Category Archives: governing bodies

Officers Of The Church — Prepetual Or Three-And-Out?

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In my recent reading I found a convergence of ideas that I want to spend some time musing about.  The basic theme of this is the nature of the ordained offices of Ruling Elder and Deacon in branches where the office is perpetual but the service on the local board is not.  I have not done a comprehensive survey of this point of Presbyterian polity but in my experience the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is the only branch I am aware of that has terms with limits as the only option, in their case six years, then requiring an individual to go off the board (session for elders, board of deacons for a deacon) for one year before serving again on that board.  For many branches, and historically for mainline American Presbyterians, once your are called as a Ruling Elder of the church you continue serving on the session without limit.  You can voluntarily step down due to personal circumstances, and if you move churches you remain an elder but you do not automatically go on to the new church’s session.  And usually there is a process to remove you from the session should circumstances warrant.  But it is not the case that you leave because “your time is up.”  (The exception there would be in the sense of joining the Church Triumphant.    )

Personally, my service as an elder on session lasted five years (I was first elected to fill a vacant partial term) and in the 12 years since I have not been invited back onto my church’s session.  I state this only as fact and not as complaint because in those 12 years I have never ceased serving the church in the capacity of a ruling elder in other governing bodies of the church.

But my experience, vis a vis the congregation, is not unique based upon the numbers in the Presbyterian Panel background summary. PC(USA) Research Services, in what I consider a misleading and inaccurate division, categorizes their sample population into “elders” and “members.”  If you dive into the data you find that when they refer to elders they mean elders currently serving on session.  Furthermore, they report that of what they classify as members, more than one-third (38%), are ordained Ruling Elders.  If you take all the individuals that have been ordained as Ruling Elders or Deacons (or both) it turns out to be more than half of the “members.” There is a very large population within the PC(USA) that have been ordained to church office.  As we will see in a minute this is such a large group that within a congregation it is difficult to effectively use them to serve on the session.  The Panel survey is silent on other ways that this large pool of ordained officers live out their call in the life of the church if they are not serving on session.

Now consider how the survey question is worded:

Have you ever been ordained an elder in a Presbyterian church?
Have you ever been ordained a deacon in a Presbyterian church?

I’m not sure if they are trying to capture those who have demitted and are no longer ordained officers, but in my experience that is a pretty small number, probably so small it would not be statistically significant.  I would think that they could better reinforce the perpetual nature of the ordained office by asking “Are you an ordained elder (or deacon) in a Presbyterian church?” Or maybe they are recognizing that individuals may not realize the office is perpetual and phrase the question so that it still captures the respondents correctly. In that case we need to do a better job of educating our ordained officers.  But either way, the nature of the survey questions do nothing to reinforce the perpetual nature of the office.

OK, that is a particular point in the ethos in the PC(USA) that really rubs me the wrong way (in case you couldn’t tell) and that I have ranted about before.  But it is not just me… In the resource piece by the Rev. Joseph Small that was posted for the Special Commission on Middle Governing Bodies I found this (as part of a longer section beginning on page 4 that is well worth the read)(my emphasis added):

What led to the bureaucratization of sessions and presbyteries? At root, it was the bureaucratization of American society, and the church’s endemic eagerness to follow culture’s lead. But there are proximate symptoms and causes. In the 1950’s, Presbyterian polity was changed at several points for the very best of reasons, but with unintended, unfortunate consequences.

First, the understanding of “elder” as a called ministry within the congregation was weakened by the introduction of a regulation stipulating that elders could serve no more than two consecutive three-year terms on the session. This mandatory rotation of elders was instituted for one very good reason and one of questionable intention. The ordination of women as ruling elders had been part of (northern) Presbyterian polity since 1930, but most sessions had few if any women serving. Limiting terms of service on sessions was one way of opening the eldership to new persons, notably women. The regulation had its desired result, but this appropriate motive was joined by another, less noble one. It was thought that mandatory rotation would break the hold of “bull elders” on the life of the church, reducing the capacity of sessions to thwart pastors in their attempts to modernize and renew congregational life.

The unintended result of mandatory rotation was the loss of an understanding of elders as persons called to one of the ordered ministries of the church. Term limits for service on the church session produced brief tenure by an ever expanding circle of members. In many congregations, one three-year term became the norm, and the understanding of the eldership was transformed from a called ministry to merely taking one’s turn on the board. Short-term, inexperienced elders also increased the influence of pastors by diminishing the ministry of called, knowledgeable elders. This imbalance, evident in sessions, became especially pronounced in presbyteries where well-informed pastors were accompanied by revolving elders who knew less and less about matters before the assembly.

My thanks to Rev. Small for including the historical context along with his concurrence on the effect that I have seen of rotating elders.  I’m glad to know that this is a recognized issue and not something I’m just reading into the polity.

What are the positives?  As Rev. Small points out it encourages (forces?) diversity and additional voices on the session.  What are the negatives?  Personally, I am especially concerned about the loss of the understanding of the roll of elders and on this I believe the other problems hinge.  And, in addition to the lack of experience and the loss, in some cases, of the joint governance, I have seen another issue where nominating committees have to find someone to “fill the position” and it becomes more of an issue of who will say yes as opposed to who has a sense of call.  I, and others I have met who are in congregations with similar happenings, would rather see the position left vacant until it can be filled by someone who does have the sense of call.  In some times and places the position of ruling elder has become just another position for someone to help out with.

In his 1897 book The Ruling Elder at Work, the Rev. J. Aspinwall Hodge captures the weight of the office and the nature of it as he writes as a fictionalized elder nominee in the opening paragraphs:

The Pastor of our church has just informed me, that the Session has decided
that the number of Elders should be increased. This has long been
regarded necessary. A meeting of the church will soon be called for that
purpose. I am troubled, because the Session desire to nominate me as
one of the new Elders. I wanted to decline at once, but the Pastor
informs me that I should with care and prayer consider what may be my
duty. He urges that, while the communicants have the privilege to
nominate and elect their own representatives, they have the right to
expect the advice of the Session, as its members are in a position to
consider the questions involved more fully than the communicants can.
They are required constantly to observe the christian character and
efficiency of the members of the church, and are thus prepared to judge
of the personal qualifications of those to be nominated. From their
intimate knowledge of the people, they should be able to propose those
who would be most acceptable to the various classes in the congregation, and
who can best represent them. And being well acquainted with the
peculiarities of themselves and of the Pastor, they can best select
those who are qualified to cooperate with them in maintaining the unity
of the church and the spirituality of the members. On the other hand,
the Session ought not to be a self-perpetuating body. It should impart
the information which it possesses, and give advice, but the
communicants can nominate and elect whom they please. Our Session,
feeling the responsibility, had, after long and serious consideration,
by a unanimous vote, determined to nominate me as one of the new Elders.

