Well that was an interesting evening.

The 224th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) has begun and the opening session certainly is one for the history books.

Under normal circumstances, the opening session of the General Assembly on Saturday afternoon is mostly training and business done as a formality. This includes the adoption of the Standing Rules, report of the outgoing Co-Moderators, the first report of the Nominating Committee and information on challenging a nomination, and a formal vote on distributing the business to the Assembly commissioner committees. It is mostly routine business to get the meeting going and do the decent and in order stuff to be sure the business and polity is set for the rest of the week. Then everyone comes back Saturday evening to elect the Co-Moderators.

For this Assembly it was already known that things would not be that routine. A special set of standing rules had to be adopted to facilitate a virtual GA with less time to do business. There were none of the regular committees so the business had to be tailored to fit a meeting that was always in plenary. And with the limited time some items had to be removed from the docket so the load was manageable.

The docket originally had scheduled one hour for this work. At a meeting yesterday afternoon the Business Referrals Committee – the only committee at this assembly which will handle the schedule and polity matters – added an extra hour to the opening business. So into tonight we went…

Four and a half hours later the GA finished the opening business. Since it was 11:30 pm on the east coast the Business Referrals Committee recommended adding another session by moving the election of the Co-Moderators to tomorrow night and the commissioners agreed by a vote of 349 to 120. So, another meeting and a change to my dinner plans.

The good news for the week was that only two closely-related items were removed from the list of business that was not considered critical or necessary enough to squeeze into this year’s abbreviated meeting. That is good news in the sense of the business load for this meeting has only increased by a little. It is bad news for the eight commissioners who were waiting in the queue to make motions removing other items from the list to refer. In particular, multiple individuals expressed disappointment that the Family Leave provisions would have to wait a couple more years. (And since it was a Book of Order change, two years beyond that.)

In the midst of all this there we a few interesting polity issues that arose.

The first are the necessary steps to allow this General Assembly to happen online. With an in-person GA not practical for a number of reasons, and with the Book of Order requiring a GA, pretty much the only option was to go online. The problem is that the PC(USA) does not have the bylaws or standing rules in place to make this happen so it was mentioned by a couple of individuals that this meeting is sort of happening outside Robert’s Rules of Order but everyone was trying to be clean and transparent about the whole thing. As the polity wonks know, this can be cleaned up by having the next regular, in-person meeting of the body – which would be the 225th GA in two years – ratify all of the actions taken by this assembly. (And I think it is a good bet that some language will be proposed to provide the option for virtual GA’s again if the need should arise.)

Another polity issue that was of concern and on the floor a couple of times was one of the special standing rules for this meeting that prohibited commissioner resolutions and new business to be brought to the assembly. The first instance was when the rules were being adopted and multiple commissioners had concerns about that prohibition. A motion was made to amend that standing rule to add an exception to allow motions to create “an Assembly-wide committee to discuss how PC(USA) will address social injustice prior to the 225th General Assembly.” The motion was defeated by 132 yes to 335 no. From the debate, the opposition to the amendment included both those who did not think adding such a significant item to a short meeting was wise and those that felt that carving such a narrow loophole was the way to go.

The second instance was when the Business Referrals Committee made a motion to suspend the standing rules to add two items of new business to the list of business for the meeting. That passed with the necessary 2/3 super-majority for suspending the rules. And one of these new business items helps address the issues for which the loophole noted above was concerned with.

And it was pointed out a couple of times that this latter approach is a permissible way for new business to be introduced. If the standing rules don’t allow it then move to suspend the rules and see if you can get the 2/3 vote.

The hot topic of the evening was the relationship of the San Francisco Theological Seminary (SFTS) to the PC(USA) through the Committee on Theological Education (COTE). The first instance was when a commissioner moved that the Dean of SFTS, the Rev Dr Jana Childers, be seated as a corresponding member as the other seminary leaders are. Turning to the Stated Clerk for advice, J. Herbert Nelson explained that when SFTS was “bought” (yes that is the term he used) by the University of Redlands they ceased to have status as a Presbyterian Seminary. As he said, “At this time there is no standing that would allow them to be seated.” The moderator ruled that the motion was out of order and moved on.

A couple minutes later the motion was made to challenge the ruling of the Moderator and after some discussion and explanation of this parliamentary procedure the ruling of the Moderator was sustained 334 to 133 and the challenge failed.

A bit later in the meeting when the business sorting was before the Assembly, the motion was made to not refer the Assembly Organization for Mission section related to COTE to the 225th GA but to deal with it in this Assembly to help sort out the status of SFTS. This move was defeated by a vote of 102 yes to 363 no.

So, the first plenary of the 224th General Assembly is suspended and will resume at 7 PM tomorrow, Saturday June 20th, with the only item of business being the election of the Co-Moderators.

But in a general sense, this was a slow start to the meeting and it raised some concerns in some peoples minds about whether the pace would pick up later in the week. A couple of the SMADs (Social Media Advisory Delegates) on Twitter wondered if the 224th GA would finish by the time the 225th begins. As I pointed out, at least with a virtual GA there is no convention hall that has a hard limit for the meeting to clear out on Saturday.

So that’s the opening night. Big credit to the Co-Moderators of the 223rd GA who handled the online meeting with grace, humor and a steady hand. Best wishes to them as they finish their term tomorrow – and I hope they enjoy this extra day. And prayers continue for all of those standing for Co-Moderators of the 224th GA. Being ready for the pressure of the election and suddenly having it moved back 24 hours can not be easy. Blessings on you as you regroup and get ready to do it again tomorrow.

Sleep well everyone.