The most significant present-day division in the Methodist Church is between the United Methodist Church (UMC) and the Global Methodist Church (GMC). The GMC officially launched on May 1, 2022, as a breakaway from the UMC. Read more here for background on the split.
Why the UMC and GMC Split
The split followed years of disagreement over whether to ordain and marry LGBTQ people. The UMC allows individual conferences and churches to decide the question themselves. The GMC holds to more traditional restrictions on both. Congregations, clergy and conferences differ on which position is right, and that disagreement is what led to the two separate denominations.
An Earlier Methodist Split
This is not the first time American Methodism has divided. From 1844 to 1939, it was split into the Methodist Episcopal Church and the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, over the question of slavery. The two reunited in 1939, and that reunited church later merged with the Evangelical United Brethren Church in 1968 to form the United Methodist Church.