I had to laugh yesterday morning when I opened up Twitter because my friend Robert Austell (@gspcrobert ) had asked the question I had been pondering myself the last few days.

I’ll tell you my answer at the end, but let me first rewind to what got me into this line of thought in the first place…

In retrospect I realize that I was all over the Fellowship PC(USA) announcement because it fell in my lap.  I got the original e-mail, it pushed one of my hot buttons, and I was off to the races.  In contrast, the NEXT Church event earlier this week was something I had seen mentioned but had not really kept track of.  It looked like just another conference like Big Tent (pick one ), Wee Kirk, or the College Conference. But when I started reading the tweets, and then watching the live streaming it seemed that this was a bit more high-profile than I had realized.

Well, the next stop was the web site to see what it said.  On the conference web page I read this:

For some months a group of friends and colleagues across the church have been in conversation about the “next” Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). We have focused less on denominational controversies and other matters and more on vital, faithful and connectional congregational ministry.

Déjà vu all over again.  Sound familiar?

Over the past year, a group of PC(USA) pastors has become convinced that to remain locked in unending controversy will only continue a slow demise, dishonor our calling, and offer a poor legacy to those we hope will follow us… Our purpose is to LIVE INTO new patterns as they are created, modeling a way of faith: the worship, supportive fellowship, sharing of best practices, and accessible theology that brings unity and the Spirit’s vitality.

Yes, those are lines from the original Fellowship PC(USA) letter.  And yes, on balance the rest of the letters are a bit different in tone and viewpoint, I will grant you that.  But both originated out of these small groups, mostly pastors it seems, that wanted to do something new to promote unity and connectionalism in the PC(USA).

Now, to be fair, almost any change, or movement (if that’s what these are), comes out of a small group and grows.  After all, Jesus started with a core of 12 and grew the movement from there.  And changes in the Presbyterian system begin with overtures from presbyteries to be debated by the General Assembly moving upward from local governing bodies to the national level.  But in this case, it looks like both of these movements have grown out of groups of “tall-steeple” pastors who wanted to do something different.  For more on the development of the NEXT group have a look at the post by YoRocko!, who happens to be addressing this exact same question.

At the moment, there is something that is different about these groups, aside from the theological perspective, and that is the fact that the NEXT group has had its first big conference.  What that conference demonstrated, and which was pointed out by the attendees during the feedback session, is that those present were mostly white and middle class, with the most diversity being provided by the seminary students. It was also pointed out that the attendees included only a small number of ruling elders and most of those were from the local area. These were initial criticisms of the Fellowship group.  The NEXT group made a commitment to diversity, much as the Fellowship group has.  The point here is that both these groups reflect the reality of what the PC(USA) looks like now.

Another similarity between the groups is that they both advocate that something needs to change in the PC(USA).  The NEXT web site says about the conference “Together, we will seek God’s guidance in discerning how to move forward in a rapidly evolving church and culture.”  The Fellowship letter says of their conference “Our purpose is to LIVE INTO new patterns as they are created, modeling a way of faith: the worship, supportive fellowship, sharing of best practices, and accessible theology that brings unity and the Spirit’s vitality.”  Both groups seek ways to discern and discuss what is the future of American Mainline Presbyterianism in a changing world.

I found one more interesting, and possibly telling, similarity between the two groups — both of their initial web sites are hosted as part of the church web sites at tall-steeple churches.  The Fellowship PC(USA) web site is hosted by Christ Presbyterian Church of Edina, Minnesota.  The NEXT web site is hosted by Second Presbyterian Church of Indianapolis, Indiana.  Checking the Top 15 list of PC(USA) churches we find that these churches are number three and number thirteen respectively on the list.  If your first reaction is “so what?”, you might be correct.  Big churches have the resources to share with developing groups like these and both groups have announced that they will be migrating to their own web presence with unique URL’s.  But look again, because I think there is a subliminal message which may not be intended but might be conveyed. In each case, at my screen resolution, the church’s banner takes up 1/3 to 1/2 of the visible page.  In both cases the church was careful (as far as I can tell in the very dynamic world of web pages) not to put the conferences on their front page, sending no message that it is a ministry of the church.  But each group’s individual page is still done in the church’s template implying an association with that body.  When I place them side-by-side, and maybe it is only me and I am over-interpreting here, the message that I see is one of “battle of the tall-steeple churches.”  The movements both give the impression of being driven by large churches contending for control of the PC(USA).