The question is, therefore, distinctly before me,
and I must consider it. The deliberate judgment of the officers of the
church demands respect, and my Pastor adds that he knows that the desire
is general in the congregation to have me an Elder.

I recently found out about a training program for ruling elders at Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.  This program, designed to be completed in two years of full-time study, leads to a Master of Ministry for the Ruling Elder degree.  The program is described to “help the
Ruling Elder function on the Session, Presbytery, and General Assembly levels in a biblical fashion.”  But they do add the qualifier that “the fact that Greenville Seminary offers these programs for the training and/or continuing education of Ruling Elders in no way implies that a seminary education is needed for the Ruling Elder to function properly in his office.”  I wonder if SFTS or Fuller will every bring a program like this to the Left Coast? (Or if there are enough other interested ruling elders to make that worthwhile?)

Before I finish this post let me present a thought exercise:  Consider a congregation of 240 members.  If we use the Panel information and figure that one-third of the members are ordained elders that would mean that there are 80 elders in the congregation.  I modeled this exercise on a congregation roughly the size of my own and my first reaction was that 80 was way too high.  However, after thinking about it some more I am now inclined to think that it is high, but not by too much.  For this thought exercise I will continue to use it. (And you will probably figure out that while the numbers are pretty close to my church, for this exercise I have selected numbers that give round numbers for us to talk about.)

Now consider a session of 12 members.  This is a reasonable number for this size congregation.  It represents 5% of the members and would be organized into three classes of four.  If we have a situation where every elder serves only one term so four elders from our pool of 80 go onto the session each year then each elder in the pool would wait 20 years between their terms on the session.  (So I have another eight years to wait.)

Of course, the situation is not that simple.  In the case where each year two of the four were eligible to serve a second term and agree to do so, only two elders would need to be drawn from the pool so the rotation would be 40 years between terms.  To add one more level of complexity what if we say that of the two “open” spots each year, one is filled from the pool but one is filled by a new elder, someone who is ordained to the office that year, then it would be 80 years between terms for those in the pool and the pool would grow by one new elder each year.

Now, this model does not take into account those that leave the pool by death or transfer, and of course it does not include elders joining the pool by transfer into the church.  In addition, it does not include those who due to age, health, or other circumstance are in the pool but not up to the responsibilities of serving the church any more.  (And I know several very faithful and dedicated elders who have inspired me who are now in this category.)

The bottom line though is that, if the Panel data is correct, each congregation has an abundance of called and ordained individuals, ruling elders and deacons, sitting out there in the pews every week.  How does the congregation continue to give them opportunities to live out their call?  How do we reinforce to them, and the church as a whole, that the office is perpetual?  If we are going to limit service on the session, how do we intentionally find ways to uses elders in other appropriate roles?  Should the denomination’s polity include provisions for limiting the number of elders so such a large back-log does not build up and individuals are able to serve on the session, and thus more often use the spiritual gifts that were recognized in them when they were originally called to serve on the session?

I want to leave you with one last image:  In about a month-and-a-half at least a couple of the elders in my church who are going off of the session will have to give up their name tags that also identify them as “Elder.”   What message does this send to them and other ordained officers not serving on boards about the perpetual nature of the office?  What message does this send to the congregation about the nature of the ordained office?  Just because they are not on the session and have stopped wearing the name tag do they stop functioning as elders or stop thinking of themselves as such?  What does this mean for the PC(USA) as a whole?

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Special Commission On Middle Governing Bodies Gets To Work

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Over the last two weeks the Special Commission on Middle Governing Bodies created by the 219th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) got down to work.  The 21 members of the Commission were named by the Moderators of the 218th and 219th Assemblies.

For historical perspective, the last General Assembly level commission in the American mainline Presbyterian church was the Special Commission of 1925 created by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America.  In the report of that Special Commission we are told that their charge was:

[T]o study the present spiritual condition of our Church and the causes making for unrest, and to report to the next General Assembly, to the end that the purity, peace, unity and progress of the Church may be assured.

The charge that the 219th GA gave the present commission is a bit more detailed:

1.  The commission will consult with sessions, presbyteries, synods and the wider church on the mission and function of middle governing bodies.  Such a process should include:

a.  current diversity in the role and functions of middle governing bodies.
b.  demographics and financial realities that affect the role and function of synods and presbyteries.
c.  the role of each governing body in its oversight role–presbyteries of congregations, synods of presbyteries, and General Assembly of synods–both historically and in present experience.
d.  relationships with General Assembly agencies in role and function.

2.  The commission will develop models that reflect the roles of middle governing bodies in our polity and the changing context of our witness in the United States and their relationships with other governing bodies.

3.  The commission will prepare a report to the 220th General Assembly (2012) of its findings and any recommended Book of Order changes. Recommendation for future roles and responsibilities will also be made to the 220th General Assembly about changes in middle governing bodies that may best serve the PCUSA [sic] in the 21st century.

4.  The commission will implement, within the powers granted it, any decisions forwarded from the 219th General Assembly (2010) and approved by presbyteries regarding the form and function of middle governing bodies with the report to the 220th General Assembly (2012).

5.  By direction of the 219th General Assembly (2010), or upon a majority affirmative vote of the affected presbytery or presbyteries or a majority affirmative vote of the presbyteries in the affected synod or synods, the commission is authorized to act as the General Assembly according to

a.  G-13.0103m: “to organize new synods and to divide, unite, or otherwise combine synods or portions of synods previously existing;”
b.  G-13.0103n:  “to approve the organization, division, united, or combining of presbyteries or portions of presbyteries by synods.”

6.  The commission will supervise the Special Administrative Review Committee on Puerto Rico and act on any recommendations they may make within the powers given to the commission.

7.  The actions of the commission shall require a two-thirds majority for approval.

Following the naming of the members of the Commission I had the opportunity to be part of the first consultation the Commission held, even before the first face-to-face meeting of the Commission. Maybe it is more accurate to say that the newly appointed Moderator of the Commission, the Rev. Tod Bolsinger, came to our Synod Assembly meeting and in a couple of the break-out sessions tried a few things out on some of us. In return, I think it is fair to say, we introduced him to a few things as well.

