual Conferences (English, French, Portuguese), to provide convenors for informational networking gatherings in the various annual conferences, to resource informed advocacy supporting those leaders who initiate processes of departure from the UMC for their congregation(s), district(s), annual conference(s), or region, and, as may be needed, supplemental transitional funding for congregations, districts, or conferences moving from the dependency dynamics of the UMC into one of the Provisional Annual Conferences of the Global Methodist Church in Africa.
Though the UMC continues to fund UM churches in Africa with apportionment dollars from the USA, the GMC model focuses on developing self-sustainability by the African church for the African church. AfricaNOW funds will be administered by the WCA and available through our established leadership network for the needs of our African sisters and brothers during this transitional time.
AfricaNOW: A Short-Term Campaign with Long-Term Impact
Currently action has been taken in three regions of the UMC in Africa toward separation. Protests have been held in two additional Annual Conferences calling for a vote to disaffiliate from the United Methodist Church. These conferences represent over 2 million members of the UMC. Additional areas are considering the same kind of action.
Time is of the essence to provide accurate information and effective advocacy.
As WCA members in the US have moved to the GMC (a move we all applaud!), our financial base has, in many cases, moved with them. At the same time this new need for our sisters and brothers in Africa has arisen dramatically and gloriously! Our best course now is a focused, short-term funding campaign appeal to support the transition of Methodists in Africa to the Global Methodist Church.
Will you help?
This AfricaNOW funding appeal is urgent for the next 4-6 months. After that point, it is anticipated that the WCA operations in the USA will largely wind down. Because of our continuing involvement in Africa and our commitment to provide resources for those congregations in the USA who may yet have opportunities into 2025 for leaving the UMC, the WCA will maintain a governance and corporate structure adequate to satisfy all legal requirements as well as maintain digital resources.
Since its inception, the Wesleyan Covenant Association has been a relational advocacy effort. In many areas of the US our mission is largely complete. We will not, however, leave our African sisters and brothers to go it alone. The history of the WCA includes the critical initial steps for the development and launch of the Global Methodist Church. Our epilogue, however, will be to provide meaningful support and assistance for the transition of African Methodists to remain true to their faith, their foundations, and their future by separating from the UMC and becoming a vibrant and leading part of the GMC.
Though the AfricaNOW funding appeal is immediately compelling, the fruit of this campaign will prove to have positive Christ-centered and biblically-grounded impact across generations yet to come. Methodism in Africa is at a turning point which has and will continue to have global implications.
There is no question about it: we need your gift now.
Already there are high-capacity and high-impact leaders in Africa. WCA networking efforts over the past several years have been very fruitful. The plans, print and digital 
materials, awareness events, and advocacy are all in the hands of African leaders. The WCA’s AfricaNow initiative is focused exclusively on providing the financial resources to facilitate the preparation, printing, and translation of informational materials, the gathering across regions for awareness meetings, and assistance with transitional costs for congregations, districts, and conferences that choose, after prayerful discernment, that the time has come for them to leave the United Methodist Church for a more faithful and fruitful future.
Your gift, along with others, will provide the resources needing to inform, network, advocate for, and make the transition to the Next Methodism in Africa.
Click DONATE below to help AfricaNOW with your financial gift. If you have questions about gifts of stock, direct charitable IRA RMD distributions, or the transfer of other financial instruments, please contact Elizabeth Fink, WCA Administrative Assistant at efink@wesleyancovenant.org for information and assistance.
Thank you for your continued support as we leave a legacy in the faith and future of the Next Methodism…in Africa!