As I said, I might be getting this wrong.  But try to think about it as if you are not an insider to the PC(USA) world — if you look at these two pages with the eyes of an outsider what message does the totality of the page send?  OK, maybe I’m the only one getting this impression.

Turning to what is different, the first thing that strikes me is the tone of the two groups and their outlook.  There is a lot more printed verbiage from the Fellowship group so their perspective is easier to see.  To be specific, the Letter and the White Paper are very negative about the future of the PC(USA) but do strike a hopeful tone about the possibility of reform when they say “We hope to discover and model what a new “Reformed body” looks like in the coming years, and we invite you to join us, stepping faithfully, boldly, and joyfully into the work for which God has called us.” Interestingly, in the white paper the similar line is followed by “We propose this change with regret, despising division and all it entails in witness to the world, but with excitement at what may emerge.”  The mix of negative and positive.

The NEXT group says less on their web page, but do begin by quoting the prophet Isaiah (43:19) “Behold, I am doing a new thing. Do you not perceive it?”  They make passing reference to the current situation in the PC(USA) and give the invitation in a positive phrasing:

We will join with friends and colleagues, old and new, who care about
the future of Presbyterian witness. Together, we will seek God’s
guidance in discerning how to move forward in a rapidly evolving church
and culture.

The NEXT Conference plenary sessions are available online so you can hear what was actually said.  I have listened to some, but not all, and again find the tone mostly positive.  But let’s turn to someone who was there, Carmen Fowler, and what she had to say in an article for the Layman.  While Ms. Fowler could probably at a minimum be described as a “skeptical observer” and she had plenty to critique about the NEXT Conference, she also had mostly positive comments about the spirit of the conference.  This includes:

The
spirit of the event was positive, framed by beautiful Reformed,
Word-centered worship and designed to promote genuine fellowship.
…
There
were no exhibits, no stoles, no banners, no buttons and no animosity
from the leadership toward the few folks in attendance who could be
identified as “right” of center.
…
There is hope among Next organizers that when Next meets again, a broader spectrum of voices will participate.

Again, when the Fellowship group meets it will be interesting to see if their tone is reviewed as positively by a neutral or skeptical observer.

Maybe the biggest difference between the two movements is that the Fellowship documents lay out as their agenda specific points and actions they want their group, and by extension the denomination to take.  The NEXT group outlines their conference description as “We will engage in worship, hear presentations and participate in small
groups. More than that, we will build relationships, connect with others
in shared ministry and learn from one another.”  In this case, the discussion and relationship are the agenda.

Finally, there is the “theological perspective” of each group.  It seems that this has been set up as a Conservative (Fellowship) versus Liberal (NEXT) polarity.  The Fellowship group is pretty clear with the stance when they list one of their characteristics as seeking “A clear, concise theological core to which we subscribe, within classic biblical, Reformed/Evangelical traditions, and a pledge to live according to those beliefs, regardless of cultural pressures to conform.” 

The lack of verbiage on the NEXT web site makes it more difficult to clearly claim a theological perspective from that source, but if nothing else the comments during the meeting that held up NEXT as an alternative to the Fellowship seem to also declare an alternate theological perspective.  Ms. Fowler suggests this as well, telling us “Unfortunately,
the conversation was had largely in isolation among Presbyterians who
share a progressive theology. Conservative Presbyterians did not show
up.”

Stay tuned…