Category Archives: Analysis

Musings On The FOP NRB Theology Document – 2. Theology Comes First

8 Replies


As we anticipate the next gathering of the Fellowship of Presbyterians I thought I would riff for a few minutes about their draft Theology Document…

One month ago the Fellowship released both a draft Theology and a draft Polity document for the new Reformed body ( NRB ) in preparation for their meeting in just under two weeks. The close of the comment period for the drafts was yesterday and registration closes on Monday. The Fellowship says that at the present time 2100 people have registered for the meeting so it looks will have significant participation.

For those interested in polity, parliamentary procedure and process I think you will find some of the analysis by Carmen Fowler LaBerge in the Layman of some interest. She highlights many of the process issues that will come up at the meeting, e.g. Who can vote on these documents? Will substitute motions be permitted? I’m sure the organizers have this all in hand but an announcement of these process issues has not been posted to the Fellowship web site. She also echoes a couple of my thoughts about the Theology document, which I will refer to in a minute.

While my first musing was on the polity related to subscribing to the theology, when the documents were released I probably looked forward to reading the theology document more than the polity — after all, our polity flows from the theology. There were several things I anticipated in the theology document and I can say that I was wrong about several of them.

Maybe my biggest question, and my biggest surprise, was the approach they took to confessional standards. The proposal is to adopt the whole of the current Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Book of Confessions as the initial standards. The Forward to the document begins with this (page 1):

The first task is to identify the statements of our confessional heritage that will connect us with the one holy catholic apostolic church and express our distinctively Reformed convictions within that church. We propose the collection of confessional documents in The Book of Confessions as the appropriate theological expression at this moment in our life together. These creeds, confessions, and catechisms have much-needed wisdom of proven worth for us, and can uniquely serve as the central documents for a new Fellowship that strives to retain meaningful connections among congregations, some of whom will be within the PC(USA), some of whom will be in a new Reformed body. (emphasis as in original)

Later it continues with (page 2)

We recognize that The Fellowship and/or the new Reformed body may, after a time of building and testing theological consensus among us, alter this judgment. But it is our opinion that the theological consensus among evangelicals has not been tested and, further, that to presume a consensus where one does not exist is to repeat one of the most significant theological failures of our generation. As members of the ordered ministries of the Church, we have agreed to The Book of Confessions. Let us keep that covenant that we may be found faithful to any new theological covenant we will make.

As I said, Carmen Fowler LaBerge echoes my surprise at this broad inclusion when she says:

I was surprised that the Fellowship document recommends the entirety of the PCUSA Book of Confessions
as the confessional standard of the new Reformed body.  In particular,
the Confession of 1967 is problematic for many who have grown
disaffected with the PCUSA’s diffuse theological wanderings since its
adoption a generation ago.

I could ask whether the playing field would have been different if the Belhar Confession had been adopted — but since it was not this really is a hypothetical and moot question at this time.

Now, I am going to take the document at face value about their reasoning, but also add that there are obvious pragmatic benefits to this choice: The document mentions the shared confessional standard that would benefit union churches and affiliations as well as the fact that they are beginning with a standard currently accepted and vowed to by those in the Fellowship. But, when you consider the time frame that the drafters were under as well as the potential for bogging down an assembly in fine-tuning a new confessional standard, the benefits of an off-the-shelf known entity are obvious. It also means that the NRB does not have to worry about publishing their own volume of confessions just yet.

The Confessional Standards are the first substantive portion of the document and the second is the Essential Tenets (of the Reformed Faith). I think that most would agree that the Essential Tenets section does a good job of articulating the historical orthodox Christian beliefs as well as what most would consider the traditional Reformed distinctives. Throughout it there is good agreement with the Foundations section of the PC(USA) Book of Order. In general, whether you personally agree or disagree with Reformed theology and basic Calvinism, you have to acknowledge that for the most part this section holds closely to that. And doing this section as a narrative, and not bullet points, I would say enhances the value of it.

The point where the disagreements would most likely begin is in the final “application” section – the document calls it “Living in Obedience to the Word of God.” This is the section that uses as a framework the Ten Commandments. While I discussed some of my hesitancy with this in the previous post, this is the section that applies the preceding confessions and tenets to specific lifestyle issues that a good portion of the church might see in a different light. For instance, the second point says:

2. worship God in humility, being reticent in either describing or picturing God, recognizing that right worship is best supported not by our own innovative practices but through the living preaching of the Word and the faithful administration of the sacraments;

Church historians and polity wonks may recognize that the term “innovative practices” is a loaded term in Presbyterian tradition. This is a current topic among churches, like the Free Church of Scotland, that are discussing flexibility in worship styles, particularly regarding exclusive unaccompanied Psalmody. As one article on the Regulative Principle puts it – “The regulative principle of worship requires man to worship God only as
He has commanded in His Word. To add elements of human innovation into
the worship of God brings His just displeasure.” (emphasis added) Many of these Presbyterian branches would consider some of the worship practices seen across the PC(USA) as “human innovation.”

Specifically, the term “innovations” is a technical term in many branches of Presbyterian polity whose depth of meaning I won’t go into at this time. One place it is regularly found is in the Barrier Act – the standard in many Presbyterian branches descending directly from the Scottish Reformation that says when an act of the General Assembly/Synod must have the concurrence of the presbyteries. A polity discussion from the Free Church Assembly regarding worship practices discusses the Barrier Act of 1697. The sub-title of the act is “Act anent the Method of passing Acts of Assembly of general concern to the Church, and for preventing of Innovations.” (Yes indeed, capitalized as a proper noun.)

But getting back to the Theology document… This complexity around the application of the second commandment is just one example. My point is that it is usually when the church tries to translate doctrine into practice that we run into the biggest differences of opinion.

Moving on I’ll finally get to what I like best about the Theology document, and that is the concept behind section three on Ideas & Questions for Immediate Consideration. Let me back-track to the Forward for the real punch line here (page 1-2):

Casual affirmation of our theological heritage by our generation has severely weakened our worship and witness. We are squandering the gifts our confessional heritage could give us. We confess we have not been good stewards of the Faith. We must now reengage the Faith of the Church in ways that are more deeply committed to its truth and thus its value in ordering our life toward faithfulness. We have a strong conviction that our current theological failures are not the failures of the bishops at Nicea, the divines at Westminster, or the confessors at Barmen; the failures are our own. Now is the time to confess it and strengthen our theological covenant.

It later (page 2) says

Structures for doing theological work and for keeping theological integrity need to be established. Theology is not only to be established in our minds and become formative for our hearts, it is to be embodied in our manner of life and in the structures of the church. Companies of Pastors and Orders of Elders need to be formed. Teaching and Ruling Elders must relearn how to fulfill their missional callings in light of the Faith of the Church.  Our faithfulness depends on it. We strongly propose that new structures will be formed for the purpose of making a contribution to the theological well-being of the church so that our Faith can make its full contribution to the mission of the Church.

[Rant mode on] This may not be true for your congregation but I sometimes ask myself “If we have a Book of Confessions, why don’t we use it?”

One of my concerns with adopting the Belhar Confession was that we have so many documents now that just sit on the shelf, what is the value of adding one more? And I’m sure my pastor is getting tired of my commenting that we don’t use confessions enough in worship and education, or when we use one from another tradition why don’t we use more from our Book of Confessions.

Don’t misunderstand me – just as this Theology document finds the standards “have much-needed wisdom of proven worth for us” I agree and value both the historical and the timeless voice in which they speak. It is not in their intrinsic value that I have questions but in their visibility and application in the church today.

[Rant mode off]

I really like the fact that the Theology document recognizes this and proposes a process for keeping the confessions “on the table,” making sure theology comes first (page 10):

Renewed commitment to sustained conversation is needed. At its best, sustained conversation is characterized by prayerful and rigorous study of the Scripture with attention to clarifying the Reformed theological lens through which we read the Scriptures, by grateful listening to the voice of the church around the world and through the ages, and application of theological wisdom to every part of life before God and for the world.

Toward these ends, we now commit ourselves to the formation of theological friendships in communities that include all teaching and ruling elders – gatherings of elders which covenant to study and learn together, providing mutual encouragement and accountability for the sake of sustaining and advancing the theological and missional work of the church.

If the creeds, confessions and catechisms are living documents, then we must live with them and into them. I very much appreciate that this document and the proposed life of the NRB addresses that fact.

Well, there are a bunch more things I had in my head to muse about, but my time is up and this got longer than I thought it would.  At this point I don’t anticipate another musing before the FOP has their next gathering so I’ll sit back and watch Presbyterian polity at work in a new venue. Prayers for the gathering and I’ll catch up with the FOP on the back side.

Follow Up On The Presbyterian Church In Canada Moderator Election — Details And Discussion

Leave a reply


The recent twist in the process to elect the Moderator of the next General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Canada is still a developing story and polity discussion. Since my last post on the topic the Presbyterian Church in Canada has released the biographical sketches of the five candidates for Moderator of the 138th General Assembly. The discussion around “active campaigning” for the office has also continued — I will get to that in a moment, but first some polity details about the election.

The focus on the election got me asking questions about what the details of the process are.  As I noted in that last post, the Book of Forms (section 282) basically says that it will happen. Drilling down a bit more I find that the most recent minutes (page 11) indicate that the process is “In accordance with the method determined by the 95th General Assembly…” Well, with a lot of help I want to take a look at the method which I have found to be a bit unique in the Presbyterian system.

Now, to give fair warning, this first part is polity wonkish and you may find it interesting but there are not many significant take-aways. You can go ahead and jump to part two if you are primarily interested in the developments in the moderator’s election itself.

Also, as I will explain in a moment, this research can not be done online.  So I am indebted to Colin Carmichael, the Associate Secretary for Communications at the PCC and the Clerks Office for providing the relevant documents for this discussion.

This all started when I read the minutes of the last General Assembly and they say that the method of election of the Moderator was determined by the 95th General Assembly (1969). The problem is that the oldest records available online are the 118th General Assembly (1992). After contacting the office Colin and the Clerks graciously, and quickly, provided me with not only the relevant portion of the 95th’s Proceedings, but also related portions of the 98th’s and 99th’s Proceedings.  In addition, they included this year’s Clerk’s letter to the presbyteries that helps explain the process.  Again, my thanks for all the work.