It is worth taking a moment to introduce you to Tod, and while the GA Moderators have not elaborated on their decision, I think you will see why Tod got the invite to convene this group.  First, yes that is the correct spelling of his name with only one “d” and I will leave that for him to explain.  Second, his present call is as the senior pastor and head of staff of San Clemente Presbyterian Church in Los Ranchos Presbytery.  He blogs at “It Takes A Church…” which is a reference to one of his books, It Takes A Church To Raise A Christian: How the Community of God Transforms Lives.  He also mentions some church and leadership consulting activity. In addition to all this, he was the Moderator for his presbytery’s Odyssey group to re-imagine the functioning of the presbytery.  So he has a tremendous background in both the redesign part and the leadership aspect making him a good candidate to convene this new group.  (And as I will get to in a minute, the materials for the Commission’s first face-to-face meeting include a white paper from the Odyssey group.)

So at our Synod Assembly meeting Tod conducted two listening sessions as part of the breakouts that we did.  Both were well attended – the second was overflow – and in neither case did he get through his whole set of questions on PowerPoint slides.  Some of the points he wanted to make were:

  • The Commission on Middle Governing Bodies ( MGB ) is not looking for one answer but multiple models for the PC(USA)
  • MGB Commission wants feedback on “How are those governing bodies best organized to be responsive both to the Spirit of Christ & opportunities for discipleship?”
  • “Are the structures of history the best platforms for carrying our mission into the future?”
  • Calvin organized Geneva to “be responsive” to the immigrant community.  How do we organize to be responsive to our communities?
  • The Commission will be listening, experimenting, discerning. Tod says he will be looking for “safe, modest experiments”

Tod then started a discussion around a series of questions he had for us to answer. A few of the better discussion starters were:

  • What is a Synod? Why did you first get involved in Synod work?
  • What do we celebrate about being Synod? Who are the heroes of the Synod?
  • What do we want to preserve in our current MGB system? Conversation must start with what will not change. What is our risk tolerance?

I (@ga_junkie) was live-tweeting this consultation and this last question was rephrased in a response from @davehackett: Conversation must start with what is most valuable to preserve. (And the rephrasing was endorsed by Tod later on.) I should also mention that my tweet about the “safe, modest experiments” raised the question from @KathleenLambert about whether a safe, modest experiment is an oxymoron?

One thing Tod found out from this was that he had way too much material for the time available (one hour).  It also seems that Tod was not expecting me, or anyone else, to be live-tweeting or blogging this consultation.  I didn’t announce it but I was sitting there typing on my laptop throughout it so I was not hiding my activity. (This does raise the question of what is social media etiquette for such meetings — I had not brought my “I’m Blogging This” badge with me.  I think a lot of us presbynerds figure open sessions in the PC(USA) are fair game without need to announce our intentions unless told otherwise.)  The result was that I tweeted with my usual MGB hashtag of #mgb and at the end of the talk Tod (@todbol by the way) told us he would be using #mgbcomm.  A bit later that day he retweeted many of my posts with the “official” hashtag. As I will get to in a minute, the MGB Comm is encouraged, if not outright required, to be Web 2.0 connected.

The next event was the first meeting of the Commission in Baltimore at the end of last week.  Actually, looking at their docket they approved the minutes of an October 14 conference call, so they have been at work for a while now.  This meeting was full of the getting-started sorts of things, including the intro remarks by the GA Moderator and Stated Clerk, team building exercises, and the usual breaking into subgroups to begin discussion and work. The listed sub-groups are the Research Strategy group, the Emerging Models group, and the “Soil Tilling Group:” Preparing the Church for Change.

The meeting did include two presentations: The first was “Middle Governing Bodies in a Changing Religious Cultural Context” by the Rev. Eileen Lindner.  Via @lscanlon  we have tweets about her presentation (and in fact tweets about the whole meeting – THANKS Leslie!), including these two, the second of which was heavily retweeted:

Eileen Lindner: Measure church vitality differently – not by membership. How many come to pray? How many bring food?

Eileen Lindner to #mgbcomm: “Don’t be afraid. Be afraid of doing nothing and hoping for the best.”

The second presentation was by the Rev. Joseph Small titled “What is a Middle Governing Body, really? A Theological Perspective.”  This was tied to a 2008 resource piece by Rev. Small among the Commission’s papers about “The Travail of the Presbytery.”  One tweet about the talk from a member of the Commission, @miriamdolin, said “#mgbcomm ‘s task according to joe small is to recover communion among congregations. Wow, no pressure!”

There was also a discussion about another resource piece titled “’How Did We Get This Bureaucratic Model?’ or ‘What Kind of Presbytery Do We Really Want?’”  This is also known as Odyssey Group White Paper 1 and comes out of the Los Ranchos Presbytery redesign group Tod chaired.

I’ve skimmed these resources and they all seem to provide a good starting point for the Commission to begin discussions and discernment.  There are some points in each that I’d like to explore further but I’ll save that for another time since this post is getting on the longer side. But as the Commission searches for models and experiments it will be interesting to see how such proposals as the New Synod and flexible presbyteries are considered and evaluated, along with the continuation of synods in our structure.

As I mentioned before, this Commission was urged to get connected to Web 2.0 and social media.  Tod has encouraged all interested parties in the PC(USA) to follow him on Twitter with his handle @todbol and the mgbcomm hashtag.  There is a Facebook page which is a place for open discussion about the Commission’s work and it appears to be very active. And at the end of the meeting several members of the Commission popped up on Twitter with brand new accounts — We will see if this is mostly for listening or speaking.

According to tweets from @lscanlon, Tod ended the meeting with three questions the Commission will look at next time:

  1. What’s the function of a middle governing body?
  2. What definitions & terms should they explore?
  3. What are the changing realities of our world that affect our discipleship?

And wrapping up this part, a couple of things @todbol tweeted help set the tone – “The question of the day isn’t what we are going to do, but what is God already doing.” and “There is a yearning for presbyteries etc to do more discernment together. What keeps us from practicing discernment?“

That wraps up my summary of the meetings.  I originally thought I would add a bit of commentary regarding that question number 1 about mgb’s, but considering the length I’ll post separately about that.  I do want to add one comment about something from the meeting…

Based on a section of the White Paper one of the members of the Commission, @johnvest, tweeted “Discussing institutional isomorphism at #mgbcomm.” This piqued my curiosity since in addition to the biological and organizational sense that isomorphism is used here, in my field of geology it has application as well regarding minerals.

In an environmental sense, be it natural or cultural environment, isomorphism refers to the organism or institution taking on a particular shape based on, or dictated by, the environment it is in.  In a mineralogic sense it refers to minerals of different compositions having the same basic shape.

The geologic alternate to this is polymorphism — minerals of the same composition having different shapes.  The best known example is carbon which has one crystal structure for the mineral graphite and another for diamond.  A couple of other examples include the chemical calcium carbonate which some clams make in the form of calcite for their shells and others in the form of the mineral aragonite.  And for different pressure and temperature conditions, there are at least six different naturally occurring crystal structures of silicon dioxide, including the common mineral quartz.

