To say that the Sunday worship service at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) does not really follow the Regulative Principle of Worship is probably an understatement.  It is always a major production with the message from the outgoing Moderator, the Lord’s Supper, liturgical dance, massed choirs, commissioning of missionaries, remembrance of those Teaching Elders who have joined the Church Triumphant, and lots of music.

I intentionally use the word “production” in the preceding paragraph because this worship service is one:  It is planned a year in advance, is held in a custom decorated worship space, is carefully choreographed and planned, involves hundreds of people, communion is served to thousands of attendees, and is expected to be culturally sensitive or politically correct, depending on your point of view.  Those years that I have attended GA I have always gone to the worship service but I have friends who, for a variety of reasons, have avoided it and found alternate worship services.

Well this year, in addition to the usual worship elements, at the 219th General Assembly there was an additional element that I don’t remember from any previous year: giant puppets.

Now, before I get into this specific case it is probably helpful to point out that the use of giant puppets in worship has become a hot topic in worship circles recently so the use of puppets by the PC(USA) just fed into this controversy.  This YouTube video set off a round of discussion a couple of years ago that included comments from First Things and Insight Scoop among others.

Well this summer, a couple of videos from the opening Sunday worship went viral with corresponding discussion.  I heard about the puppets from the press release but looking back it was probably Viola Larson’s posting of the video and a second video where I first saw them.  It was then picked up by Bad Vestments with their “Giant Papier-mâché Calvinist Puppets of Doom.”  (And Bad Vestments quickly followed with two more examples from other churches.)  At this point the blogosphere weighed in, most with critical comments, including Ad Dominum, Stand Firm, and Gairney Bridge.  Jody at Quotidian Grace ran a poll and of the 43 readers  that responded, 2/3 answered the question “Are giant puppets appropriate in worship?” with “Hell No!”

I’ll say that considering the discussion about this topic that has been going on none of this current controversy seemed out of the ordinary to me.  But then it crossed the Atlantic…

On August 28th the immediate past Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland weighted in on his personal blog, and he too was critical:

It all looks a bit pagan to me, and certainly out of place in a denomination that claims to be Christian and reformed.

…

Given the other decisions and proposals of the General Assembly with regard to Christian marriage and the place of practising homosexuals in leadership, it seems that PCUSA has drifted away from its biblical and reformed roots. But some people have been pointing that out for many years.

At the present time there are 16 comments to this post — check them out, there is some good material in there.  Today Will Crawley of the BBC Northern Ireland on his blog Will & Testament highlights Dr. Carson’s blog post and the responses in the comments section.  It turns out that that the commenters are mixed in their opinion and include a brief one saying “Not nearly as silly looking as an Orange or Black parade,” and another that observes “There are children and young people present at the opening of their general assembly. Maybe they do some things better than us.”

One long comment, and most reasoned response in my opinion, comes from the noted Belfast blogger Alan in Belfast.  In the comments he says in part:

Stafford, some might say that the opening procession has a bit more life and colour about it than PCI’s stately procession of ex-moderators! But surely it is difficult – perhaps dangerous – to pick a 5 minute excerpt out of an opening event that took a couple of hours and criticise it. Cherry-picking lacks context, lacks any verbal or written explanation of the significance of what was happening. Surely General Assembly Opening hermeneutics requires a bit more context and material before jumping to conclusions.

Later he continues:

The second video – the puppets – has no connection with PCUSA as far as I can tell. It might have helped in the post if you’d made that clear. Maybe it’s because I spent a very pleasant half hour recently talking to Oscar the Grouch, but I do note that puppets seem to have a place in NI Christian teaching. My daughter attended a holiday Bible club a few weeks ago which featured a pair of camels that could be accused of helping spread the Gospel. And the same puppets (or is the puppeteers) have taught children from PCI at more than one Kid’s Praise Party.

And Alan concludes with:

Is there no light to be had at all in either of these situations? As the “standards of the church” that get read out at PCI ordinations and installations say:

“In exercising the inalienable right of private judgement the Christian is not to set his reason above the Word of God, or to refuse light from any quarter.”

Dr. Carson responded:

Alan, you are absolutely right about the importance of context, and nowhere is this more important than in your last statement. “Not refusing light from any quarter” does not mean that anything goes or that all opinions are equally valid for reformed Christians. The statement comes in the context of affirming the authority and sufficiency of Scripture and the inadequacy of human reason. The statement goes on to say that conscience is free from “the doctrines and commandments of men which are in anything contrary to His Word or beside it, in matters of faith and worship.” It is for that reason that traditionally reformed churches have opted for only those elements in worship which are commanded or recognised in the Bible. No one’s conscience should be bound by being required to participate in worship which includes other elements not prescribed by Scripture.

Peter, another commenter, also has a long and thoughtful response to Alan where he talks about children wanting to know “what is real.”  He concludes with “Real sins, like exclusion, are dealt with by participating in real dramas, real dramas like eating and drinking with people, real dramas like words, words of kindness and grace, real dramas like offering, again, the hand of friendship even after it has been spurned. Real dramas like the Cross.  And that, to my mind, is what is pagan about such events in the church, it is the replacing of the real drama with a made up one of our own, one behind which we hide… and the really disturbing thing is that we can hide behind the most orthodox of doctrine.”

But the real zinger in this discussion, and thanks to Will Crowley for pointing this one out, is from a “Bemused Parent” who was at Dr. Carson’s church, First Portadown.

Truth is stranger than fiction ! ! !

At First Presby’ Portadown, on Sunday, our children’s address consisted of one man dressed all in black, he was the Dark Destroyer(Satan) and the other, dressed in white, was Jesus. They had a tug of war! Go(o)d v’s evil. First time evil won then Jesus with the help of his “friends”, won.

We were all encouraged to cheer and boo the appropriate “hero”.

Stafford, your children’s address was different, are you taking your led from PCUSA? You obviously do not reject light from any quarter. What are you planning next week?

Maybe the best summary of all this is a phrase that Peter and Alan have been discussing back and forth in the comments — “Where do you draw the line?”