So what is the process? Based on a recommendation from the Administrative Council concerning a suggestion from the Committee to Advise the Moderator, the 95th General Assembly (1969) established a five year trial of standing orders to have the church elect, or technically nominate, the Moderator of the General Assembly. The process begins with presbyteries nominating individuals for the position — each may nominate up to two and they can be from other presbyteries. Then, based on these nominations the Clerk’s office confirms each of those nominated is willing to serve and sends out ballots to the presbyteries.  Here is where it get’s unique – each individual with a vote in presbytery, ministers and the designated ruling elders, is eligible to vote. But the vote is not by presbytery but rather all ballots get returned to the national office and they get collectively counted.  The top vote-getter is the final nominee for the office.

Now, for the polity/parliamentary procedure specialists the instructions have as part of their Preamble: “That in the Regulations below where the phrase “nomination of Presbytery” or equivalent is used, this phrase be understood for convenience only. (The only true nomination for Moderator is from the floor of Assembly.)” You can breath easier now.

I have simplified the steps in the discussion above but those are the essential steps. What is interesting is that this is what is referenced in the current minutes since it was only a five-year trial. That is where the Acts and Proceedings from the 98th and 99th GA’s come in. The vast majority of the original process was retained but an important change was made: In the voting each presbytery member now ranks their choices for Moderator. If no nominee receives a majority, not plurality, based on the number 1 choices, then the lowest vote-getter is dropped and those ballots selecting that person first have their second choice votes distributed. The process continues until one nominee receives a majority.

Again, for the polity wonks, here are the usual contingencies:

10. That the nomination be made from the floor of the Assembly, and that the opportunity be given for another nomination or nominations.
11. That, if the foregoing fails to be effective, the election of the Moderator shall proceed in the manner of 1969, notice being given to the Presbyteries as early as possible.

Let me throw in two things here: 1) Somewhere there is a little bit more because these instructions don’t include the part that a nominee needs the endorsement of three Presbyteries to appear on the ballot. 2) Because the instructions are pieced together from a series of Acts and Proceedings it appears that while reference is made to Standing Orders, they exist only as parts of different acts recorded by year and not a unified reference book.

A great transition to the next topic is the Clerk’s Letter from last August soliciting nominations for Moderator of the General Assembly. With that letter the Clerk included an adopted overture from the 74th General Assembly (1948) [slightly edited for length]:

A&P 1948, page 160 (Appendix)
NO. 11 – PRESBYTERY OF GUELPH
Re: Undue Influence Among Presbyteries
 
To the Venerable, the General Assembly:
WHEREAS, circular letters have been received by this Presbytery each year for a number of years from one or more other Presbyteries giving notice as to whom they have nominated for General Assembly appointments, and
WHEREAS, these nominations are supposed to be reported only to the General assembly and to the Boards concerned, and
WHEREAS, it would appear that the Presbyteries responsible for this procedure have been seeking to influence other Presbyteries to support their candidates.
It is humbly overtured by the Presbytery of Guelph that the General Assembly taken some action to put an end to this practice which we deem undesirable.
Extracted from the Records of the Presbytery of Guelph by Morriston, Ontario
March 17th, 1948
T.G.M. Byran
Presbytery Clerk

A&P 1948, page 94 (minutes)
Overture No. 11, Presbytery of Guelph, Re Undue Influence Among Presbyteries

Mr. W.A Young was heard in support of the Overture of the Presbytery of Guelph Re Undue Influence Among Presbyteries, and moved, duly seconded, that the Assembly express disapproval of practice complained of, and it was so ordered.

The Clerk includes in the body of the letter the advice:

While the overture refers only to letters from presbyteries, I am of the opinion that if, in the overture, reference had been made to letters from individual ministers, Assembly’s attitude would have been the same – disapproval of the practice. Subsequent Assemblies have not changed the position taken by the 78th [sic?] Assembly, but it appears that some within our church are either not aware of the action or have chosen to disregard it. Your assistance in communicating this concern and your good example will be greatly appreciated.

So that is regarding the lobbying of presbyteries and individuals on behalf of a candidate. The current situation involves the candidate himself and the use of social media and not letters.

To recap the situation, one of the candidates for Moderator, the Rev. John Borthwick of Guelph (déjà vu?) has been active on social media to begin a discussion about the moderator election.  Is it “active campaigning” as I originally called it?  It could be interpreted that way and I will leave it to the reader and those in the presbyteries of the PCC to decide if it is.  What he has done is opened up a discussion about the role of the moderator and what else should go on around the process of election.

At this point Mr. Borthwick is taking full advantage of social media with his personal Twitter at @jborthwik, his moderator Twitter at @borthwick4mod, a Facebook page, and more recently a blog related to his Moderator campaign – borthwick4moderator. That blog is what I want to focus on.

Now, while I appreciate his reprinting my previous post on this topic in his second post on the blog, I want to focus on his writing as a whole, with some emphasis on a more recent post. I will quote extensively, but will edit almost all of them for length.

The blog does have a number of sections found on typical PC(USA) Moderator candidate sites including the obligatory Who Am I? and the Sense of Call. His sense of call is short and telling – here it is in total:

“I’m average.”  I discovered that fact while I was attending the October
2011 meeting of the Synod of Central and Northern Ontario and Bermuda. 
During The Rev. Jeff Crawford, our Synod Youth Consultant’s
presentation, it was noted that the average age of Canadians is 39 years
old.  I’m 39, really and not just holding.  For the last year or two,
I’ve felt called to the role of Moderator of The Presbyterian Church in
Canada.  I was originally inspired by the journey and witness of The
Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow as he became one of the youngest moderators of the
PCUSA [sic].  I believe it is time for the Canadian average to be represented
and apparently our young people do as well.  As a conclusion to Jeff’s
presentation, he noted that the members of the Synod’s Presbyterian
Young People’s Society had asked him to deliver a recommendation to the
upcoming Synod meeting: that we consider nominating a 39 year old to the
position of Moderator of General Assembly.  It was then that I said,
“Here I am!”

(I will leave comments about being inspired by Bruce and the PC(USA)-ification of the PCC for another time.)

 In addition, he has the usual Endorsements section and the Experience and Education list.  He also has a couple sections you don’t regularly see – a listing of his Growth Areas and the information on The Other Nominees.

As of today he has seven posts on his blog including a brief initial Welcome, a recent Christmas greeting, and the reprint of my article I have already mentioned. I will leave it to you to read the article about what a Moderator is and the one on “Ten, actually Nine, Questions Every Moderator Nominee Should Answer.” I want to finish this post focusing on the remaining two that focus on the Moderator campaign.

The second of the two is “Being the Change” where Mr. Borthwick responds to a couple of thoughtful comments posted on the Facebook page about his handling the campaign, with an eye not so much on the legalistic aspects but on a spirit of fairness.  Here are a few selected sections of Mr. Borthwick’s response:

I deeply appreciate these comments.  I would love for all of the
nominees ‘to be on the same page’… but recognize that we didn’t ‘sign up
with this in mind’.  I appreciate Andrew’s point in a previous post,
where he says let’s hear from all the nominees instead of just promoting
John Borthwick.

and

I respect my fellow nominees deeply and am honoured to be on a list with
them.  I also believe that any one of them would make an excellent
moderator… but most of all I’d love to hear more about their vision and
hopes for our denomination (beyond the 100 words) and would consider it a
privilege to spend the next 114 days discussing the issues with them.

and finally

I am attempting to ‘be the change’ as opposed to following a traditional
process.  That doesn’t always win you friends.  My goal in all this is
not about ‘winning’ though but about shaking our denominational tree a
little to see what fruit falls.

The other post is his extensive answer to the idea of “active campaigning.” Here are his arguments for his approach, extensively edited for length:

  1. The moderator of the PCC is just the chair of a really big meeting… but I
    believe that the office carries tremendous power to influence and even
    transform our denomination.  […] [W]e
    should hear more than 100 words from our candidates!  We should hear
    about their vision and the ways that they will attempt to implement that
    vision.  […] I’ve always wanted
    to know more about the candidates.  And so that is why I’m sharing with
    you.

  2. I believe that the process we have now diminishes the office.  I’ve
    talked with many over the years who see the role as insignificant.  A
    victory lap for some.  A final feather in the cap for others.  […] Most people tell
    me that they tend to vote for who they know and like (or by process of
    elimination, vote for who they don’t know but have no negative opinion
    of unlike the other candidates).  […] I’ve heard ruling
    elders say that either they don’t vote or they ask their minister who
    they should vote for… since they don’t know any of the candidates.  I
    wonder if we have ever looked at ‘voter turnout’ with regard to our
    Moderatorial race.  Some of my colleagues have told me that they haven’t
    voted in years.  […] I’d suggest that some kind
    of modest campaigning (at least one that outlines what kind of vision
    candidates have for our denomination and how they would go about
    executing it through their year as Moderator) would be helpful and
    appropriate.

  3. Maybe the way we have understood the role of moderator is a thing of
    the past.  […] It seems that one
    generation sees it as something that one ‘stands’ for while the other
    wants to know what one stands for!  I think it is time that we knew what our moderator candidates stand for.

  4. There seems to often be a disconnect between the office of the
    moderator and the overall direction of the Church and its vision,
    planning, and campaigns.  […] Wouldn’t it be great if our moderators worked in
    partnership with denominational directions, plans and campaigns.  [… W]hat I’m recommending is that
    the Church makes an informed decision on who they would like to see as
    giving ‘voice’ to those directions.

  5. Finally, I’ve been told that I’m being disrespectful to past
    moderators and my current fellow nominees.  I wish to convey no such
    disrespect.  I have appreciated and valued the work of our past
    moderators, and our current one.  I respect greatly how they chose to
    serve our beloved Church in the role of moderator and their richness of
    work and witness that raised them to being recognized by the Church.  I
    also respect my fellow nominees, Peter Bush, Gordon Haynes, Andrew
    Johnson, and John Vissers.  They are all men whom I have met personally
    and have greatly appreciated my interactions with them.  Any one of them
    would make an excellent moderator of the PCC.  I would love to hear
    more from them as to how they would lead our denomination into the
    future and what kind of vision they would desire to see implemented to
    strengthen our life and work together.