My first question was was to wonder whether our present institutional structure would permit presbyteries to be polymorphic.  Given the same basic ingredients could different judicatories use them to form different shapes based on the local conditions.  Beyond that, does the new Form of Government currently before the presbyteries help us, or even encourage us, to be polymorphic?  Maybe the big question, given that Tod has already helped do something like this in Los Ranchos Presbytery without outside help, is what role does the Commission play to do this across the church?

Let me take this geologic object lesson one step further:  In mineralogy we have some fascinating mineral forms called pseudomorphs.  You probably picked up on the Greek roots and realize that this means “false shape.”  They are a mineral that has taken the shape of another.  But how this typically happens is interesting and possibly instructive.  Under the original conditions a mineral will grow within another rock and fill a space that has the shape typical of its crystal shape.  Then, when conditions change, that mineral alters to another chemically similar mineral.  But in the alteration it keeps the exterior form that the original mineral carved out for itself rather than reshaping the rock around it to its own new form.  There is a great page of pictures of pseudomorphs that shows the results of the iron sulfide mineral pyrite altering to similar iron minerals limonite and goethite but keeping the cubic shape of pyrite.

I probably don’t have to spell out the object lesson here other than to ask the question whether the present presbytery structure is actually a pseudomorph with an outward shape reflecting circumstances under which they were formed at an earlier time but now with a composition that would not naturally take on that shape.

Anyway, you hopefully followed my scientific explanation and maybe it will give you something to think about like it did for me.  Thanks John for sharing that comment on Twitter.

Well this process has a long way to go and the Commission will be traveling around the denomination for both full commission meetings as well as presbytery and synod consultations.  The next meeting is in February in Orlando, then the end of May in Seattle, in Indianapolis in October, and Dallas in February 2012.  Keep watching to see where this process goes.

74th General Synod Of The Bible Presbyterian Church

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As I write this the 74th General Synod of the Bible Presbyterian Church has convened with worship at Grace Bible Presbyterian Church, in Sharonville, Ohio.  The Synod will be meeting today through next Tuesday, August 10, with the theme taken from Hebrews 13:1 “Let Brotherly Love Continue.”  All of the messages delivered at the Synod will be based on passages from Hebrews 13.

Consulting the Docket, the meeting includes committee meetings today, a free day/family day on Saturday, and the Lord’s Day devoted to the business of worship.

Additional materials for the meeting, reports and resolutions/overtures are distributed at the meeting so there is not much else to link to right now.  I’ll add a link here for updates if any become available and will post a summary once the actions of the Synod are posted on the web site.

Moderator Designate Of The General Assembly Of The Presbyterian Church In Ireland

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Three news sources, the BBC, U.TV, and Daily News, are reporting that the Rev. Norman Hamilton, pastor of Ballysillan Presbyterian Church in north Belfast, has been chosen by the presbyteries as the Moderator designate of the 2010 General Assembly.  Presuming that he carried the five presbyteries that voted for him in the February vote, he received votes from six of the nine presbyteries that voted for candidates not making it into the second round.  He received the votes of eleven of the nineteen presbyteries.

The BBC provides this reaction from Rev. Hamilton:

“I am greatly humbled and surprised that this has come to me.”

“I hope during my year to bring a very Biblical perspective to a wide range of issues that are important to both church and society.”

Called Meeting Of The General Synod Of The ARP

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As observers of Presbyterian denominations know it is a very rare event for a denomination to call a special meeting of its highest governing body.  At about this time today a Called Meeting of the General Synod of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church will convene at Bonclarken Conference Center in Flat Rock, N.C., to hear the report and act on the recommendations of the Moderator’s Commission on Erskine College and Theological Seminary.  This Commission was created by the 205th General Synod last summer and the minutes of the Synod meeting (p. 44, 47th page of the PDF file) record the adoption of the following Memorial from First Presbytery:

That First Presbytery encourage the 2009 General Synod to instruct the Moderator of Synod to form a special commission to investigate whether the oversight exercised by the Board of Trustees and the Administration of Erskine College and Seminary is in faithful accordance with the Standards of the ARP Church and the synod’s previously issued directives.

Erskine College and Theological Seminary (“Erskine”) are linked educational institutions in Due West, South Carolina, founded by, and still associated with, the ARP.  In case that is not obvious from the name, the institutions are named for one of the principal leaders of the secession Presbyterian branch in Scotland, the Rev. Ebenezer Erskine, who helped establishe the Associate Presbytery in 1733.  It is worth mentioning that the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church descends from this branch and is not, nor was ever, a part of the mainline American Presbyterian branch.  Furthermore, the ARP can trace its founding to 1822 without any subsequent reorganizations making it the American Presbyterian branch with the longest time period since the last division or merger.

Erskine is still associated with the ARP — the vast majority of the trustees are elected by the General Synod and it is considered an agency of the church.  The College on its web site is not as clear about this association.  It refers to its status as a “Christian institution” and its Mission Statement does refer back to its ARP origins.  The Theological Seminary describes to itself as “organically and historically related to Erskine College” and the Mission Statement is:

Erskine Theological Seminary is an educational institution of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, and the Seminary has been called by God and commissioned by its host to serve not only that denomination, but also the entire Church of Jesus Christ. The mission of Erskine Theological Seminary is to educate persons for service in the Christian Church.

According to the minutes (pg. 10) the ARP General Synod budget for 2009-2010 includes $617,000 in unrestricted funds for support of Erskine College.  In addition, Erskine is the beneficiary of special offering funds and occasional special allocations.

I don’t know how far back questions started to be raised about the Christian world view of the College but I do know that there was significant discussion by the 204th General Synod (2008)  as reported by ARP Talk, and various reports suggest that there were issues well before that Synod.  (ARP Talk is an unofficial source of news, commentary and advocacy edited by the Rev. Dr. Charles Wilson that has devoted a lot of electronic ink to the Erskine debate.)  The heart of the issues with Erskine has been with the infallibility of Scripture and whether the faculty upholds and teaches in accord with that belief.  As a general statement of the Synod, but clearly aimed at the college, the Synod took the following action, described as the most significant since 1979.

That the 2008 General Synod go on record by stating that the position of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church on Scripture is that the Bible alone, being God-breathed, is the Word of God written, infallible in all that it teaches, and inerrant in the original manuscripts.

While that position went into the minutes it seems to have had little affect on the college.  ARP Talk continued to report from students, faculty and alumni about the world view of some members of the faculty.  Independent blogs were set up that both advocated for change at Erskine as well as another that defended the school.

