You can tell that my younger son has grown up in a Presbyterian family.  This past weekend he had a telling Freudian slip when he was reading a line in a presentation and instead of saying the correct word “obligation” he substituted the word “ordination.”

But when you get down to it much of the current discussion and debate in the Presbyterian church branches is around what it takes to be ordained an officer in the church and the standards for ordination and ordained officers.

The PC(USA) is wrapping up the vote rejecting the replacement of the “fidelity and chastity” section in the Book of Order.  There are also judicial cases (Paul Capetz, Lisa Larges) in process related to declaring exceptions.

The EPC will be discussing transitional and affinity presbyteries at its GA to accommodate the various theological positions permitted under their “local option” and “in non-essentials, liberty” regarding ordination of women as officers.

The PCA is actively debating and discussing women in helping ministries and when their role begins to be comparable to that of a man’s role as an ordained deacon.  (This issue has been developing so quickly that I have not had time to properly package it up for posting so here is only one of many recent news items on this topic.)

The moderator designate of the GA of the PCI has received some notoriety for his views that women should not be ordained ministers.

And as the Church of Scotland GA rapidly approaches the discussion continues over the call of a partnered gay man to a church in Aberdeen and the protest of that call to be heard by the Assembly as well as an overture clearly stating the standards for ordination and service.

With all of that GA business, an additional story has taken on a life of its own…

Over the weekend Adam Walker Cleaveland over at pomomusings wrote about “When an M.Div. from Princeton isn’t enough…” and his attempt to come under care of San Francisco Presbytery and the requirement from their Committee on Preparation for Ministry (CPM) to take six more classes to fulfill their education requirements even though he has the degree from a PC(USA) seminary.  Getting ordained has been a continuing struggle for him and this is only the latest speed-bump, road block, brick wall, on-coming train… you pick the metaphor.

I have known many people who had trouble with their CPM’s like this but what makes Adam’s current situation interesting is that his friend the Rev. Tony Jones, who has a soap box on beliefnet to broadcast this far and wide, has take up his cause and started a petition to support Adam.  It currently has 130 signatories.  In the blog entry Mr. Jones writes:

Few things piss me off as much as the sinful bureaucratic systems of
denominational Christianity. When rules and regulations trump common
sense, then the shark has officially been jumped.

But what gets
to me even more is that bright, competent, and pastorally experienced
persons like Adam continue to submit themselves to these sinful
systems. They assure me that it’s not for the health insurance or the
pension. They do it cuz they feel “called.” And if I hear another
person tell me that they’re sticking with their abusive denomination
because, “They’re my tribe,” I’m gonna go postal.

So, it’s time
for us to do something. It’s time for us, the body of Christ, to ordain
Adam. To that end, I’ve started a petition, beseeching Adam to quit the
PC(USA) ordination circus and to accept our ordination of him.

This led another friend of Tony’s (FOT?), PC(USA) minister John D’Elia to argue, among other things…

On the other hand, your friend may have erred in being unwilling to
demonstrate that he could take direction and counsel from a governing
body—something that I believe has a place in the context of the
American religious free market. In the PCUSA, the process of becoming
ordained is partly an exercise in learning healthy submission to peer
authority (I can see the eyes rolling back in your head). Now setting
aside the not-nearly-rare-enough instances where the submission
required is unhealthy, it’s not a bad lesson to learn. More
importantly, once candidates have completed (survived?) that process,
we have enormous freedom to live and serve as our own calling leads us.
It’s OK with me that we disagree on this point. That’s not the problem.

(I should add that Rev. D’Elia has posted an apology to Rev. Jones for drifting into a personal attack in this post.)

Tony Jones has a follow-up post where he writes:

I’ve got a bunch of people upset at me for encouraging my friend, Adam Walker-Cleaveland, to forsake the ordination process of the Presbyterian Church (USA) denomination. I even went so far as to post an online petition
to attempt to convince Adam to drop out of the PC(USA) process and
consider himself “ordained” by the Body of Christ — that is, by all of
his fellow believers.

and then he continues the discussion responding to the Rev. D’Elia.  It ends with a “To be continued…”

This publicity provided by Tony Jones has resulted in some additional articles about Adam’s situation and this discussion, including Out of Ur, neo-baptist, and koinonia.

Two observations on all of this:

1)  The ordination standards debate is nothing new.  It was part of the disagreement in American Presbyterianism that lead to the Old-side/New-side split of 1741.  The question there was over, wait for it, THEOLOGICAL EDUCATION and “religious experience.”  The Old-side Presbyterians were questioning the preparation and theology of the New-side Presbyterians being produced by the Log College, an educational institution sometimes pointed to as a predecessor of, yes, Princeton.  (Note the argument that there is not an administrative lineage between the two schools like the theological heritage they share.)  The more things change…

2)  “The governing bodies are separate and independent, but have such mutual relations that the act of one of them is the act of the whole church performed by it through the appropriate governing body.” [from PC(USA) Book of Order G-9.0103]

This one sentence is at the heart of these ordination debates in the Presbyterian Churches.  In Presbyterianism the idea is that once an individual has been ordained by one governing body the whole church recognizes that ordination.  This sets up an appropriate tension between individual ordaining bodies and the broader church to set standards for ordination so that others are comfortable accepting an officer ordained by another governing body.

This is not to say that once ordained you are a “free agent.”  On the contrary, you agree to the discipline of the church and if you stray from the church, its standards and its beliefs, the discipline of the church is to restore you and reconcile you with your brethren.  Again “the act of one of them is the act of the whole church.”

It is interesting that one of the important points in the discussion between Tony Jones and John D’Elia is that the Rev. Jones was ordained in the Congregational church and the Rev. D’Elia was ordained in the Presbyterian church and that is reflected in their views and arguments.  The role of the “institution” is at the heart of their discussion.

In most Presbyterian branches the Presbyteries are responsible for the admission, preparation and examination of candidates for the Ministry of Word and Sacrament.  In the PC(USA) there are certain national standards for education and written examinations in particular areas.  But the presbyteries are given some flexibility even in these to set their own standards for candidates.  That is where Adam is getting tripped up.  And because of the presbytery’s control and authority it is recommended, as Adam points out, that you do not switch presbytery of care during the process.  I can point to several cases I know of where that was nearly disastrous for candidates.  I also know of cases where an individual was not accepted into the process in one presbytery but was later accepted by another.  That is the nature of the Presbyterian system and on-balance we believe that it works. 

From my reading of Adam’s transcript I would have accepted his education with the exception of the weak area he notes himself (Greek exegesis).  But I’m not on a CPM or in the presbytery he wants to come under care of so I have to trust it to them.  So if/when he is finally ordained I do accept the actions of that presbytery as the “act of the whole church.”

Are there problems?  “All synods or councils, since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; and many have erred.” [Westminster Confession, XXXI, IV]  So yes, problems arise.  But that is also part of our Reformed theology that we are more likely to get it right as a group than we are individually.

Where this is getting difficult at the present time is in declaring exceptions to non-essentials.  While the PC(USA) still has “fidelity and chastity” in the constitution one part of the church considers it at least binding if not essential.  Clearly there are those with the view that just because it is in the constitution it does not mean it is binding or essential.  But there are some on both sides that do recognize that if something so clearly stated in the constitution can be “scrupled” that this at worst will lead to a breakdown of the trust relationship between ordaining bodies, and at best court cases over the obligation of one presbytery to accept the ordination of another when an exception has been declared.  It makes an end-run around the established system that holds us in tension and accountable to each other.

So we will see how all of these develop.  There is a lot to watch in the coming weeks.