I would encourage you to look at the thoughtful responses in the comments section of that post.  Bryn MacPhail notes “In my 13 years in the PCC, I probably left something like 4 or 5 signed
ballots blank–not because I didn’t value the position, but because I
valued it so much that I refused to vote for someone I wasn’t well
acquainted with.” Andrew Reid has a particularly thoughtful and extensive response which includes the observation “However, the impression I took from your “campaigning” was that you are
not trying to change the process but simply sweeping it aside.” And finally, Colin Carmichael reminds everyone that if other candidates want to participate in the discussion the church has a resource in www.pccweb.ca that they can use and his office would be glad to help them get going with their own web sites.

An interesting discussion – and I will leave it up to you to determine its value. On the one hand, it is aimed at making the church more open, more  interactive, more appealing to the younger generation. On the other hand, it is a unilateral attempt to do this in a way that is inspired by a different Presbyterian branch and clashes with the ethos of the PCC. Is this a reasonable goal? Is this a good way to go about reaching that goal? What matters here is not just the destination but the journey – how it is done is just as important to involving members as what the final outcome is.

Still plenty more to come in this discussion I am sure. It will be interesting how both the wider church responds to this discussion as well as how the 138th General Assembly does. Stay tuned…

The Airline Industry As A Model For The American Mainline Churches

Leave a reply


Last Friday on NPR‘s All Things Considered news show there was an interesting piece in their Planet Money segment on “Why Airlines Keep Going Bankrupt.” In that report the following lines got me thinking:

(Reporter) CAITLIN KENNEY: …[A]ll airlines face these challenges and only some file for bankruptcy. He says it’s usually a certain type.

(Interviewed expert) PROFESSOR SEVERIN BORENSTEIN: The legacy airlines.

So my thinking made the jump –

“All churches face challenges and only some are in steep decline: The mainline churches.”

Is there a parallel or model in here?  I am still not sure, but permit me to riff on this a bit.

The story discussed how the legacy airlines had price structures and business models that date from before 1978 when the airline industry was deregulated. After deregulation they could not change rapidly enough to compete with the new low-cost carriers that sprung up and the legacy airlines were driven into bankruptcy, sometimes twice. What did bankruptcy get them?

KENNEY: And that’s where bankruptcy comes in. When you see a
bankruptcy, think of it as an airline saying we want to renegotiate our
contracts so we can be more like newer airlines. James Sprayregen is a
partner at the law firm Kirkland and Ellis. He’s worked on the
bankruptcies of United Airlines and TWA.

JAMES
SPRAYREGEN: Those contracts, albeit amended, you know, dozens and
probably hundreds of times, they sort of grew on themselves almost like a
coral reef. And a lot of inefficiencies got built into those.

KENNEY: In bankruptcy, work rules change, vacation days go away, pensions and benefits get reduced.

SPRAYREGEN: Unfortunately, bankruptcy is all about breaking promises.

KENNEY: Breaking those promises means the legacy airlines are going to start to look a lot like the newer airlines.

So, let’s break this down a little bit…

The concept of deregulation is an interesting one to consider for denominational dynamics. When the mainline membership peaked in the 1960’s the mainline was pretty close to a de facto established church. Then society changed and the mainline church, and churches in general, lost their cultural and social status and the decline began. Norms were not the same regarding the mainline churches and more flexibility and variability were introduced into society’s church-going habits. As I pondered this change that might reflect a sort of “deregulation” in the American religious landscape two things came to mind that might be indicators and results of this change.

The first is the, shall we say, change in stability of the American Presbyterian mainline. Following the division in the 1930’s related to the Fundamentalist/Modernist debate, the branches of the Presbyterian mainline enjoyed a period of relative tranquility that was marked by unions and not by divisions. Following the 1960’s the controversies heated up again with the formation of the Presbyterian Church in America from the southern branch in 1973 and the Evangelical Presbyterian Church from the northern branch in 1981, and other rearrangements continuing to the present. (Check out the chart of the American Presbyterian branches.)

The second development I thought might be indicative of a denominational deregulation is the external influence of non-denominational churches and particularly megachurches. With the loss of influence, authority and loyalty to denominations in general, and the mainline in particular, independent or loosely affiliated churches grew. Note the similarities in timing discussed in this article by Scott Thumma (written around 1996):

 Nearly all current megachurches were founded after 1955. The explosive
growth experienced by these congregations, however, did not begin in
earnest until the decade of the eighties (Vaughan 1993:50-51). The 1990’s have not slowed this growth. Data collected in 1992 revealed over 350 such congregations (Thumma 1993b).
Vaughan estimates that the number of megachurches grows by 5 percent
each year (1993:40-41). Given this rate over two million persons will
be weekly attendees of megachurches in the United States by the start
of the new millennium. Anyone familiar with the American religious
scene cannot help but have noticed the rapid proliferation of these
massive congregations. In fact, it is precisely their size which
attracts so much attention.

OK, so in this model we have a societal change that results in a sort of deregulation of the denominational, and particularly the mainline, landscape. This deregulation resulted in both internal and interdenominational changes. And like the airlines the churches are in a position that they can not change fast enough to stay competitive. (old inefficient airplanes –> old inefficient buildings?)

In the story the thing really inhibiting the legacy airlines are the labor agreements. For the churches, what would be our “labor agreements” that have built up over time and keep us from being able to transform into the new reality?

  • Our polity? Does nFOG solve this for the PC(USA)?
  • Our structure? Will the MGB Comm be able to solve this? How about the Special Committee on the Nature of the Church for the 21st Century?
  • Our leadership? Not enough creative thinkers or not enough with a good perspective on youth?

I could go on naming elephants in the room and sacred cows and I’m sure you can think of things that I would not.  The point is that there are lots and lots of things which are being mentioned that are keeping a mainline church pointed in the same direction and there is usually someone that thinks that changing that thing will allow the church to, forgive me for using the business term, be more competitive.

Let me step back for a moment here and affirm that there are certain things that are needed for a business and likewise for a church. These can be modified and adapted but not all together dispensed with. To take the analogy to possibly an absurd level of detail, just as an airline needs planes a denomination needs congregations, and as a plane needs a pilot a church needs a pastor. The question is not do we need a plane, but what plane works best in a particular situation? A pilot needs to be trained, but how much and what kind of training for that plane and that situation? Similarly, the “business model” for a denomination does not require every congregation look the same and every pastor have identical training.

If you would permit me a short detour on this theme: Taking a cue from the airline industry, maybe churches need “type certification.” In the airline industry the basic educational requirement for pilots is very similar.  If all you want to do is train to be a air transport pilot you can do it in about 6 months for $60,000. But whenever you switch aircraft types you need to be trained and certified on that specific aircraft. Just because you fly a 737 does not mean you can sit down in a 747 and properly fly it. So, could the church have a basic fast-track training program for pastoral leadership and then a more customized extension for the specific situation the individual is going into? For the PC(USA) there is already an interim pastor training program that does something like this. (Although it is an extension, not a replacement, of the standard course of study.)  And yes, this is a very general proposal and actually off-topic for this post, but maybe something for continued contemplation.

Returning to the original riff – Let’s move on to the most loaded and divisive question in this model: What would the equivalent action be for a mainline church to reorganize like a company would reorganize in bankruptcy?

Let me put it a different way: What does the mainline church need to get out of to continue on as a viable entity? Or to use the language quoted above – What promises does the mainline church need to break to become the church for the 21st century?

Note carefully the model — this is not working around the edges or tweaking a few programs. This is noting one or two really big things that you then throw out and begin over again. This is the opportunity to deal with that one thing that is holding you back and replace it with something you can work with.  Yes it is radical, but in this model, that is what the legacy airlines have to do to remain viable.

So what is it? Maybe the polity? The structure? The ecclesialogy? The theology?  I don’t know and I’m not going to suggest anything specific here. The question for thought and discussion, if you accept this model, is what items are peripheral to our core business of being Presbyterian and Reformed, of “Glorifying God and Enjoying God Forever,” of preaching the Word, administering the Sacraments and upholding Discipline, that we can dispense with at whatever cost? If we said “no more Mr. Nice Guy,” what would you do to change the church?

Now, maybe I am completely off base with this – I am more than ready to accept that conclusion. I am simply extending the historical development of one industry to a completely different realm. I can easily be convinced that the model I have put forward here is way too superficial and general and that comparing the airline industry to the Christian Church is not fair to either. I am cautious that what I have done is forced the analogy, making something fit where no correspondence is deserved.

So there I end the thought experiment, at least for the moment in this form. I will say that enough of the analogies work in my own mind that I don’t plan on stopping to think about it – but I won’t promise any written follow up. However, in this time of rethinking everything about the mainline churches I thought it might be an interesting model to put out there.  Thanks for thinking it through with me.  Your mileage may vary.

Now, where did I put that court decision…

[After thinking about this over the past weekend I was interested to see that on Monday Pastor Questor reposted a similar sort of model, but comparing the mainline to the American auto industry.]

Musings On The FOP NRB Polity Document – 1. Can I Declare An Exception?

Leave a reply
Prologue
Regular readers have probably noted that my blogging productivity has decreased a bit the last few months. This is due to an increased number of personal, professional and Presbyterian commitments. While I always anticipate that I can find more time for blogging in the future, sometimes that does not come to pass.

I tell you that as an introduction to this particular post and probably a few to follow. (I won’t promise anything.) I have decided to classify these as “musings” – posts which are shorter, more spontaneous and less polished than what I consider my regular writing to be. I also consider musing about this particular topic appropriate since the Fellowship of Presbyterians’ New Reformed Body documents are also a work in progress and at a stage where a more informal discussion is probably most appropriate.

Well last weekend I “escaped” and backpacked to a campsite up in a canyon in the mountains above L.A. (picture right) It was a wonderful chance to get away and the weather was really great. (And then that campsite probably got a foot of snow in the storm that rolled through yesterday.) But being so close to the longest night of the year I brought plenty of reading material and had a chance to do a first read of the NRB Theology and Polity documents. (Anyone read them in a more unique location?) A couple of first impressions and thoughts from that reading…

 

The Fellowship of Presbyterians recently released their two organizational documents for discussion in advance of their Covenanting Conference in mid-January. To set the stage for anyone who has not reviewed the documents yet let me begin with a summary of the two pieces.

The Theology document is a three-part statement that begins by affirming that the confessional basis for the NRB will be the current Book of Confessions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). The second section then sets out what the NRB considers to be the Essential Tenets of the Reformed Faith. The third part is titled “Ideas & Questions for Immediate Consideration” and sets out a vision for the NRB as a group that actively does theology and has a “renewed commitment to sustained conversation.”