Additional perspective on the situation comes from an article by Joel Belz in World Magazine which describes the dynamics that have caused the present tensions in the following way:

It’s true, of course, that such a prickly relationship between a denomination and its colleges and seminaries is hardly a new thing or a newsworthy matter. But this may be different. There is, for example, no mountain of evidence that the two ARP schools have lurched noticeably leftward in recent years. What’s happened instead is that the sponsoring denomination has itself moved decidedly to the right—and now wants to take firm steps to bring its college and seminary with it.That’s a rarity in the ecclesiastical and educational history of America.

This was a high-profile issue at the 205th General Synod last summer and coverage included blog reports from ARP bloggers Brian Howard (three parts – 1, 2, 3), and Tim Philips (with a whole bunch of his follow-up articles).  There was also a lot of Christian media coverage of the meeting including the previously mentioned article in World Magazine, at least two articles in the Layman, and the Evangelical Press News Service (provided by Tim Philips).

At that meeting the minutes (pg. 71) record the Report on Erskine College and Theological Seminary where the Chairman of the Board of Trustees and the Pres
ident say:

A few students have publicly criticized Erskine for failure to live up to its Christian profession and some of those criticisms are valid and are being addressed. Because Erskine does not require a profession of Christian faith for admission, there will always be some students who do not embrace our mission statement or live by Christian values.
…
Every year Erskine hires some new faculty and their appointment is probationary for the first year. In their application and during interviews, they subscribe to our mission statement and to Synod’s document on the Statement of the Philosophy of Christian Higher Education. They also affirm Synod’s view of the inspiration and authority of Scripture. New faculty are carefully evaluated by the Academic Dean and some of those professors who do not embrace or practice our mission are not invited to return. One or two senior professors have been singled out for criticism and the administration has investigated those criticisms and taken appropriate action. Erskine has sought to faithfully measure up to the expectations of Synod to be a Christ-centered institution. We, like many ARP churches, have not always succeeded but we sincerely strive to please Christ in all that we do.

In addition, there was a panel discussion one evening where the President and a Vice-president of Erskine answered questions posed in writing and during the debate the next day the Synod granted voice to Erskine students to address not only the synod committee but to allow a representative to speak to the full Synod.  In the end, the Synod approved the Memorial, quoted above, and a Commission was appointed.  It was announced in January that the Commission was ready to report and the Called Meeting of General Synod was scheduled for this week.

The Aquila Report provides us the text of the Preliminary Report of the Commission — the full report will be distributed to the General Synod today.

The Commission does not mince words — It comes to the following unanimous conclusions (summarized here – read the report for the full text of each):

  1. The General Synod has been negligent in its oversight of Erskine College and Seminary.
  2. There are irreconcilable and competing visions about the direction of the college and seminary among the members of the Erskine Board of Trustees.
  3. There are irreconcilable and competing visions about Erskine’s mission as a liberal arts college on the Erskine Board and within the Administration and faculty… Despite vocal differences among the faculty and Administration, it was not evident that the trustees have given any clear direction in these matters.
  4. It became evident to us as we listened to all the parties concerned that Erskine College and Seminary stand at across roads as the search is conducted for a new president. The General Synod must speak clearly at this critical juncture so that the message of our interest in Erskine’s success is unambiguous. The next president must have the full support of the ARP Church and its Board of Trustees of Erskine College and Seminary.
          In our candid conversations with trustees, faculty, and members of the search committee, we came to the conclusion that no presidential candidate could garner the whole-hearted support of every Erskine Board member. It would be grievously unfair to the next president and potentially disastrous for these institutions if he does not have this unqualified support.
  5. Almost without exception, present and past members of the Board of Trustees believe that the size of the Board is a significant obstacle to effective governance.
  6. In an effort to govern the institutions effectively with such a large number of trustees, the Board is subdivided into several committees. While committees can be an effective means of utilizing the special experience and skills of trustees, the committee structure presently employed by the Erskine Board is a hindrance to proper governance and oversight because, in the nature of the case, the Board relies heavily on its Executive Committee. The result, despite the best of intentions among those serving on the Executive Committee, is that most trustees are left without knowledge about large parts of the institution entrusted to their care.
  7. The structure and composition of the Board of Trustees are problematic for the faithful oversight of the seminary.
  8. The ideological divisions on the Board have created significant challenges for the Erskine faculty. The College faculty are rightly troubled that the Board of Trustees and Administration have given them little guidance for the implementation of Erskine’s mission. The lack of clear directives has led to widespread faculty confusion about their responsibilities to the ARP Church in the classroom setting.
  9. The Board has been negligent in its responsibility to hold the Administration accountable for the faculty it employs. The Board has not instructed the Administration to evaluate the faculty either on the quality of their teaching or on their ability to integrate faith and learning in the classroom.
  10. The so-called “culture of intimidation,”found by Second Presbytery’s Committee on the Minister and His Work several years ago, is still present on the campus. There is an atmosphere in some quarters of Erskine College and Seminary that is inimical to faithful implementation of the mission.

The preliminary report does not present recommendations but instead says:

This Commission has been constantly aware that the very nature of our work is sensitive. It involves the reputations of trustees, administrators, faculty, staff, and students.The goal of our report is that Erskine College and Seminary emerge from this process with the tools and vision necessary to fulfill the missions the ARP Church has given to them. This goal must also inform how the Commission reports certain conclusions.
…
Some have asked that our entire report be delivered to delegates weeks in advance of the called meeting of General Synod. We are sympathetic to this line of thinking. We, too,want the delegates to have sufficient time to discern the Lord’s will prior to the hour of decision.

However, it should be evident to all that the discussion and debate over Erskine over the past several years has generated much heat and little light. This is at least partially to be explained by the widespread use of blogs, internet discussion boards, and “Facebook” as methods for disseminating sensitive information.

We believe that the release of some conclusions and our recommendations would have the effect of depriving the General Synod of the deliberative process such a premature action is meant to effect. Our report would then be removed from the carefully reasoned and prayer
ful deliberations of elders and ministers in the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ and would instead be subject to the publicly-voiced opinions of anyone with internet access, whether or not they hear the Commission’s full report or have any real interest in the future success of Erskine College and Seminary. The realities of what takes place on the Erskine campus and among the trustees are nuanced and delicate.


Debate about these matters should be marked by the fruits of the Spirit of God and not the sometimes mean-spirited clamoring that so often occurs on the internet.

Conclusions like these have caused not a little bit of concern from various quarters in both the church as well as academia, and have produced a new round of media attention.  There is an article from Inside Higher Ed that recaps the story to this point, discusses some of the implications, and quotes one anonymous faculty member saying of the report “They are not traditionalists. I’m a traditionalist. They are extremists… I am not sure what they want except control.” 

