There is a lot going on this week across American Presbyterianism and up for today is the start of one of the more unique General Assemblies this year. Today in Nashville the first meetings begin for the 141st General Assembly of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in America and the 186th General Assembly of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. This is a concurrent general assembly which has among its business the report of the Unification Task Force and the reception and referral to the presbyteries for study a Plan of Union to reunite the denominations.

At the present time I am not finding documents specific to the CPCA meeting but much is reflected in the CPC documents. In preparation for the meeting, a few things you might be interested in:

• The CPC does their reports by producing a preliminary set of minutes with what is expected and then it is fill in the blanks and adjust the language and actions as they go along.
• The meeting schedule – which lists both CPC and CPCA specific events as well as joint events – is in the preliminary minutes.
• For polity documents, the CPC has a streamlined set of Rules of Order that can be found online. The Standing Rules of the General Assembly for the CPCA are also available.

UPDATE: There is no live stream for this event but there is a live blog.

Twitter traffic is low. Probably the primary Twitter feed to follow is the Ministry Council (@ministrycouncil) and the hashtag #cpga16. A couple other official Twitter feeds to keep an eye on include CPC Youth (@cpyouthministry) and CPC Young Adults (@cpyamc). One extra reason is because there is a CPC/CPCA young adult gathering happening along with the Assembly meeting. UPDATE: As the Assembly gets underway I see that M. Derek Jacks (@mderekjacks) is tweeting from the meeting and would be a good source to follow. And another addition: Joy Warren (@joyseyes) also has a nice Twitter commentary going.

As a concurrent General Assembly a significant emphasis will be placed on the Report of the Unification Task Force. Their report begins on page 110 of the Preliminary Minutes. The report is fairly straight forward if not short. The longest part is a proposed Plan of Union presented for study by the churches. There is also a recommendation that for the foreseeable future the two churches hold concurrent General Assemblies. Finally, they ask the GA to declare the third Sunday in February as Unification Sunday to promote and pray for the reunion of the churches.

I will also note, as this is an issues at many assembly and synod meetings this year, that right before the Unification Task Force report in the Preliminary Minutes (page 107) is a study paper titled “A Confessional Response to Discrimination.” The recommendation is for the denominations accept them as study papers and they be made available to the churches through the presbyteries.

So our best wishes for the meeting and we look forward to the stories and pictures that will come out of this important meeting.