The Polity document is a Form of Government for the NRB modeled on the PC(USA)’s new Form of Government section.  There are no Foundations, Worship or Discipline sections yet.

One point that struck me as I read through the Polity was the reliance on the Essential Tenets section of the Theology.  I found nine references to it (numbers following are the FOG section number, italics as used in the original, text from the version posted now (expecting the obvious typo to be fixed soon)):

  1. (Regarding new congregations) …desire to be bound to Christ and one another as a part of the body of Christ according to the Essential Tenants [sic] and government of the NRB. [1.0200]
  2. (Regarding expectations of members) Those who are invited to take significant leadership roles in the congregation should ordinarily be members for at least a year, agree with the Essential Tenants [sic] of the NRB, be trained and/or mentored, and be supervised. [1.0305]
  3. (Regarding qualifications of officers) Ordaining bodies must ensure that all officers adhere to the Essential Tenets of the NRB. [2.0101]
  4. (Third ordination vow) Do you receive and adopt without hesitation the Essential Tenets of the NRB as a reliable exposition of what Scripture teaches us to do and to believe, and will you be guided by them in your life and ministry? [2.0103c]
  5. (Regarding the preparation of pastors) In addition to adherence to the Essential Tenets, presbyteries shall ensure that candidates for ministry are adequately trained for their task. [2.0400]
  6. (Regarding Affiliate Pastors) Affiliate pastors must adhere to the Essential Tenets of the NRB. [2.0401f]
  7. (Regarding the duties of the synod – note that in this FOG a General Synod is the highest governing body.) c. maintain the Constitution and Essential Tenets of the NRB. [3.0202c]
  8. (Regarding Union Congregations) Congregations, historically members of the PC(USA) or other Reformed denominations, who wish to maintain that membership while joining with the NRB and who recognize and teach the Essential Tenets may request to join a presbytery of the NRB… [5.0202]
  9. (Regarding other denominations) Out of our common Protestant heritage, partnership and joint congregational witness will be encouraged where mission, ministry, and collegiality can be coordinated and approved by the appropriate governing bodies, and where the Constitution and Essential Tenets of the NRB can be followed. [5.0300]

Clearly the Essential Tenets are put forward as the distillation of what is unique and special about the NRB. This is plainly presented as the litmus test of what it means to belong to this branch. For comparison there are only four uses of the term “scripture” or “scriptures,” three of them in the ordination vows, and two uses of “confessions,” one in the ordination vows.

In reading through this I did wonder about the variation in the language regarding the relationship to the Essential Tenets. The word most commonly used is “adhere,” so the intent is to stick to them. But the ordination vow preserves the current language of “receive and adopt” adding the “without hesitation” regarding the Essential Tenets. Are these the same or different? If my promise is to “receive and adopt” is asking me elsewhere to “adhere” to them asking more, less, or something different of me? Remember, I’m just musing about it here and don’t really have an answer at the moment.

I guess what really sticks out to me is that the language seems to be asking me to agree to 100% of what is in the Essential Tenets, even when I think it might conflict with my understanding of Scripture or the Book of Confessions. This is not an academic exercise.

A simple example:  For the sake of this example let’s say that I agree with everything the Essential Tenets say except that as I read them there is one little point that bothers me based on my theological framework. At the end of the document the Ten Commandments are used to summarize some of the points. This is a time-honored way of discussing theology and is used in many catechisms, along with the Lord’s Prayer, as a template for teaching the faith.  But the Essential Tenets summarize the fourth commandment like this:

4. observe Sunday as a day of worship and rest, being faithful in gathering with the people of God;

I honestly have a theological issue with simply taking this commandment and substituting “Sunday” or “Lord’s Day” for the term “Sabbath.” To explain briefly, I see the Sabbath as an Old Testament template or analogy for the celebration of the Lord’s Day in the New Covenant of Jesus Christ. The theological connection is much more nuanced than can be expressed in a simple one-to-one substitution. The Westminster Confession of Faith [section 6.112ff in the Book of Confessions] takes a lot of words to expound on this analogy. Maybe the best brief discussion of the nuances is from the Heidelberg Catechism:

Q. 103. What does God require in the fourth commandment?
A. First, that the ministry of the gospel and Christian education be maintained, and that I diligently attend church, especially on the Lord’s day, to hear the Word of God, to participate in the holy Sacraments, to call publicly upon the Lord, and to give Christian service to those in need. Second, that I cease from my evil works all the days of my life, allow the Lord to work in me through his Spirit, and thus begin in this life the eternal Sabbath.

All this to say that on this point I have a small, but what I consider substantive, disagreement with the Essential Tenets. So what happens now? The Essential Tenets do not address how minor differences in theological understanding are to be treated. Taken on face value I guess I can not adhere to the standard as the Polity requires. (And please understand, I am not putting up a hypothetical disagreement here but one that I honestly and sincerely hold.)

Now, the polity wonks have surely figured out where I am going with this (even if they weren’t tipped off by the title). The American Presbyterian church has been struggling with how to handle these differences, big and little, throughout its entire history. We affirm in the Westminster Confession that “God alone is Lord of the conscience” and we understand that to a certain degree we can differ in belief but must be consistant in practice. That is what the Adopting Act of 1729 was basically about.

So how is the NRB going to approach this? At the present time I did not find a solution in the proposed Polity document.  One approach would be a highly structured method like the Presbyterian Church in America has where ordained officers are required to subscribe to the Westminster Standards and they must declare and explain exceptions like I have done above. As the Book of Church Order says [21-4f]

Therefore, in examining a candidate for ordination, the Presbytery shall inquire not only into the candidate’s knowledge and views in the areas specified above, but also shall require the candidate to state the specific instances in which he may differ with the Confession of Faith and Catechisms in any of their statements and/or propositions. The court may grant an exception to any difference of doctrine only if in the court’s judgment the candidate’s declared difference is not out of accord with any fundamental of our system of doctrine because the difference is neither hostile to the system nor strikes at the vitals of religion.

But this adds an additional layer of administration to a Form of Government which is intended to be simple and clean.  It also opens up the “slippery slope” or “camel’s nose under the tent” problem where a series of very small steps away from the Essential Tenets results in a cumulative substantial difference and heterogeneity in what is intended to be a fairly homogenous belief structure. As I pondered this it seemed to me that incorporating a way to relax a point in the Essential Tenets could be problematical for the NRB.

You can justly accuse me here of focusing too narrowly on minor details — Guilty as charged.  My particular point detailed above is pretty minor in the grand scheme of Christian doctrine. But let me ask these two questions: 1) If I have a tiny little difference of understanding can I still in good conscience adhere to the standard if no provision is made for variability? 2) If differences around tiny details are acceptable, where is the line between the tiny stuff and the big stuff?

Enough musing on this for now. As I continue musing to myself on other points in the Polity and Theology documents maybe a few more will find their way into this virtual space. So until next time I leave you with the sunset over The City of Angles that I watched last Saturday night.

Second Moderator Candidate For 2012 PC(USA) GA Endorsed

Leave a reply

Let me begin with a technical note: The Second and Third individuals to be endorsed to stand for Moderator of the General Assembly were endorsed by their presbyteries on the same day and the news seems to have hit Twitter within a few minutes of each other.  But, media outlets seem to be consistent in the use of the 2nd and 3rd designations so I will use them as well.

On Tuesday October 11 the Presbytery of Great Rivers endorsed their General Presbyter and Stated Clerk, Teaching Elder Susan Davis Krummel, to stand for election as the Moderator of the 220th General Assembly.

There is no bio or statement posted on the Presbytery web site but the PC(USA) news article tells us that TE Krummel has served in a variety of pastoral positions in various sized churches in the first 24 years of her ministry.  She has been in her current position for the last eight years. She received her ministry degree from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and has additional certificate education from McCormick Theological Seminary.

Ms. Krummel has a strong record of service to the denomination including teaching polity at the University of Dubuque Theological Seminary, serving as the president of the Association of Executive Presbyters, and Moderator of the General Assembly Nominating Committee.

Her Moderatorial web site is up and it contains the press release and a collection of weekly perspectives she wrote for the Presbytery. It also invites us to follow her on Facebook and Twitter (@skrummel) for which there is one tweet so far.

In the press release, Ruling Elder Gary Davis, the moderator of the presbytery nominating committee, is quoted:

“An inspiring preacher and
teacher of the Reformed faith, Sue Krummel knows about the culture of
our presbytery because she was born and raised here. We recognize that
most of the churches (small membership congregations) in our
denomination are very much like some of the churches that Sue has
served. We believe that in this critical hour, the Presbyterian Church
(USA) needs a Moderator who understands the people in the pews. Sue
does.”

The Presbyterian Outlook has an article about her and the third candidate (I’ll post tomorrow) and The Layman Online has an article on all three of the current candidates.

This endorsement raised an interesting question about the current call of individuals who are standing for Moderator.  It struck me that serving in a higher governing body council was rare for those also serving as Moderator, but after I looked into the statistics it is not common, but not as rare as I though.

The obvious exception right now is Teaching Elder Landon Whitsitt who, while currently serving as Vice-Moderator of the General Assembly, just recently received a call to be the Executive and Stated Clerk of the Synod of Mid-America.  But that change was recent and he was serving as a parish pastor at the time of the 219th GA.  The other Vice-Moderator that came to mind was Ruling Elder Gay Mothershed who was serving as an Associate Executive Presbyter in Texas at the time of the 208th GA.

So, looking systematically at the list of Moderators, there have been 25 General Assemblies since reunion.  Of the 25 Moderators there have been 17 Teaching Elders and 8 Ruling Elders.  While the ruling elders could be an executive (cf. RE Mothershed above) it turns out that five were involved in business or non-profit corporations (Wilson, Gwynn, Brown, Ufford-Chase, Bolbach).  Two of them were in academics (I. Rogers, Gardner) and one writer (Marj Carpenter – I was tempted to call her a missionary because she wrote with a mission).

Regarding the Teaching Elders, about half (nine) were parish pastors at the time of election (Taylor, Hall, Fife, Dobler, Bohl, Buchanan, Andrews, Gray, Reyes-Chow).  Three were in academics (Oldenburg, Rhee, J. Rogers), two missionaries (Nelson and Weir – retired at the time of election), and one heading up a ministry non-profit (Abu-Akel).  The remaining two were an Associate EP and an EP (Salmon-Campbell and Valentine respectively).  So while being elected Moderator while serving in a presbytery executive position is not unheard of, it is one of the less common positions of call to be in at the time of election.