The other dynamic in this drama is the announced retirement of the Dr. Randall Ruble as Erskine’s President on June 30.

So, with an attitude of prayerful support and discernment, and what I hope is not “mean-spirited clamoring,” I and others await the Spirit-led discernment of the General Synod.

I would conclude by adding one further prayer concern for those traveling to the meeting — Tim Philips has arrived there and is blogging about the meeting.  He reports this morning that with snow expected there is a concern whether the meeting will have a quorum so that it can actually take action on the report.

News From The CCAP: Synods Become Flexible And An Ecumenical Alliance To Monitor Democracy

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Over the last couple of weeks one news item from Malawi is that the three synods of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian in Malawi have agreed to an arrangement that would end their dispute over having churches in each others’ territory.  The synods have essentially agreed to become non-geographic or flexible synods.

The disagreement goes back a number of years.  I became aware of it when it hit the media in the late summer of 2006 when there were complaints that Tumbuka language congregations associated with Livingstonia Synod were established within the boundaries of Nkhoma Synod which is predominantly Chewa speaking.  However, the reverse of Chewa language congregations in Livingstonia had been the case for a substantial time before that.  Over the last three years there have been additional developments in this story but recently there has been news of an agreement to end the disagreement.

The solution – an agreement that all three Synods will have flexibility in membership.  Essentially, each will have a geographic component but will be non-geographic to the extent necessary to include churches based on their predominant language.  While the news broke at the beginning of the month (Nyasa Times Feb 2 article, Feb 4 op-ed) the Livingstonia Synod Moderator did a radio interview on Thursday with some more information.  The Nyasa Times writes:

CCAP’s Livingstonia Synod moderator, Rev. Mezuwa Banda has said the wrangle over border issue with the Nkhoma Synod has been settled with a “gentleman’s agreement” and is not legally binding.

and

“That’s no longer an issue. You will remember that Nkhoma recently has agreed with us to say there is no border not only with Livingstonia but with Blantyre as well.”

“Let Nkhoma go as far as they can go, Livingstonia can go as far they can go. The matter is over.”

However, the story does say that this agreement comes at a loss of connectionalism:

On membership, Nkhoma Synod said in a statement signed by moderator Vasco Kachipapa that any individual will have the right to belong to any congregation under a synod of their choice and not have allegiance to another synod.

“That there shall be no transfer of eldership or deaconship across synods and that church leadership shall only be attained through the expressed wishes of the local congregation, presided over by an ordained minister of the same Synod,” the statement reads.

While this interview was with the Livingstonia Moderator the two earlier articles both indicate that this ultimately came about by a unilateral decision of Nkhoma Synod.  The Feb 2 article begins:

Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP) Nkhoma synod has finally given up  over the boundary wrangle with Livingstonia synod and say the synods should operate on a no boarder basis.

Nkhoma Synod the made its position in a pastoral letter that was read in all its prayer houses signed by the moderator Vasco Kachipapa and senior clerk Rev Kamwendo.

…

In a statement the synod said, it has finally decided to stop pursuing the matter following the disturbing and worrisome developments that have taken place since the row started.

And the Feb 4 Op-ed includes:

Going by recent events, I am relieved to see that the hot air seems to be simmering away, what with the Nkhoma synod declaring unilaterally the new “no boundary policy”, not just with their erstwhile “enemy” but across the country and beyond, meanwhile bringing Blantyre and other international synods into the fray.

So where is the General Assembly in this?  The Feb. 2 article quotes the Nkhoma statement with a mixed assessment – “We acknowledge with gratitude the initiatives taken by the CCAP General Assembly in order to resolve the border conflict, which to say, have all been in vain.”  And the Christian Observer reports that Livingstonia Synod requested a postponement of the December 2009 meeting of the General Assembly as Nkhoma Synod worked out their current response to the situation.

From the viewpoint of being Presbyterian this would not be the end point.  Will this loss of connectionalism continue and the two or three synods essentially operate as independent denominations on the same territory? Or, over the next few years can the General Assembly work out an arrangement that will preserve the flexible nature of the synods while recognizing membership and ordinations across the boundaries?

In other news, and with a touch of irony, about a month ago it was reported that a faith-based alliance called Church Foundation for Integrity and Democracy (CFID) was launched in Malawi.  In an interesting commentary on the boundary dispute resolution the General Secretary of the new organization is the Reverend Andrew Kamponda from Blantyre Synod of the CCAP.   At the conference announcing the new group his comment was that it is time for the church to stand and speak with one voice against evil.  What is one of the particular evils named?  Tribalism, often cited as being at the root of the boundary dispute between the other two CCAP synods.

(Editorial note:  While this story talks about the launch of the group I do find it on an old list of organizations (#58) accredited to provide voter education for the 2009 elections.)

The group is chaired by the Reverend Malani Mtonga, a former adviser to Malawi’s president.  The Nyasa Times reports:

According to Mtonga the organization has been formed to restore human dignity and sustain moral responsibility in the country and was quick to tell the audience that came to witness the launching ceremony that the organization is purely apolitical.

“We are here to pursue a common goal of seeing to it that the country (Malawi) is fully enjoying the fruits of democracy attained in 1994,” Mtonga told Nyasa Times on the sidelines.

He said the grouping will not tolerate evils to take roots in Malawi.

Mtonga cited homosexuality, tribalism and intra-party divisions as some of the things the clergy need to stand up against.

Readers are probably aware that in many places in Africa homosexual practice is a topic of some debate and illgele.  While the proposed legislation making homosexual sex a capital offense is Uganda has been grabbing headlines, in Malawi the arrest of a gay couple has been lower profile but raising complaints and requests for release
of the couple from NGO’s.

Finally, I mentioned at the beginning of January how pastors from Livingstonia Synod were protesting against the University Council and government quota system for getting into the University.  That is ongoing with comments on both sides being disputed by the other, as evidenced by an article in the Feb. 14 Nyasa Times that quotes critics (not necessarily from the CCAP) of the Education Minister, and another from Feb. 18 where the Moderator of the Livingstonia Synod has critical comments of the President and the government about this.

We will see how all of these situations develop.

Presbytery Merger In The Presbyterian Church Of Aotearoa New Zealand And Some Polity Observations

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I recently saw a news item on The Southland Times web site about a presbytery merger in the Presbyterian Church of Aotearoa New Zealand that, as written, surprised me a bit.  (Today brings another, more detailed article from the Otago Daily Times.) The fact that there was going to be a merger was not what caught my attention – the PCANZ is in the midst revisioning and restructuring the church with there Press Go program and the Reform of Presbyteries initiative. No, being the polity wonk that I am what I was wondering about was the way the article phrased the approval process.  The article says:

Southern presbyteries will be united in February to better connect with their communities and to try and attract more youthful members.

