The UPCI does not govern by a single fixed creed alone; its positions on contested social and moral questions are set by written resolutions of two bodies, its General Conference and its General Board, published afterward as standing position papers that name their own adoption date on the title page. "The Biblical Ideal of Marriage and Family," first adopted by the General Conference in 1990 and readopted in 2012, defines the family as founded on "one man and one woman, married by law in accordance with all biblical injunctions," and commits the church to opposing any broadening of that legal definition, though it stops short of stating a rule for divorce or remarriage among members.
"The Biblical View of Human Sexuality," adopted by the smaller General Board rather than the full Conference in September 2015, addresses a wider list of subjects than the 1990s paper had: fornication, adultery, polygamy, homosexuality, bestiality, incest and transgenderism are each treated in turn as improper expressions of human sexuality, each with its own scriptural citations. Both papers close on the same note, that the church's aim toward those who fall short of its teaching is reconciliation rather than condemnation, a pairing of firm doctrinal statement with an explicitly stated pastoral posture that runs through both documents.