A couple of brief notes about the March 2009 issue of the magazine Presbyterians Today published by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

The first item concerns the regular column “What Presbyterians Believe,” this month written by Dr. Michael Jinkins from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary.  The subject is “What Presbyterians Believe about Heresy.” (Interesting note that the article is about “heresy” while the URL says “heretic.htm”)  Well, it turns out that between Mr. Jinkins’ original manuscript and the initial publication of the article an editor tried to improve on the headline and lede and, in Mr. Jinkins’ opinion, misrepresented his viewpoint.  The misrepresentation was significant enough that Prof. Jinkins wrote an article published online by the Presbyterian Outlook stating his complaint and including the article as he originally wrote it.  The online version of the Presbyterians Today article now displays Mr. Jinkins’ original version but presumably it is too late for the print version.

In the Outlook, Dr. Jinkins says this about the Presbyterians Today article:

Several months ago I was
asked to write an article on heresy for the “What Presbyterians Believe
Series” in Presbyterians Today.

When
the article appeared this week I was surprised and dismayed to discover
that the opening two paragraphs of the published article were so
clearly not my work that I have had to take the unprecedented step
(unprecedented for me at least) of formally distancing myself from
several key aspects of an article that appears under my name.

In
some thirty years of writing for church publications, this is the first
time I have ever had to do this. I have asked the magazine to retract
these paragraphs and to publish what I actually wrote because the
editors’ changes do not reflect my theology. I am frankly embarrassed
to have my name appear on the published article, and I do not want the
erroneous views attributed to me to reflect negatively on the
Presbyterian Church and the seminary I serve. I have informed the
publisher of Presbyterians Today that I am posting this blog to set the
record straight, and that I will refer readers to my original essay so
they can read it if they want to know what I actually wrote.

He goes on to discuss how the modification of the first two paragraphs made him sound sympathetic with “Arius, the arch heretic of the early church.”  In addition, he says the new title “How to spot a heretic” is inappropriate because it “conjures up a predatory spirit that I find profoundly disturbing in the contemporary context.”  Check out the Outlook article for the original text and the full discussion of these issues.

As long as I am on the topic of Presbyterians Today, I will mention a piece of slightly older news, the January appointment of Jeffrey Lawrence as publisher of the magazine. (Presbyterian News Service article)  Mr. Lawrence brings a wide variety of skills to the job including legal, business, and pastoral experience.  I wish him well in his new position.