So, there is a summary of Rev. Krummel’s endorsement and the EP’s that have gone before her to this position. Our best wishes as she stand’s for the position of Moderator of the General Assembly.

Now, on to number three…

The Fellowship Gathering — Through The Tweets Dimly

9 Replies

Last week was an interesting week for me, what with the Virginia earthquake on Tuesday and the two day Fellowship of Presbyterians Gathering in Minneapolis on Thursday and Friday.

I did not make it to The Gathering so I have been trying to follow it from my vantage point over here on the Left Coast. News and blog articles about the event are starting to appear, but it was fascinating to track the Twitter comments and interactions during the meeting.  However, what I found was that while the tweets were interesting and helpful they were not enough to help me connect all the dots to understand what the Fellowship is and where it is going. (Guess you had to be there… )  What follows is not so much reporting on the Gathering but sharing my impressions from and about the social media content related to it. As Scott Keeble (@skeeble99) put it:

Gotta love overreactions to 140 char. summaries of a conference you aren’t at.

If you want to play along at home you need to check out the tweets with the hashtag #mn2011.  As the meeting was getting underway I did comment that I did not see a lot of use of the #pcusa hashtag and by implication there was a distancing from the institution. Several friends of different theological stripes informed me that it is indeed common practice to only use the conference hashtag and that nothing sinister should be seen in the use of hashtags.  I stand corrected and apologize for casting aspersions where nothing should have been read into it.

Now, if you want a good look at the best play-by-play of the event you need to check out the constant stream of tweets from Carolyn Poteet (@cvpotweet) who was the unofficial live-tweeter. Her stats say she is only at 1034 tweets ever — I would have sworn that she had 10,000 in one day last week! Of course, she hit her rate limit a couple of times and to get the complete picture you need to also check the tweets from @TomJHouston which she co-opted to keep the info coming while her account was in time-out.  Carolyn, thanks for all your efforts! Your tweets helped tremendously to follow along. (Generally tweets I quote but are not identified as from another source came from Carolyn and I trust that my quoting her in what follows does not stray from Fair Use.)

Also be aware that there were times when the participants split up into breakout sessions so if you see tweets sent at about the same time but on very different topics that is probably what is happening.

Moving on from the reporting to the “conversation” the first thing that impressed me was the theological breadth represented by those tweeting from The Gathering. In particular there are several people I know that I don’t think were at the meeting to sign up for the New Reformed Body but were checking out the Gathering for other reasons. I trust that they will provide their thought in the blogosphere in the near future. Based on the Twitter activity I make a back-of-the-envelope calculation that about 5-10% (100-200 people) of those present probably held viewpoints contrary to the view of orthodoxy the Fellowship seems to be promoting.

In addition, I was pleased to see at least three of the “big four” from the General Assembly at the meeting.  The GA Moderator and Vice-Moderator were there — Moderator Cynthia Bolbach made some well-received comments towards the end of the meeting, judging by the tweets, and Vice-Moderator Landon Whitsitt was his usual self providing a nice stream of insightful comments throughout the meeting. (More on this later) If I understood the tweets correctly, GA Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons was also in attendance and spoke briefly — as Seth Normington (@revnormsy) put it “Brief, rather opaque comments from ga stated clerk, gradye parsons. Nice of him to attend. Blessings, good sir.” There was no mention of GAMC Executive Director Linda Valentine being present and likewise but I saw no identification that anyone else from the GAMC was in attendance. [Update: Thanks to Jody Harrington’s comment below where she commented that Linda Valentine was at the conference. The text above has been adjusted appropriately.]

That leads me into a few observations about the meeting gleaned pretty much exclusively from the tweets:

  • Besides the breakout sessions there were also discussion groups. It looks like the higher governing body professionals and officers were grouped together in their own groups. I did not see an explanation of this and am curious why.
  • Carmen Fowler LaBerge (@csfowler2003) informs us “#mn2011 registration info: 950 clergy; 575 elders; 53 church administrators; 20 PCUSA staff; 68 presbytery execs. 300 didn’t indicate.” (That would be 1966 total)
  • Carolyn also tweeted the answer to one of the nagging questions I had: “Primary diff from New Wineskins – tone.” Another time a speaker is quoted as saying “I felt like New Wineskins got hijacked by angry people.”
  • Leslie Scanlon (@lscanlon) of the Outlook provides us with some of the descriptions of where the conservatives feel they or the denomination is – “Some metaphors used at #MN2011. Deathly ill. Stuck in a box canyon. Car sunk in swimming pool. #pcusa”
  • Because it is Twitter with a 140 character limit the acronyms were flying. Two that I had to recalibrate my brain for were NRB – which to this group means New Reformed Body but I normally think of as National Religious Broadcasters – and the FOP (or FoP) – which of course here means Fellowship of Presbyterians but in my day job is a professional organization.
  • There were questions from afar about the diversity in the Gathering but I did not see the questions answered.  However, at one point Carolyn tweets this telling comment “Potty parity at #mn2011! First time in my life I’ve ever seen a line at the men’s room but sailed through the ladies’!”

Going back to that bullet point about the tone of this group, I was struck by how positive the official portion of the meeting was.  That did not completely extend to the Twitterverse, but I’ll talk about that below. Based on the 140 character reports the leadership of the FOP is in communication with, and maybe even working with, the OGA leadership.  It was also made clear that  “we are not calling anybody apostate,” and “will not seek to demonize the #PCUSA in any manner.” And one final quote on this – “One of the ways this won’t be a spin off to a new denom (quickly), is b/c we don’t want to lose relationships w/people we love.”

Two big topics at this meeting that are inexorably linked are the New Reformed Body and theological beliefs, usually referred to as the Essential Tenets of the Reformed Faith.

Coming into the meeting the FOP had made it clear that the NRB (yes, I can throw acronyms around too ) was going to happen but that there were a lot of details to be worked out.  The impression I got from the Twitter reporting and discussion is that enough details have to be worked out and now this is a train that has left the station and is headed for the announced constitutional convention January 12-14, 2012, in Orlando. But the FOP clearly hopes for the NRB to continue in some form of partnership with the PC(USA).  One comment was “the degree to which the NRB can relate back to the PCUSA, and we hope it can, baptisms, ordinations, permeable boundary.” Another said “hopefully we can share some HQ functions – missions, theology and worship…” One of the themes I found most helpful was the description of what they are about in this sequence of tweets from Carolyn: “like-minded church to unite around a common purpose. from Phil 2:1-2,” “we’ve created such a broad tent that there’s no center pole. we need to establish essentials again,” and “need to make clear abt what’s at the center rather than police the
boundaries, so people can determine if it’s a good fit for them.”

Related to this is the question of standards.  At the Gathering the NRB was described as an “empty warehouse” waiting to be filled.  That is to be done this Fall when draft documents are posted on the web site, regional gatherings are held, and they are finalized at the constitutional convention in January.  There is a clear intent to define or state the Essential Tenets of the Reformed Faith. But this led to a lot of Twitter conversation about the standards.  There were comments about the return of subscription. While not necessarily advocating subscription, @BenjaminPGlaser, who was at the meeting, asked in a tweet “I wonder how many of the ministers/ruling elders at #mn2011 could affirm the WCF w/out major qualification…” (WCF is of course the Westminster Confession of Faith, a document that Presbyterians historically have included in the standards that needed to be subscribed to.) There were also references to Machen, particularly his final sermon recently republished in Theology Matters. To that TwoFriars commented “Machen’s fundamentals are NOT Reformed essentials, FYI.” Along a similar line Landon Whitsitt (@landonw) commented “I’m struggling to reconcile the fact that the “essentials of faith” being thrown out at #mn2011 are classicly Evangelical, not Reformed.” Craig Goodwin (@craiggoodwin) had a number of thoughtful comments about standards and in response to Landon asked ” …are Evangelical, not Reformed. Can’t be both?” It will be interesting to see what this discussion produces throughout the Fall leading up to the January meeting.

Going forward I suspect the real hard questions will not revolve around the theology, although they probably should, but around the “Three P’s”, yes pensions, property and power.  To put it bluntly – can you take it with you when you leave?  From the Q&A portion of a presentation on the NRB Carolyn tweeted “lots of Qs about per capita, pensions, etc. A – we’re not giving answers
at this point, don’t want to get tangled in the details.”  This turned out to be a bit deeper than it seems — they put off some of the discussion of details to a breakout on Friday but they are also putting off details until the relationship of the NRB with the PC(USA) is more clearly defined.

I want to look at this topic of the relationship between the NRB and the PC(USA) in more detail another time after the presentation videos are posted and I have had a chance to digest them.  Let me just say here that three possible models were proposed: 1) This might be accomplished with union presbyteries – a polity solution that already exists. [ed. note – I should have seen that before now!] 2) Create the category of affiliate churches or affiliate presbyteries like the current affiliate members. Requires new polity language. 3) Leave completely.  Regarding this, Carolyn quotes Jim Singleton: “Singleton – yes, this is gonna be messy!!”

Now, a couple of weeks ago in my pre-Gathering piece I suggested that this event was a Rorschach Test for those who had issues with the PC(USA).  Well, I see now that I was right in concept but wrong in scope.  This event was a Rorschach Test for the whole PC(USA) and maybe even for American Presbyterianism more broadly. But after the broad reaction that the very first Fellowship letter last February engendered I should have expected that.

Departing from Twitter for a moment it is important to note that groups with opposite views have posted very specific pieces on their web sites interpreting or making suggestions related to the Gathering.  More Light Presbyterians issued a call to prayer for the meeting and a related article.  Individually, Janet Edwards offered a suggestion to the FOP ahead of the Gathering, as did Shawn Coons, and Adam Walker Cleaveland wanted to make sure the elephant in the room got named. Clearly this meeting had a lot of people’s attention across the denomination.

So back to Twitter and the meeting…

First, in the interest of full disclosure I would comment that I (@ga_junkie) did not tweet much but did make the one comment I discussed above that could have been considered snarky, and also a second that could be taken that way as well.  Early on Andrew Johnson (@AndrewJohnsonYM) tweeted “New reformed body… no brand but Christ” which I retweeted adding “Starting to sound like the Springfield Presbytery”. (If you need the reference, Springfield Presbytery was part of the Stone-Campbell Movement that left the Presbyterians two centuries ago proclaiming “No creed but Christ” and led to the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). )

The vast majority of Twitter comments I saw were constructive and contributed to the social media discussion.  Yes, a lot may have had a snarky edge to them, but I found few offensive and there was a general improvement in tone when the organizers made it clear that this new group was not about demonizing the PC(USA).

