Had to laugh at the comic strip Mallard Fillmore yesterday — not often we get references to Presbyterians in the comic pages, to say nothing of “Radical Presbyterians.”  As the PCA Historical Center has shown us, comic strips about Presbyterians, and our General Assemblies no less, have been more common in the past.  [My all time favorite Presbyterian political cartoon from the 217th General Assembly (2006) not withstanding.]

One tends not to think of Presbyterians as “radical,” but I do remember a quote in a sermon one time about the fear inspired on the battlefield by a small band of Scottish Presbyterians on their knees in prayer before a battle.  [I could not find a source for that but I’ll ask my friend that preached the sermon about it on Sunday, unless one of you recognizes the quote.]

Our Presbyterian polity actually does talk about being “radical,” but in a different sense of the word than we think of today.  While these “radical principles of Presbyterian church government and discipline” are included in the current PC(USA) Book of Order, G-1.0400, the footnote tells us that they were adopted by the 1797 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America.  Through the wonders of Google Books, I can quote from an 1828 issue of The Christian Advocate (v. 6, p. 59) from a letter submitted to that publication:

Radical Principles of Presbyterianism.

Perhaps I shall not be able to state these better than by an extract from “Form of Government,” chap. xii. page 563, note. “The radical principles ofPresbyterian church government and discipline are:— That the several different congregations of believers, taken collectively, constitute one church of Christ; called emphatically the church; that a larger part of the church, or a representation of it, should govern a smaller, or determine matters of controversy which arise therein;—that a representation of the whole should govern and determine in regard to every part, and to all the parts united; that is, that a majority shall govern: and consequently that appeals may be carried from lower to higher judicatories, till they be finally decided by the collected wisdom and united voice of the whole church.”

These principles I hope to see preserved without any infraction— and I feel persuaded the more they are examined and tested, the more dear they will be to the Presbyterian church.

So we are radical in our polity, although it should be pointed out that the current PC(USA) Book of Order clarifies the meaning of radical by saying “the word ‘radical’ is used in its primary meaning of ‘fundamental and basic,'”

So have fun going out there and being radical — or at least “fundamental and basic.”