Every year I create for my own congregation a one page summary of the actions of the just completed General Assembly. I try to write it for a more general audience and I keep it to one page. (But the ordination standards section is a bit challenging this year so you may have to explain it to others.) I have linked to it below. If you find it useful you are welcome to distribute it to those who might be interested.
http://www.gajunkie.com/218GAa.pdf
Correction: I was in error about the fact that the vote on same-sex marriage was close. Thanks to Presbylaw for catching my mistake. A slightly modified version of the sheet has been posted.
Stephen,
Thank you for your play by play of the business of the General Assembly. I found myself going to your blog quite often to find out what happened.
I also appreciated your balanced tone and concern for facts. Good work!
Peace,
john
I am a little confused. Did $2m come out of the budget for LDF or is it ALL from donations?
There was GREAT confusion about this after the fact. I and several others initially thought that it was a per capita budget line item.
However, after checking over the budget and reading PC-biz a few times it looks like the amendment to make this “extra opportunity” giving did pass. The financial implications passed on Saturday are well short of $2 million. In trying “follow the money” and not finding it, I am now pretty sure this is donation based.
The part about the legal suits – in particular that “most of the presbyteries are defendants” I believe is misleading.
Of over 20 cases going on nationally moany if not most are cases of the Presbytery suing congregations, at times even individuals, to maintain the trust clause. Many of the cases are churches that; having exhausted all other means, have appealed to the courts to clarify title between the corporations.
Bill-
You may very well be right about that.
What I put down was the way it was presented at GA. Of the 40 presbyteries in litigation it was presented that 37 or 34, depending on who you talked to, were the defendants. And having gotten strong comments from presbytery leadership, both personally and in the blog comments, about being the defendants I’m going to stick with that for the moment.
However, your point is important that there is a “back story” to many of these and the litigation is only the latest salvo. I’m not sure if I have the time, interest and energy to chase all 40 of these, but later in the summer when GA season is over maybe I’ll track down a few of these stories. I do know from your blog and others that churches have not felt that the presbyteries have been dealing with them in good faith within our polity and have felt compelled to step out to the civil process. It is my prayer that the commissioner resolution about gracious departure will help return us to a stance of mutual respect on both sides that will demonstrate to the world how Christians should agree to disagree and part ways in a manner that glorifies God.
Thanks for the reminder about where some of these cases come from.
Steve
On the Moderator election and blogs:
Bruce was not only the one who already had a Facebook presence, he actually assisted at least one of the other candidates in getting started.
Because of my role in hosting the pre-Assembly meet and greet event in Lawrenceville, NJ, I was able to see how the candidates interacted. They were a VERY collegial bunch. I honestly believe that all of them would have been comfortable if any of them had been elected.
I thoroughly enjoyed meeting them when they were here.
“commissioner resolution about gracious departure” will have no effect on how churches view their Presbyteries, they know that the commissioner do not speak for Louisville. The only thing, that will is for the “Louisville Papers” are disavowed and lawsuits are settled by the presbyteries voluntarily.
I agree with Bill…the conversation on the floor of the assembly was a bit upsetting about this…it was never acknowledged as to who was in the position of power on these issues.
That of course is the denomination…so to say that its churches primarily involved in instigating the litigation is in fact misleading.
Litigation would never happen if congregations didn’t have to fight for the property.
I certainly did not mean to imply you were stating the “most” there – I understood you were reporting what happened.
Thanks for all the hard work.
“narrowly chose to keep the definition of marriage as being between a man and a woman.” I just got tagged on this quote, the vote was 540-161 according to an anonymous commentor. Is this correct? Also, am I correct that “fear of consequences” was used to turn this vote by one of the GLBT supporters?
Presbylaw,
My mistake on that one. Yes, that is what I said and yes, I was wrong: the decisive vote was not close at 80% favoring keeping the definition as it is.
I will correct that this evening.
In thinking about it I was probably influenced by the committee vote of 38/20 which was closer, but arguably still not “narrowly” close. That and the speed with which I wanted to get the summary ready for my congregation.
For full, and official details, check out the item on PC-biz
I apologize to all for my inaccuracy on this one and regret the error.
Steve
On the issue of good faith, I would submit the reverse is also true: presbyteries have likewise felt that the litigating congregations have not been dealing with them in good faith within our polity. It has been a painful business all around
Christine,
I completely agree with you. In some of the things I have been doing recently I have been sitting on both sides of the table. And while all the cases do not involve litigation at this time, I have seen higher governing bodies needing to resort to civil litigation. And I have been on the presbytery side of a couple of uncomfortable conversations where churches were becoming suspicious of the PC(USA) and were projecting that on the presbytery in particular afraid Louisville was “pulling our strings.”
What is required at this point is to build trust between our governing bodies and hold in tension our need to do things “decently and in order” while still dealing with each other graciously. It is a hard tension and quite frankly where this does not happen is when it makes the headlines.
Steve