Yet most of the comments, my own included, seemed to clearly reflect the lens through which the writer was viewing the Gathering.  Exempli gratia:

DavidIvie1 David Ivie
#mn2011 why would a group convene to protest gay ordination and then on day one celebrate women’s ordination? no sense of irony?

David_Berge
David Berge
#mn2011 lots of people talk about “post-denominationalism” 4 better or worse #fellowshippres is actually doing something about it

rwilliamsonjr Robert Williamson Jr
If you want to leave, I will
bid you peace. If you want to stay, I will embrace you. But I can’t
relate to the leave-but-stay option

Stushie57
John Stuart
The future of the Church is in Christ’s good hands, not conferees nor ordinands.

joyousjava Lara B Pickrel
Sometimes our churches’ panicky attempts to keep people from leaving (for the sake of numbers) feels like idolatry.

craiggoodwin
Craig Goodwin
Pleasantly surprised by tone and focus of #mn2011. Did it take finally losing the vote for Presby evangelicals to get focused on mission?

Reading the events through our own lens or filter is not inherently an issue.  It is what shapes our diversity and understanding of the world and the conversation and listening process for others helps us to not only see alternatives but can help us refine, sharpen or adapt our own perspective.  Along those lines I have to point out and say how much I appreciated the tweets from Landon Whitsitt (@landonw) who was multi-tasking and reporting on the proceedings through both his open source lens as well as his progressive lens. This tweet captures his dual perspective:

Okay…I’m putting my cards on the table. Except for including GLBT
persons, I want a church that looks like what I’m hearing at #mn2011

Let me conclude by saying that in spite of some sharp comments in the Twitterverse I was generally very impressed by the depth, breadth, level, volume, tone, thoughtfulness and civility of the Twitter conversation around this event.  But the operative word here is “around.” While the live tweeting helped me know what was going on I still feel that I am looking through a glass dimly related to where this is going. The quotes that were passed on and the sessions reported on still seemed to reflect the influence of the core group of tall-steeple pastors. There seemed to be lots and lots of discussion of a New Reformed Body but I did not sense how that might have been informed or moderated by Dr. Mouw’s comments regarding why we need each other. And I am still left with the impression that tail number four may be wagging this dog. But this is only what I see from my remote vantage point via the Twitterverse.

So, as this moves on I am looking forward to several things. First, I want to see the videos when they get posted on the Fellowship site so I have the primary sources for much of this information and I can judge for myself. Second, I await written accounts from those who were there – something longer than 140 characters. (The Presbyterian Outlook has already posted several articles by Leslie Scanlon including ones on the lead off presentations, Richard Mouw’s message, the talk by Ken Bailey, and an initial summary. There are similarly one, two, three and four articles from the Presbyterian News Service.  In addition, it looks like Two Friars and a Fool are aggregating blog posts on the Gathering but I would single out Jim Miller’s which is getting a lot of Twitter recommendations.) Once I have a chance to view, read, think and digest I anticipate being ready to make some more comments about the content of the meeting.

Looking out a bit further the real test of this model as the open source community that Landon is looking at will be in the process for posting, consulting, editing and approving the new documents for the New Reformed Body.  At this point I am pretty much trusting Landon’s impression of the proceedings so far in its promise for development of a Covenant Community in a participatory environment.

Looking even further ahead, there is a good possibility that both the New Reformed Body’s partnership with the PC(USA) as well as developments in the other FOP streams will require actions by the 220th General Assembly and changes to the Book of Order. Leslie Scanlon captured this quote from Mark Brewer:

“This next General Assembly is going to be wild.”

I look forward to seeing how the development process works and what product it results in.  I also look forward to seeing how the broader church reacts as this progresses.  This has the promise of being new territory — I like an experiment and I hope you do too.  Stay tuned…

Between A Rock And A Hard Place

Leave a reply

Well, it is not exactly Scylla and Charybdis, but the Mid-Atlantic states of the U.S. found themselves in the shaking of a moderate earthquake Tuesday while keeping a watchful eye on Hurricane Irene.

I want to talk about the relative risks later in this post, but first a little bit on the earthquake itself.

As you can probably imagine Tuesday was an interesting day at work for me.  The day began with hearing about the other significant earthquake in Colorado. When I heard about it on the radio I was expecting it to be a bit further west in the more active seismic belt where I have worked (fifth from top and third from bottom if you really care).  But I found it was to the east along the front of the Rocky Mountains.  An interesting location but not completely unexpected.

Then about 11 AM PDT my computer ground to a halt.  Checking around I found that my Twitter feed for earthquakes had gone crazy and that a 5.8 had occurred back on the east coast.  At about the same time my email sprung alive with notes from college friends with questions or comments.  Now here was an interesting event. And it was the largest earthquake globally on Tuesday.

For a comparison of this earthquake to previous eastern US events you can have a look at the USGS Historic Earthquake list.  The largest east coast earthquake is the 1886 Charleston, SC, earthquake at 7.3 and there are no other east coast earthquakes over 7 on the list. There are no earthquakes on the list in the magnitude 6 range. The next earthquake is an 1897 event in western Virginia which appears to still hold the record as the largest earthquake in the state. In total there are thirteen earthquakes in the magnitude 5 range in the coastal states.  Then there are seven more earthquakes for which there is not complete enough information to accurately estimate a magnitude, but we know that the intensity of shaking was strong enough that we can safely consider them to also be in the magnitude 5 or larger range.

So, for the eastern seaboard that are 21 earthquakes in about 300 years or an average of one earthquake about every 14 years. The previous one? Nine years ago in northern New York.

It is interesting to look at the seismic hazard map for the contiguous United States.  An experienced Presbyterian will appreciate the seismic hazard zones for the central and eastern US.  With only a few exceptions we don’t know where major deep faults are and which of the myriad of faults are inactive and which might be reactivated. Therefore, where there is higher seismic hazard is where something has happened in the past, just like some sections of the Book of [Church] Order are there because something happened. In that part of the world seismic hazard analysis is reactive.

The western US is a different story.  We think we know where active faults are, can measure their activity and put hazard estimates on specific geologic features and not just broad areas. Hazard zones are more narrowly defined and we believe have better known values.

So with that quick intro to seismic hazard estimation, lets consider how it compares to other natural hazards.  The bottom line for much of the country is that earthquakes are the least of your worries.

A good comparison comes from an analysis by Barton and Nishenko for the USGS. They find that for the United States the probability of having 10 fatalities for an event in a given year is 11% for an earthquake, 39% for a hurricane, 86% for floods, and 96% for tornadoes. For a graphical representation of where you would expect these consider this map from Insurance Center Associates. There is a similar one from the New York Times. (And it is worth pointing you to Robert Simmon’s critique of how this map represents the data.)

Now, let me make what will seem at first to be a quantum leap…

One of the thing’s I appreciate about our Reformed heritage is the concept of Vocation. What this means in my field is that when I talk to people about earthquakes I recognize that there are usually emotional issues underlying many of the questions they ask me.  In a sense, I am not just an earthquake geologist but I become a counselor or therapist as well.  In other words, I am doing ministry in a particular and unique way.

What I have found in doing this is that to a given individual the type of natural disaster is just as important as the risk of a disaster itself.  It is clear to me from talking with dozens of people that the different numbers only matter to a point and that people have different personal comfort levels with different types of risks. This is brought home nicely in a split-panel cartoon that ran right after the Northridge Earthquake — in one panel a guy is up to his eye balls in snow reading a newspaper headline saying “Earthquake hits California” and in the other panel a Californian, with debris behind him, is reading the headline “Record Cold Grips Northeast.” And each of them is thinking “Why would anyone live there?”

Why would anyone live in earthquake country? Because they don’t like tornadoes, hurricanes or blizzards.  Likewise, I know people who have left California for the Midwest because they are more comfortable with tornadoes than earthquakes.  Some people like predictability. Some hate waiting for the unknown in a tornado warning and would rather not have the suspense and have an earthquake hit out of the blue.  Some have a sense of security knowing that hurricanes have a season when they hit and you get two days notice.  Some would rather have an earthquake and get it over with.  I think that I have heard it all.

Likewise I sometimes wonder if different Presbyterians have preferences for different risks in the church. I will leave the development of that idea as an exercise for the reader.

So to those between the rocking of the earthquake and the hard place of the hurricane, may you know God’s solid presence in the midst of earth’s uncertainty. To all of those who are in the path of Irene, whether it has already gone through you or is still headed your way, we lift our prayers.  To those in the epicentral region of the earthquake we pray that your damage is not substantial and is easily repaired and give thanks that there was no loss of life and no serious injuries. To those currently meeting in Minneapolis we pray that no tornadoes will go through town. And to all affected by the many different types of natural disasters we pray for God’s comfort and peace for you in the midst of it.

Fellowship PC(USA) Gathering — Some Things To Pay Attention To

8 Replies

I have to admit that for the purposes of blogging I was not really tracking the Fellowship PC(USA) Gathering too closely.  Yes, I knew it was coming up but I did not have it ranked too high on the news scale of the stories I was tracking. It struck me as a bit of a New Wineskins redo and instead I have been struggling to stay on top of other news items, especially in the midst of General Assembly Season.

Now, this may seem contradictory, but in the interest of full disclosure let me also say that personally I have been very curious about the Fellowship gathering and how it fits into the PC(USA) big picture at the present time.  In fact I was interested enough, and the questions in my own congregation were numerous enough, that I very seriously considered attending. However, family commitments are keeping me home that weekend and it seemed a long way to go for a two day meeting.

Having now put my cards on the table, I will continue by saying that I have changed my mind and now consider this something that all of us in the PC(USA) need to be watching.

What changed my mind? First, the size.

At the present time the Fellowship PC(USA) is saying that they have pre-registered an overflow crowd of 1900 attendees.  Checking some numbers, it seems that this will be the largest gathering in the PC(USA) this year, and I think it will make it one of the largest gatherings of Presbyterians in the world this year.

