Customer Reviews

Questions and Answers About the United Methodist Church

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As a current Methodist wanting to learn more about my religion, I was hoping for a little more detail. This book is a little too basic although it might be a good first reading for a person who is considering joining the Methodist religion. On the plus side, the information is clearly presented and is easy to read.

Thomas S. McAnally has written a brief, clear-cut booklet that quickly and succintly explains the nuts and bolts of Methodism. Admittedly, it is not a book of deep theological inquiry, but it was never intended to be. Rather, it answers many common questions important either to new Methodists or non-Methodists taking a first look at the Church. For those who need more, a list of suggested books for further research is included. McAnally's book is a great key to unlocking the fruits behind the door of the reader's local United Methodist Church. Recommended.

I'm actually a Catholic, but I've been interested in finding out why the Methodist methods (try saying that 5 times really fast!) are different from ours, but yet, in some ways they're just like our ways of doing things. Unfortunately, when I saw this article of reading I thought it would be longer than what it actually is...cause it looked like a book from what was being shown on the site. But actually, it isn't really a book, it's like a pamphlet. So i was disappointed in that i spent that much money on something that looked like I could've gotten from a church.But, it was pretty informative.There's probably better forms of information, more in depth forms of information about this branch of religion out there that's more lengthy. But, if you just want a basic idea of the practices Methodists partake in, then this is worth getting I suppose.

Many Methodist churches carry free copies of this brochure in their vestibule. That's where I got mine.

It is a very surface-level Q&A-format booklet that responds to each topic with a single paragraph. It answered several questions I had but it bogs down for a few pages (for me anyway) with details about church hierarchy and procedure. You can get as much information from the UMC website, actually.

For a more substantive but concise introduction to Methodist belief and practice, I'd highly recommend the 120-page Methodist Doctrine: The Essentials by Ted Campbell. It was much more informative but still written for the layperson.