Highland Park United Methodist Church senior minister Rev. Matt Tuggle said in a video update that the church was “completely blindsided” by recent news that a regional governing body of the United Methodist Church is suing HPUMC.
The lawsuit from the Horizon Texas Conference of the United Methodist Church, a regional governing body which covers North Texas, alleges the 100-plus-year-old Park Cities church’s leadership made changes to its governing documents in 2022 and 2023 that weren’t approved through the processes required by the United Methodist Church and without notifying the Conference. As of the morning of Aug. 17, the lawsuit didn’t appear online in Dallas County court records, but the conference had shared a copy of it with Park Cities People.
Specifically, the lawsuit alleges HPUMC filed a restated certificate of formation in 2022 which “changed the corporation’s name to Highland Park Methodist Church and removed all references to The United Methodist Church, the Conference, and the Discipline from its governing documents.” The lawsuit further alleges that HPUMC adopted amended bylaws that year, which “i) remove all references to The United Methodist Church, the Conference, and the Discipline; ii) remove the rights of HP Church members to participate in any matter ‘affecting or involving the Church’; and iii) remove the members’ right to participate in determining the denomination of HP Church, including selection of the Church Council.”
In December of 2022, the lawsuit also alleges “HP Corporation filed an Assumed Name Certificate listing Highland Park United Methodist Church as its assumed name.”
Further, In a video shared on the Horizon Texas Conference’s website, Bishop Ruben Saenz Jr. said the conference leaders since last fall “have sought to resolve these issues directly with Highland Park’s leadership, but that request has not been accepted.”
For its part, HPUMC said in a statement on its website responding to the allegations that the church changed its corporate documents in accordance with guidance in 2020 from Texas courts “on managing church affairs under neutral principles of Texas law.”
Tuggle, in a response on the church’s website, further said the conference’s allegations are “without merit” and that church leadership had met with the Bishop “offering proposals on how to move forward together” shortly before the lawsuit was announced, but the pending litigation wasn’t discussed.
“Myself, our clergy, our staff, and lay leadership were caught completely off guard by the filing of this lawsuit. We’re all disappointed and bewildered that the conference has taken this action,” Tuggle said in the video. “We have been a faithful United Methodist Church and have always supported United Methodist leadership.”
He said that the church had also continued to make payments to the conference.
“Everything we did was by the book and in the best interests of our church,” Tuggle said in the video. “Simply put, this lawsuit is an unwarranted overreach.”
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