How big? Not as big as a PC(USA) General Assembly, but the PC(USA) Big Tent gathering had an announced attendance of around 1700.  The NEXT Church event was 350.  The PCA General Assembly had 1,183 commissioners and the Church of Scotland GA had around 800 commissioners.  For the GA’s, if we make a rough estimate that observers are about the same number as commissioners that puts their total attendance in the same ball park as the Fellowship PC(USA) is expecting. In the PC(USA), 1,900 members would represent almost one in every thousand of the total membership. If you want to consider congregations, the 830 congregations expected to have representatives make up about 8% of the PC(USA) churches.

Is it a minority? Yes. Is it significant? In light of the size of other gatherings I think it is.  The material from the Fellowship says “The initial planners thought there might be a few hundred people interested in new ways of ‘being church’…” This event has evolved into something bigger.

So lets be honest – to bring together the largest gathering of Presbyterians this year with a six-month lead time says something about the state of the PC(USA). However, I think it says more about the uncertainty some members of the PC(USA) feel than it necessarily says about the new organization itself.

Why do I say this?  Consider the developments in that time.  The Fellowship PC(USA) launched with a letter and a white paper which quickly needed some clarifications added to it. Early on there was a video by the Rev. Jim Singleton talking about a “new kind of fellowship” as a group mostly within the PC(USA), but maybe some outside it, and advertises it as an idea to be presented to the Fellowship gathering.  There is also an interesting video by Rev. Singleton where he takes credit for the “deathly ill” phrase and gives the explanation behind it.  Then in May, with the impending passage of Amendment 10-A, the Fellowship issued another letter that said “we are committed to starting a new Reformed Body without leaving the PC(USA).”  So having a portion of the Fellowship outside but in correspondence with the PC(USA) had been de-emphasized.  (Although it should be noted that one of the signatories to that letter is Head of Staff at a church that is now exploring dismissal, but keep reading because this letter has been superseded.)  The Fellowship also announced the hiring of the Rev. Dr. Paul Detterman as Administrative Consultant for the Fellowship.  On June 24 they announced that the main room had reached capacity and that registrations were going to be taken for an overflow room bringing the total possible registration to 1,450.

At about that time another letter was posted with new goals for the Fellowship.  They say:

The goal of the Fellowship is to form a new way for Presbyterian
congregations to relate, recapturing more of what it means to be the
body of Christ.  The mission of the Fellowship is to create an
environment in which these congregations can grow and thrive as
communities in covenant.

And they acknowledge that the landscape has changed:

While the original motivation for the Fellowship was a desire to
positively impact the decline and increasing dysfunction of the PC(USA),
the passage of Amendment 10-A has brought an enormous challenge into
the discussion.  Suddenly, a new reality has emerged in our
denomination, creating a crisis of integrity for Presbyterians who
remain committed to theological orthodoxy.

And the new Reformed Body outside the PC(USA) was back on the table:

One option under the Fellowship umbrella will be a new Reformed body
that, while desiring to maintain mutually helpful association with the
PC(USA) and its related institutions, will nonetheless provide a clear
and distinct identity beyond the PC(USA).  Documents required for the
creation of this new Reformed body are in process.

And in an interesting admission they say “We believe the new Form of Government (nFoG) provides specific options previously unavailable to us, and we are exploring these.” And somewhere about this time the name changed from the Fellowship PC(USA) to Fellowship of Presbyterians. (For reference, the new domain name fellowship-pres.org was acquired on August 11) [Update: The Fellowship discussed their new name and logo on August 16.]

The final step in this prologue to the meeting was a letter from the Administrative Consultant titled “What to expect in Minneapolis…”  I will return to this in just a moment.

It is important to also recognize that while this may be the most high-profile effort under way there are numerous other initiatives floating around.  One of these is the creation of Presbytery Committees of Correspondence. (News coverage by the Presbyterian Outlook, The Layman) (And for those not familiar with the term, “Committees of Correspondence” is a loaded term going back to the American Revolution)  In another development the Presbytery of San Diego has created an Administrative Commission to work with churches interested in moving their membership to them as a like-minded presbytery, “if the way be clear,” effectively forming a flexible, semi-geographic, or “fuzzy-boundary” (as I like to call it) presbytery.

So, in this present landscape what should we be watching for at the Fellowship Gathering? In looking this over I see a Rorschach Test in all of this – if there are 2000 people there will there be 2000 different opinions and expectations?  Has the Gathering come to represent a visible way of expressing protest or uncertainty about the PC(USA) without enough common vision?  In his recent letter Mr. Detterman admits as much:

As the spring progressed, however, and it became clear that ordination
standards and a significant portion of the Book of Order would be
changed, the August Gathering became the go-to place for many more
people with a wide range of different needs and concerns.  As the number
of registrations grew, so did people’s expectations.  Now with well
over 1,900 people attending, the “gathering” appears to have morphed
into a “happening.”

and

The 830+ congregations sending representatives have many different
needs.  Some are looking for a “safe” place in the wake of changed
ordination standards.  Others are looking for innovation and
opportunities for missional engagement.  Some are committed to
continuing long-term relationships with the PC(USA) while others will be
seeking assistance toward an expedient departure.  People who are
coming to Minneapolis looking for an ecclesiastical “silver bullet,” an
instant solution that calms the waters of their ministry will be
disappointed.

With that introduction the letter gives four things, or “tiers,” to expect:

First, for those happy, content, or accepting of where they are the gathering will be offering “ideas and options for nurturing Christ-honoring ministry in place.”

Second, some attendees will be interested in innovative and creative changes in presbytery structure. “A few of these models will be explained and explored.”

Third, for congregations not in a comfortable place in their presbytery “new possibilities for “affiliate” congregations will be introduced.” This will also include discussion of possible changes to be sent to the 220th General Assembly.

Finally, there is the option of a “new Reformed Body,” now explicitly distinct from the PC(USA). This goes on to say:

The idea is to recapture our core identity, believing that Reformed
theology has much to say to our contemporary culture, and that Calvin’s
original vision for the nature and role of presbyteries offers a better
way of relating to one another than most of us are experiencing now.  In
forming this new Reformed “body,” there is also the opportunity to move
with imagination and energy into the reality of a post-denominational
world.

The letter is clear that no votes will be taken at this meeting.  The letter says “We will be presenting a carefully-designed range of options, all covered
by a large “umbrella” of shared commitment to Jesus Christ, to God’s
mission in the world, and to each other.  Discernment and intelligent,
Christ-honoring discussion will be the heart and soul of our time
together.”

I have to think that there are a few more possibilities out there as well so it will be interesting what comes to the surface and what ideas and reports come out of the Gathering.

It will also be interesting to see what reaction there is from outside the Gathering.  There has been a bit so far from beyond the Fellowship’s sphere of influence.  Shawn Coons has written encouraging them to honor the statement on the web site that their actions be “mutually helpful association with the PC(USA) and its related institutions.”  An article from The Christian Century anticipates a strong preference for the fourth option above in a piece titled “Lull before another Presbyterian storm?“

I do want to point you to one more video before I go.  One of the keynote speakers at the Gathering is Dr. Richard Mouw, President of Fuller Theological Seminary.  He was gracious enough to take the time and speak with my presbytery and I understand that he has been speaking to others as well.  Los Ranchos Presbytery heard him and posted the video of his hour-long talk.  It is not exactly the same as what he discussed with us, but his perspective and passionate argument for staying together as a denomination make the video well worth watching.  (At our presbytery meeting he spoke more about practical ways that we could work out to stay together.)

So, I look forward to hearing about this gathering from a distance.  The official Twitter account for the Fellowship is @fellowshippcusa [Update: changed to @fellowshippres] and the announced hashtag is #MN2011. We will see who else is tweeting and blogging from the event. And as it goes, maybe we will have enough pieces of a large jigsaw puzzle to start finding a picture emerging.

[As a postscript let me point out that the Presbyterian Outlook was working on this event in very similar directions as I was and got their stuff posted over the weekend.  They have (at least) one article about the Gathering, another on the mixed signals, and an editorial.]

Two PC(USA) GAPJC Decisions On Ordination Standards — A Plate Of Polity, Doctrine On The Side…

4 Replies

Today the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) released their decisions in two closely watched remedial cases.  One reason for the high-profile nature of the cases is the fact that they began their lives with G-6.0106b, the “fidelity and chastity” language, in the Book of Order, but as of last month that language has been removed and modified in the new G-2.0104b. Does the change in language make the cases moot?  The GAPJC said yes… and no.

If you want the summary and outcomes, here you go:

The case of Session of Caledonia Presbyterian Church and others v. Presbytery of John Knox deals with the examination for ordination of Mr. Scott Anderson.  The key quote in this decision is:

The Motion to Dismiss Appeal as Moot is granted, and the Stay of Enforcement is lifted. The only alleged irregularities set out in Appellants’ Notice of Appeal cite G-6.0106b and Authoritative Interpretations of that section as the basis of their Appeal. The language of that section was removed from the Book of Order prior to the GAPJC hearing of the Appeal. In granting this motion, this Commission declines to rule upon the application of a provision of the Book of Order that no longer exists. Nothing in this Decision should be construed to interpret the ordination standards under the new Form of Government, as that issue is not before the Commission.

The second case is that of Parnell and others v. Presbytery of San Francisco and results from the examination to ordain Ms. Lisa Larges.  This case was not dismissed but eight of the specifications of error were not sustained for the same reason the Anderson case was dismissed. Where this was different is that doctrine was cited as an irregularity.  The decision says:

The record does not reflect that the SPJC ruled on the Appellants’ contention that Scripture and the Confessions prohibit certain sexual behavior. While the Appellants’ complaint was based primarily on G-6.0106b, the Appellants clearly and consistently presented arguments at trial on the basis of scriptural and confessional standards without objection by the Presbytery. Since the doctrinal issue is central to the Appellants’ case, it was error for the SPJC not to expressly rule upon the issue.

The case is remanded back to the Synod of the Pacific PJC and the SPJC is “encouraged to direct the Presbytery to reexamine the candidate under G-2.0104b.”

OK, that’s the bottom line.  Now polity wonks, lets do some more reading.

Regarding the Caledonia v. John Knox decision what is striking to me is that while the decision itself is just the dismissal and relatively straight-forward, I did after all give you the complete Decision in the quote above, this is a longer decision.  Of the 15 commissioners on the GAPJC (there is one vacant position) eight signed on to one of the three concurring comments and five signed at least one of the dissenting comments. (One commissioner signed both dissenting comments.) So a lot of the commissioners wanted to say something and these additional comments essentially triple the length of the decision.