Five presbyteries, encompassing all Presbyterian parishes within Southland and Otago below the Waitaki River, are joining together to form the Southern Presbytery.

and

The Southern Presbytery will merge on February 13 at the Calvin Church in Gore at 2pm, and will be ratified in October by the Presbytery Church of Aotearoa New Zealand.

The polity wonks out there probably immediately recognized that this is the reverse of what we are used to in these matters.  The structure and shape of presbyteries is usually a matter for the next higher governing body, in most cases the General Assembly.  As the article says the presbyteries “will be united in February” and then it “will be ratified in October” by the General Assembly.

On one level the PCANZ Book of Order is a bit unique in its description of the powers and responsibilities of the GA when it says

General Assembly to establish presbyteries
8.7 Formation, alteration and abolition of presbyteries

(1) The General Assembly may

(a) form a presbytery,
(b) determine the name of a presbytery,
(c) fix the area or region for which a presbytery has responsibility,
(d) on its own initiative or at the request of a presbytery, alter the name of a presbytery, abolish a presbytery, or change the area or region for which a presbytery has responsibility.

I was surprised to see in there that the GA “may” and not “shall” do these things regarding presbyteries.  However, the present news is the result of action taken by the last General Assembly in 2008 when it approved, without debate, the report of the Presbyteries Task Group on The Reform of Presbyteries.  The GA approved in advance the reorganization of all the presbyteries and we can expect more of these mergers to follow with final approval at this year’s Assembly in the fall.

But in researching this and looking at the details of presbytery structuring in other Presbyterian branches I was reminded of an interesting quirk in the polity of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

Let me begin with the Book of Church Order of the Presbyterian Church in America, for a reason you will see in a moment.  The BCO includes in the list of responsibilities of the GA

14-6. The General Assembly shall have power:

e. To erect new Presbyteries, and unite and divide those which were erected with their consent;

A quick check of the history of this section of the BCO shows that the PCA has always had this section as a “shall” and before that the predecessor polity of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S. had the GA as the governing body to create and dissolve synods, but not presbyteries.  The polity would then give the synods the responsibility to organize presbyteries.

What is the current situation in another PCUS successor denomination, the PC(USA)?  The current Book of Order says:

G-13.0103  The General Assembly constitutes the bond of union, community, and mission among all its congregations and governing bodies. It therefore has the responsibility and power

m. to organize new synods and to divide, unite, or otherwise combine synods or portions of synods previously existing;
n. to approve the organization, division, uniting, or combining of presbyteries or portions of presbyteries by synods;

Affected synods must concur with presbytery changes, but this GA responsibility for presbytery creation sets up an interesting paradox in that the Assembly creates the presbytery but the synod reviews its records.  Cooperative governance.

The Annotated Book of Order gives no indication of a change to this section shifting responsibility for presbyteries from synods to the GA and no reference to pre-merger citations or documents so this could be inherited from the UPCUSA. or derives from the merger.  More research necessary – but an interesting mix of ecclesiastical responsibility and weaker powers for the synods.

With the significant discussion about the role of synods in the PC(USA) this is only a quirk or minor distraction.  The real question gets back to the restructuring of the church in New Zealand and whether these merged presbyteries with minimal administrative responsibility can fulfill the expressed purpose of attracting more youthful members.  Will the mission drive the polity?

The 219th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) — Synods: An Expanding Or Contracting Universe?

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It has been an interesting week for synods in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and not just because my own met a couple of days ago.

It is clear that the 219th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) will have plenty to talk about next summer related to synods, if they want to tackle the subject.  We already knew about the optional changes to synods that the new Form of Government document would permit if it is approved.  In addition, two overtures have been posted that would reduce or eliminate synods.  Finally, there is a proposal from Presbyterians for Renewal to create a new non-geographic synod for churches and presbyteries to gather in based on theological affinity.

The PC(USA) has been in serious discussions for a while now about the usefulness of synods and whether it is a middle-governing body the church should do away with much like the Church of Scotland did away with them in 1992.  This discussion is recognized by both the original Form of Government Task Force Report as well as the updated nFOG report.  While the two reports do not get rid of synods, they both contain an essentially identical section (like most of the updated nFOG the new version reads a bit better than its original) G-3.0404 Reduced Function which says:

A synod may decide, with the approval of a two-thirds majority of its presbyteries, to reduce its function. In no case shall synod function be less than the provision of judicial process and administrative review of the work of the presbyteries (G-3.0401c). Such a synod shall meet at least every two years for the purposes of setting budget, electing members to its permanent judicial commission, and admitting to record the actions of its permanent judicial and administrative commissions. Presbyteries of such a synod shall assume for themselves, by mutual agreement, such other synod functions as may be deemed necessary by the synod.

Before going any further it is useful to look back at the history of synods in American Presbyterianism.  We usually put the beginning of the Presbyterian church in America in 1706 with the establishment of the first presbytery.  This was followed in 1717 with the first synod, the Synod of Philadelphia, which became the highest governing body until the first General Assembly in 1789.  In 1741 this main branch of American Presbyterianism had its first split into the Old Side and New Side and a second synod, the Synod of New York, was created for the New Side presbyteries and churches.  While the resolution of the split in 1758 returned the church to one synod, the Synod of New York and Philadelphia, the Old Side/New Side division persisted at the presbytery level, even to the point of having over-lapping presbyteries based on theological affinity in the New Side First Presbytery of Philadelphia and the Old Side Second Presbytery.  These would eventually be merged but it took over fifty years.

More recently, in the business before the 218th General Assembly the overtures included one to once again permit affinity presbyteries and now synods by allowing for flexibility in membership (Item 03-05), an overture to study the synod structure (Item 03-06), and the 217th GA was overtured to look into a Korean language synod.  All of these proposals were turned down by the full Assembly.  It is important to note there is historical precedent for racial ethnic synods with the Catawba Synod of the former PCUSA in the first half of the 20th century.

Since my last summary of the posted business for the 219th three more overtures have been added to the PC-Biz site.  One addresses Authoritative Interpretations and I will comment on that separately.  The other two new ones both address synods, specifically asking for a reduction or elimination of them.

