The Discipline is the main organizational document for the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, USA. It contains our rules of doctrine, our Constitution, our moral and social standards, and the by-laws which govern how we operate. The Discipline is published every two years after meetings of the United States National Conference.

The information falls into three categories.

1. Confession of Faith

The Confession of Faith--a concise, seven-point statement on major doctrines--was adopted in 1815 and has never been changed. Altering the Confession of Faith would first require changing the Constitution, which forbids changing the Confession of Faith.

2. Constitution

The Constitution was adopted in 1841 and cannot be amended without a referendum by the US members. A majority vote by the membership gives the US National Conference delegates permission to make the change, though it requires a two-thirds vote of the delegates to make it official.

3. By-laws

Everything from chapters 4-33 falls into this broad category. It includes our stands on moral and social issues, operational procedures for all church levels, boundaries, ministerial requirements, and much more. The information in these chapters can be changed by majority vote of the US National Conference.

Supplemental Materials

In the past, the complete Discipline was published in a book along with other information--an opening section on our origin and history, an Appendix of materials which changed from edition to edition, and the governing documents of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, International. The US National Conference decided against publishing a commercially-printed edition of the Discipline, partly because the National Conference changed the frequency of its meetings from every four years to every two years, which cut in half the Discipline's "shelf life." Instead, they instructed that the Discipline be made available online in PDF (Adobe Acrobat) format. In an effort to keep the PDF download shorter, it includes only the three sections cited above--Confession of Faith, Constitution, and By-Laws.

Other materials, which were previously published along with the Confession of Faith, Constitution, and By-Laws, are still available online. People are invited to download and print them as supplements to this document. They include materials which have, in the past, been included in the Appendix.

A key document is the Pastoral Ministry Handbook, which contains most of the chapters previously contained in the Ministry section--chapters on the various levels of ministerial licensing, on assignment procedures, and on doctrinal statements we have done in the past. The Pastoral Ministry Leadership Team is authorized to revise that Handbook as it sees fit. It, too, will be published online as the PMLT works on it.

International Documents

You can also download the governing documents of the International United Brethren church. It includes four parts: Confession of Faith, Core Values, Constitution, and By-Laws.

Nine "national conferences" comprise the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, International. The United States churches comprise one of those conferences. All nine must agree to follow the standards and requirements contained in the international documents. Only the international General Conference, which meets every four years, can change those documents.

The international Confession of Faith is identical to the Confession of Faith contained in the US National Conference Discipline. In fact, this is the primary document which binds together United Brethren people around the world.