The concurring comments included commentary on how the General Assembly had issued a flawed Authoritative Interpretation, how the Commission could not consider broader issues than G-6.0106b because they were not raised in the appeal, how the Presbytery should have started over with Anderson under the new Book of Order language as suggested, and how some commissioners would have preferred to have affirmed the SPJC decision rather than dismiss the case.

The dissenting comments focus on how the SPJC decision is flawed because it did not address the doctrinal arguments (like the SPJC decision in the Larges case) and the flawed nature of the GA AI.

The catch of course is that while these statements were made in the decision, since the case was dismissed they do not raise to the standard of Interpretation.  However, the tension over the AI from the General Assembly that allowed scrupling of practice as well as belief has been substantial and that issue is reflected in the concurrence by Copeland, Kim, Cramer and Cornman says:

While we find the “Knox AI” to be flawed, we believe that the Presbytery acted in good faith when it based its decisions on its interpretation of that Authoritative Interpretation of G-6.0108 adopted by the 218th General Assembly (2008). G-13.0103r of the Form of Government in force at the time of the contested ordination examination states, “The most recent interpretation of a provision of the Book of Order shall be binding.” In this case this would be the Knox AI. The flaw of the Knox AI, however, is that it fails to recognize that any AI, regardless of who issues it, cannot modify a specific requirement of the Book of Order. An AI can interpret the Constitution but the only way to modify such an explicit requirement (G-6.0106b) is through the amendment process.

The decision in Parnell v. John Knox is more extensive, but eight of the eleven specifications of error are dismissed because “the constitutional provisions under which the Candidate was examined are no longer part of the Constitution.”  A ninth was dismissed because they found that the record did not sustain the claim that the presbytery itself departed from the Essential Tenants of the Reformed Faith by approving the candidate. There were two specifications of error regarding the SPJC not dealing with the doctrinal issues raised and only dealing with process. These are the errors that were sustained.  I have quoted the relevant portion of the decision above where the GAPJC points out that “the Appellants clearly and consistently presented arguments at trial on the basis of scriptural and confessional standards without objection by the Presbytery.”  The GAPJC decision is careful to also note that “In sustaining this specification of error, this Commission is not ruling on whether doctrinal error or abuse of discretion occurred, but only that it is not evident from the language of the decision whether or not the SPJC ruled upon this matter.”

There is a concurring opinion by one commissioner who expresses caution that review of ordaining bodies decisions should be done carefully:

The protocol for review by an appellate body needs, therefore, to be very prudently limited to those cases in which either an ordaining body or a Permanent Judicial Commission has very clearly erred or the process is so defective as to have deprived one of the parties of due process, such that there are extraordinary reasons for reversal. The duty of a reviewing body is to be discharged with caution and great deference.

He says that the only reason he can concur is because the recommendation is to have the presbytery do the examination again under the new standard.

There is also a dissent by three commissioners who feel there are no grounds to have the doctrine arguments reviewed by the SPJC: “For an appellate body to be empowered to micromanage the ordination process without there being extraordinary reasons would be ill-advised.”  They conclude their comments with the economic argument:

Both parties urged this Commission not to remand this case for further hearings as they recognized that to do so would not only cause significant and unnecessary expense to the church, but would also result in no difference in outcome. This Commission is charged with securing th
e “economical determination of proceedings.” We believe that sending the case back to the SPJC does not accomplish that charge.

A couple of things jump out to me in these decisions:

1) Previous GAPJC decisions regarding ordination standards seem to have been crafted so that members of the GAPJC were unanimous, or nearly so, in the decision. The decisions give the appearance that this was done by focusing on the process.  The variety of voices heard in these decisions, particularly the Caledonia v. John Knox, strikes me as a shift in tone and there is no longer an emphasis on high-consensus decisions.  It may be the change in circumstances with the passage of 10-A.  It might have to do with the fact that these cases have reached a level of maturity that all the procedural issues have been beaten out of them and they are now down to the core doctrinal issues.  Or it may be that the church as a whole has reached a point where we need to start taking these issues seriously.  I don’t know if others agree but looking over these decisions I sense a change in tone from previous ones.

2) Related to that, these decisions appear to me to be sending a message that the GAPJC  is ready to start dealing with those issues, maybe even wanting to based on some of the writing.  The feeling is not unanimous, as a couple of the minority comments argue for leaving those issues to the presbyteries.  But one concurring decision in the Caledonia v. John Knox case says:

Additionally, the Appellants, while arguing on appeal a scriptural basis for overturning the Presbytery’s action, failed to include such arguments in either their original complaint or the specification of errors. These omissions meant that this Commission was unable to address issues broader than the application of G-6.0106b in its Decision.

They almost seem to be lamenting the fact that they wanted to deal with this but could not work on that problem because of the structure of the appeal.

Now, there is an opinion that differs from mine regarding this, but as I read these decisions it seems to me that the GAPJC is saying it might be time to examine the doctrine at the highest level.  The caveat they place is that it needs to be done decently and in order by properly arguing it at the court of first impressions and by properly appealing it in the brief.

So the bottom line – In Mr. Anderson’s case the process has concluded.  The stay of enforcement is lifted and he is cleared to be ordained.  As for Ms. Larges, the process continues.  There will be another trial before the SPJC on the doctrinal issues, there will probably be another examination for ordination before the presbytery based on the new Book of Order language, and I would suspect another appeal to the GAPJC following the new SPJC hearing.  While this extends a very long journey even further, the apparent benefit to many of us in this upcoming cycle will the the opportunity to actually have the GAPJC rule on the doctrine and not just the process.  Stay tuned…

[Update: Note the comment below by the Rev Mary Holder Naegeli who was in the midst of this case. 1) The remand does not necessarily mean a reopening of the trial, 2) doctrine was discussed by the PJC in the proceedings but not in the decision, 3) The GAPJC consensus seemed to be that they would not accept the case for review another time.  Thanks Mary.]

“The Medium Is The Message”… Again

2 Replies

Well, I am back on the grid after a series of trips and time in the wilderness – a literal wilderness not a spiritual one.  I have a number of ideas outlined from this time of camping, work and reflection and hope to get them worked up as blog posts shortly.  This includes some thoughts on Landon Whitsitt’s book Open Source Church, which played into what I want to talk about today.

In my brief time back on the grid a bit over a week ago the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) released the PDF version of the new Book of Order and initially charged for it.  This was a break from tradition, both for the PC(USA) specifically as well as for Presbyterian and Reformed Churches in general. There was an initial uproar about it and a few days later the decision was reversed. As Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons tweeted (@gradyemp) “I will confess that we have not explained well the move to charge for the download.” With that the controversy quickly died down — We have returned to normal and all is right with the world again.

First, thanks to all who wrote me with the update that the download was once again free. I did catch it just before going off the grid again but did not have time to properly respond.  Now I have had a chance to reflect on this a bit.

Some observations:

1. Once again “the medium is the message” and the medium now is Twitter.  I have found it interesting how quickly a topic can get circulated via Twitter.  As one article says, “Twitter Does Not Supplant Other Media, It Amplifies It.”  This change was quickly amplified on Twitter and that is where the majority of the questions, answers, guesses and complaints were circulated, all in 140 characters or less.

2. As I indicated in my initial response the move to charge crossed a line that I am not aware that any other Presbyterian or Reformed denomination had previously crossed. (Please correct me if I missed one.) This does not mean that the PC(USA) should not have taken this route.  The fact that they started down this road, even if they quickly turned back, is an indication that cost recovery needs to come from somewhere, especially if sales of hard copies are dropping as more people acquire the electronic version. If the Book of Order is to support itself then as sale of print copies decreases it only makes sense to charge for the electronic copies. I am pretty sure that was the rational behind the move. The other alternative is that initial publication costs be funded through per capita.

3. As the quote from the Stated Clerk above indicates the move was not done well. Again, the medium is the message. In addition to the change being made with no advance warning or interpretation the license terms of the new version were not explained.  The copyright notice it carries is the same as the print version.  Does that mean that I have to pay $10 for every computer I want to store it on? Can I store it in the cloud on something like Dropbox or Google Docs? Can all the ruling elders in a single household use the same download copy? Can a church, presbytery or synod office pay for one copy for the administrative and ecclesiastical personnel to share? Should it contain DRM measures to control the use?  I could keep on going.  While the questions are currently moot the issue is that the world has changed and that electronic use agreements can not be the same boiler plate we are used to in the paper copyright statements.

4. A couple brief quotes from Landon Whitsitt’s book are applicable here:

In so many areas of church organizational life, I believe that part of the problem we in the church have is that we unreflectively mimic what we see played out in the business world. “Business” is hard to avoid because it affects so much of our lives. [p. 148]

and

But when we employ modern business practices unreflectively, we begin to internalize the value systems from which those practices spring. [p. 149]

Now, those familiar with the book may comment that the book deals with orgaization and leadership while this controversy has to do with the sale of a document.  True enough, but in making the decision to start charging for it did the organization reflect on why to charge or was it reduced to a “business decision.”

5. Speaking of Open Source Church, when I saw that The Book of Order download was no longer free my first reaction was that somehow violated open source principles. (And I was not the only one.) But it was only with a little reflection that I came to realize that the Book of Order does not even come close to the Open Source Definition.  Again, Landon had a lot to say about this as well.

Let me suggest that this incident says a lot more about how we operate than whether we are willing to shell out a few bucks for our constitutional document.  It says a lot about how we communicate with each other, or don’t communicate as the case may be.  As I suggest, if we have to pay for the paper version why should we not have to pay for the digital version. (Maybe the paper version should have a premium price to pay for the materials as well as the labor of putting it together.) But it also suggests that more thought needs to be put into the differences between an electronic and paper version in regards to how they are used.

Let me also suggest that the church as a whole should be open to new models.  How about an even more radical form of the Book of Order that I have not had time to pursue yet (so go ahead and run with this if you are interested). What if the Annotated Book of Order was online as a Wiki. Yes, it would require permission to upload all the text, but the idea is that the actual text and official annotations are displayed and locked, but us polity wonks generate additional commentary and discussion on the material.  It would be possible to include preceding versions of the text for historical perspective and language from other branches for comparison.  Think of it as sort of a Presbyterian polity midrash.

It is fascinating to view the interaction here of the top-down control structure and the new instantaneous bottom-up feedback made possible through social media.  The church needs to adjust to the media in many different aspects, if not embrace it, as the technology advances.