Overture 4 from the Synod of the Rocky Mountains asks for changes to Chapters G-12 and D-5 of the Book of Order to decrease the responsibilities.  In fact, one of the parts of the overture would add to the current Government section the same language that is proposed in the nFOG about “reduced functions” for synods at the option of the constituent presbyteries.  But the overture goes on to proposed changes to the Government and Discipline sections that would allow two adjoining synods to form a joint Permanent Judicial Commission.

Overture 5 is more dramatic, proposing the elimination of Chapter G-12 all together eliminating synods from the PC(USA) structure.  The next part of this overture from the Presbytery of New Hope would set up a Synod Transition Administrative Commission, which would be the decently and orderly thing to do so as to wind up the work of the Synods.  There are a couple of polity issues I have with the wording in the overture.  (If this is something the Assembly decides to do the rewrite of the Commission mandate would be relatively straight-forward.)

Keeping in mind that a Presbyterian Commission is empowered to act on behalf of, and with the full authority of, the governing body that creates the commission, I would object to the members of a commission being named by the Stated Clerk and the Moderator of the Assembly.  That would be fine for a committee or task force, but if a commission is to have the power of the Assembly, than the members should be approved by the full Assembly itself.  This would necessitate the vote on the constitutional changes following the 219th GA and the naming of the commission and subsequent wind-down of the synods by the 220th GA two years later.

[For the polity wonks, GA Junkies, and those interested in the details:  It is interesting that the Book of Order keeps talking about “appointing” commissions.  But if you drill down into the Annotated Book of Order, under G-9.0503a(1) there is an annotation referring to an interpretation by the 217th GA that a presbytery may delegate the responsibility of naming a commission for an ordination.  So, by implication the naming of commissions for other purposes may not be delegated but must be approved by the full governing body.]

My second concern is, I believe, a polity problem and that is with the mandate of the Commission.  This part of the overture reads:

2.   If the presbyteries concur in removing synods from
the Book of Order or proposed Form of Government, that the Stated Clerk and Moderator of the 219th General Assembly (2010) be authorized to appoint a Synod Transition Administrative Commission by July 2011 to ensure that all matters related to the elimination of synods be addressed. This includes review of presbytery minutes, permanent judicial commissions, or other constitutional functions assigned to synods. The commission would be authorized to resolve all fiduciary functions related to synods and any regional groups that are currently functioning as part of synods.

There are several aspects to my concern.

First, there is no end date for the Commission.  Give it a two-year initial life and renew it every GA if its work is not done.

Second, the overture contains a reasonable list of things to do, but is the commission to do those things (minutes review, PJC cases) for what is in process at the time of the constitutional change or forever?  It seems that a more detailed plan for synod transition is needed, unless this commission becomes a permanent commission (and the name of the commission contains transitional so it is not intended to be the case).  Let me put this another way:  If the commission is to do review of presbytery minutes is that just once for the transition or on an ongoing basis.  And if just once, than there should be another section to this overture that describes how the GA will take on the review of the minutes of 173 presbyteries in the future.

And that is my Third concern, that while this overture covers the transition commission, what then?  There needs to be consideration of the transition process for the OGA and the GAMC if they are going to take over the essential functions of the 16 synods.

Yes, I am being picky here, but because of the nature of commissions you have to cover the details when it is created.  I don’t see any fundamental problem with this overture that can’t be overcome with some detailed rewriting by the Assembly, if this is the direction they chose to go.  And I am very curious to see the Advisory Committee on the Constitution’s comments on this overture.

Well, that is what is currently on the docket, but this past week also brought another proposal that we can expect to see on the radar in the next couple of months.  The organization  Presbyterians For Renewal (PFR) has published their solution for the PC(USA) going forward, which is to expand the synod structure by creating a 17th synod to serve as a non-geographic affinity synod.  Churches concerned about the doctrinal direction the PC(USA) is taking could chose to switch over to this New Synod.

The full proposal is 13 pages long, of which 9 are FAQ and 2 are the text of the proposed constitutional changes with a 2 page Appendix that appears to act much like the procedural manuals envisioned under the nFOG.

Since this is just a proposal and has not been transmitted yet, or at least posted, as a formal overture from a presbytery I am not going to dissect it line-by-line but will make some general comments and highlight a few specifics.

As you can imagine for something like this to work it contains a bit of creative polity, especially items granting the New Synod (the working name until it is created and formally named) a reasonable amount of autonomy.  It does however say that it has the “same responsibilities and powers as all other synods” which presumably means the ecclesiastical and administrative functions that include a PJC and records review.  However, it also says that the provisions in this new section supersede any other Book of Order provisions to the contrary and that the provisions in this section may not be changed by the rest of the denomination without a majority vote of all the presbyteries in the New Synod.

One polity point that quickly becomes apparent is that New Synod presbyteries lose a certain amount of authority under this plan.  On the one hand, the synod will control ordination standards instead of the presbyteries.  Presbyteries will conduct the examinations but the New Synod “has the responsibility and power to maintain the standards for ordination and continuing ministry.”  There appears to be little room for interpretation of the standards at the presbytery or session level.  On the other side dismissal of churches from the New Synod has been removed from presbytery approval to a vote of the congregation wishing to switch.  (And this applies to a church wishing to join New Synod or leave New Synod.)  However, while approval of the dismissing presbytery is not required the approval of the receiving presbytery is required in both cases.  (Under present polity for a church to switch the congregational vote is not required but it must be approved by both presbyteries, the synod or synods involved, and the GA.)

I had to laugh when I saw in the FAQ the comment about the church fighting over ordination standards for the last 3 decades.  While the current sexual standards have been the point of contention for 30 years, the Old Side/New Side split almost three centuries ago was over ordination standards, including subscription to the Westminster Standards.  Interestingly, this New Synod proposal brings back something that is very close to creedal subscription.  A couple of ways this will happen is outlined in the Appendix.  First, the New Synod will produce a list of some, but not the, essential tenets as areas that must not be overlooked in examining candidates for ordained office.  Secondly, in the New Synod any ordained officer of the church must affirm:

Along with the broader constitutional standards for manner of life (e.g. G-6.0106a), New Synod also holds to the standard that its officers will live either in fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness.

It goes on to say “Those who can not make this affirmation for their own manner of life will not be approved for ordination or installation in an office, or for membership in a presbytery.

It is important to remember that the standards New Synod is interested in maintaining are the ones that are currently in force in the PC(USA).  Currently the church is debating if there is any flexibility in the standards either because they are  “non-essentials” or because the violate an office-holder’s conscience.  What the final version of this document needs to do is present the ordination standards for New Synod not so that it sounds like legalism, but instead in a way that it brings grace.

It will be interesting to see if this Assembly wants to tackle the present situation with synods.  And I await the wording of the New Synod proposal as an overture from a presbytery.  Stay tuned…