Wespath is the general agency that administers investments and benefit plans for The United Methodist Church. It is one of the largest faith-based retirement funds in the world, with nearly $28 billion in assets under management as of December 31, 2025. Wespath serves over 100,000 participants through its retirement and health benefit plans. The agency has a history of caring about both its participants and God’s Creation and is a leader in sustainable investment stewardship, which is synonymous with socially responsible investing.
Wespath is also an interesting and important example of leading ecumenically in the Church and beyond. Its General Secretary and Chief Executive Officer, Andy Hendren, works hard to make sure Wespath is connecting, engaging and serving the wider Judeo-Christian community around the world and offers a positive example within The United Methodist Church. Wespath has supported the Methodist Church of Puerto Rico and Cuba Methodist Church for decades with retirement benefit services. In 2022, Wespath began providing retirement benefits to the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church. And most recently, Wespath has begun attracting ecumenical customers to its institutional investment services, including Mennonite, Evangelical Lutheran, Baptist, and non-denominational churches, colleges, and social service organizations.
As an attorney, Mr. Hendren came to Wespath in 2004 to serve as the agency’s associate legal counsel. He has had a keen interest in the ecumenical aspects of his ministry for many years. For example, in advance of the major reforms of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) going into effect on January 1, 2014, Mr. Hendren made several presentations about the ACA to ecumenical gatherings of church business administrators, denominational health plan managers, and church plan lawyers from denominations all across the U.S. Those presentations helped him build many ecumenical and interfaith connections.
It naturally followed that when he became the agency’s General Secretary and Chief Executive Officer in 2022, Mr. Hendren’s ecumenical engagement continued. Under his leadership, Wespath has remained an engaged member of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, which advocates ecumenically for shareholder rights.
Through its active membership in the Church Benefits Association (CBA), Wespath is part of a purchasing coalition that allows the UMC’s health plan to benefit from the pricing power of 400,000 lives, instead of just the approximately 15,000 involved in Wespath’s health plan directly. Additionally, Mr. Hendren proudly serves on the Board of Directors of the Church Benefits Association.
The CBA is a coalition of predominantly Christian and Jewish benefits organizations whose members manage well over $100 billion in benefit plan assets. It has been in existence for over 100 years and has evolved into a professionally staffed association with over 50 member organizations. These organizations include Mainline Protestants, like the UMC, but also evangelical denominations, historically Black churches, Unitarians and Jewish traditions.
The CBA’s main purposes include networking, sharing best practices and engaging in mutual education. At their annual conference, several hundred representatives join together for workshops, topical interest groups and fellowship. Mr. Hendren believes the CBA network to be one of the most reliable and faithful ecumenical and interfaith spaces available in the country today, and it has the admirable ability to work across theological divides in order to serve those who serve the many faiths involved.
And, in April, Mr. Hendren was named the Chair of the Board of Directors for a sister organization to the CBA called the Church Alliance, which is an interfaith coalition of 35 benefit organizations. Formed in 1974, this organization began as a policy response to proposed federal legislation, which became the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). ERISA would have allowed only employees of steeple houses of worship (local congregations) to participate in denominational benefits plans. This would have disallowed persons in extension ministries access to such plans.
A Baptist leader and a Jewish leader worked together to gather other benefits officers to engage Congress on the proposed legislation. They shared their case, and got the legislation changed. Today, with Chris Wells serving as the Executive Director, the Church Alliance continues to advocate for the needs of their member religious organizations on Capitol Hill. Thus, through his work as the Board Chair, Mr. Hendren periodically engages in policy-setting dialogues with Congressional members and legislative/committee staff, as well as staff at many regulatory agencies.
When the Freedom from Religion Foundation challenged the clergy housing allowance, for example, the Church Alliance submitted amicus (friend of the court) briefs. Similarly, when the ability of church ministries like hospitals, colleges, and children’s homes was at risk in litigation, the Church Alliance submitted amicus briefs sharing its deep understanding of the needs of religious employees. In his earlier leadership role leading the Church Alliance’s working group of lawyers, Mr. Hendren was present for both the 2015 Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals hearing that determined the housing allowance would remain legal, and the 2017 U.S. Supreme Court arguments that would lead to a ruling protecting the ability of church plans to cover employees of ministries like seminaries and retirement centers.
When the special rules that allow contributions to retirement plans for missionaries serving outside of the United States were at risk during the debate of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), the Church Alliance lobbied for their continued inclusion. When the first SECURE Act was proposed, the Church Alliance lobbied for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act’s tax on more expensive health care plans (often the case for clergy plans due to demographics), and for the repeal of the TCJA’s unintended tax on church parking lots. Success was achieved in all these cases on behalf of the ecumenical and interfaith entities the Church Alliance serves.
Often, we think about ecumenical and interfaith engagement as being limited to formal dialogues, theologically-defined relationships, and formation or coalition-building councils. Mr. Hendren shows through his leadership that unity among the Body of Christ and our neighbors in other religions can go way beyond those expressions. He recently said: “The value of these kinds of ecumenical and interfaith benefits organizations goes beyond their educational and lobbying successes. Their value is in the ecumenical community they create. It is so powerful to serve on two boards, often with me sitting across from someone from Christian Brothers Services (a Catholic organization), and next to someone from Guidestone (an evangelical organization), and on my other side is someone from the Reform Jewish Pension Board. And, we’re all talking together. We pray together. We break bread together. We talk shop together. And, we almost never bring up our differences. Instead, we focus on who we serve and caring for those who have given their lives to lead in God’s work.”
Mr. Hendren believes in setting aside differences and working with partners for the benefit of the whole, and so he believes the example of the Church Alliance and the Church Benefits Association can be an example to the wider Church of Jesus Christ. Might their example be used by the Judeo-Christian community to fight racial inequality, solve problems of affordable housing, or other social justice issues, like raising awareness of the impact of data centers coming into our communities? May it be so.
This content was originally published by the Council of Bishops of The United Methodist Church; republished with permission by ResourceUMC on July 9, 2026.