Presbyterian News Headlines For The Week Ending April 27, 2013

Leave a reply


Here are a few of the global Presbyterianism headlines that caught my attention in the past week:

A couple of weeks ago the hot topic for the Church of Scotland was the report to the General Assembly from the Theological Commission on Same-sex Relationships and the Ministry. This past week the news shifted on to a Joint Report on the Implications for the Church of Scotland of Independence for Scotland. The recommendation that seems to have caught everyone’s attention is “In the event of Scottish Independence… that the monarch should have a Scottish coronation…” Among the articles covering this are:

Scottish independence: Church of Scotland to debate coronations – From the BBC

Kirk: Give future monarch a Scots coronation after Yes vote – From The Herald

And it was noted that the Free Church of Scotland would also be exploring this topic:

Free Church to Discuss Independence – Free Church of Scotland news article

In the Free Church of Scotland there is another interesting pastoral call following last month’s call of an Italian minister to Leith:

Anglican Minister to take Free Church Congregation – From The Scotsman

In Ireland, where the Presbyterian Church opposes same-sex marriage, a political leader came under fire for his views that differ from the church’s position:

Alliance leader David Ford stands down as church elder over his support for gay marriage– From The Irish Times

And from the Presbyterian Church of Ghana:

Indiscipline amongst the youth need to be checked – Okyenhene – From GhanaWeb [note: The Okyenhene is the royal leader of a clan in Eastern Ghana. he was speaking at a Presbyterian Church.]

Politicians can’t fool Ghanaians any longer – Presby Moderator – From Vibe Ghana

Presbyterian News Headlines For The Week Ending April 20, 2013

Leave a reply


Well the buzz of the week was from the Church of Scotland and was related to the release of the Reports for the upcoming General Assembly. More specifically it relates to the report of the Theological Commission on Same-Sex Relationships and the Ministry. It is an interesting read — I’m about half way through it and will blog on it later this week.  But it generated a lot of media buzz so here are some of those headlines:

In other news…

Colleges and their ties to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
Davidson Trustees Study, but Stop Short of Relaxing Church Connections – college press release. After a year of study the trustees have affirmed the current relationship with the PC(USA). They will keep their rare requirement that the college’s president be a Presbyterian. There is also a college press release about a petition to change that requirement.

Whitworth University Ends Exclusive 123-Year Partnership with PC(USA) – Christianity Today article. The university will be able to develop ties with other Churches of Christ.

Presbyterian Church Appoints New Clerk – from the News Letter
The lede to the article: “The general board of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland has agreed to
the nomination of the Rev Trevor Gribben as the next Clerk of the
General Assembly.”

Presbyterian News Headlines For The Week Ending April 13, 2013

Leave a reply

[Ed. note: Last year I started doing these headlines posts but dropped it during GA season and never restarted. Well, enough interesting things are happening that I thought I would restart this weekly post. As before, these are generally news items about global Presbyterianism that catch my attention but I don’t have time to blog about individually. I do however reserve the right to come back and write more about a story later. – SLS]

Lord High Commissioner for the Scottish General Assemblies
This is actually old news – Her Majesty’s Government issued the announcement three months ago – but it was highlighted this past week by a release from the Free Church of Scotland. While the Lord High Commissioner is technically only a position with the national Church of Scotland, they usually also visit the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland.

This year’s Lord High Commissioner is that same as last year, The Right Honourable Lord James Alexander Douglas-Hamilton, Baron Selkirk of Douglas, PC, QC.

New Role for Ex-Moderator
The Newsletter reports that the Rev. Dr. Stafford Carson has been selected as the new Principal of Union Theological College, Belfast. Rev. Carson was the Moderator of the 2009 General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland and is the pastor of First Portadown Presbyterian Church. Union College has about 300 students with about 10% of them training for the ministry.

The position still needs a series of approvals of which the final one is from this year’s General Assembly in early June.


Austin Presbyterian seminary receives $2.5 million gift
An article from the Austin Statesman informs us of a gift to Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary to endow the Blair R. Monie Distinguished Chair in Homiletics. The gift is from Mary and Robert J. Wright of Dallas and honors their pastor. The Rev. Monie has been a long-time trustee of Austin. (There is also a press release from the Seminary)

Asante Presbytery creates website to keep members informed
The Asante Presbytery of the Presbyterian Church of Ghana has launched a new web site. The objective is clear from the article: “…to keep its members, both home and abroad, adequately informed about its activities.“

The PC(USA) Focus On The Form Of Government

10 Replies

Let me say right up front that this post may appear snarky to some of you, maybe many of you. Maybe it really is snarky. But as I processed through what I am going to talk about I came to the conclusion that this is not just a knee-jerk cynical reaction but there is something really revealing about this. I am hoping I get all the snark out – you may think otherwise.

To begin with, a really interesting and useful piece was announced today on Twitter from the Presbytery of Chicago and the tweets attributed it to their Stated Clerk Barbara Bundick. It is a Road Map To The Form Of Government — a one-page, two-sided color leaflet that guides a person through the Form of Government section of the PC(USA) Book of Order.

It is a very good resource – get it, use it. I will include it myself in future ruling elder training.

But what got my attention was the stylized map that went with it to explain the relationships.

Let me first give it credit for good cartography – things are clearly labeled and there is a north arrow and a scale. If I had to guess I would say they used the Netherlands as a starting point for the base map. That would make the Book of Confessions and the Rules of Discipline Belgium, or part of it, and Germany is The Secular World.

But the graphic bothers me on one secondary and symbolic point. I have no problem with the vast majority of it – Scripture as an ocean, the emphasis on the Form of Government (that’s what the pamphlet is about after all), the Rules of Discipline as a bordering area (and is the red symbolic? “Danger, Will Robinson!”), and the Directory for Worship and Foundations of Presbyterian Polity as being more of Scripture than government and the Foundations tying it all together.

But yes, it is the treatment of the Book of Confessions that I find revealing. On a practical level when viewing this it looks like just another section, like the neighboring Rules of Discipline. It is not given the heft of a part of our Constitution that has its own volume — and being volume 1 no less. Should it not be treated as different in nature from the sections of the Book of Order? Would it not have been useful to somehow distinguish it as different since our ordination vows say we are instructed and guided by the confessions, something that is not said of the Book of Order?

Or, am I getting worked up over nothing?

Let’s break down the possibilities…

One is that I am completely off my rocker, over interpreting a stylistic figure and finding importance in minor details that are not really part of what the document is ultimatly about. This could certainly be the case.

Another possibility is that this diagram was carefully laid out so that the Book of Confessions was fully intended to have no greater or lesser importance in the PC(USA) polity world than the Rules of Discipline. This could also be the case but considering the emphasis Presbyterians generally place on our confessional standards I don’t think it was quite this intentional.

It is my conclusion that the answer probably lies in between these two. The guide sheet is about the Form of Government so that section is rightly given predominance in the diagram. The figure is carefully constructed and full of symbolism but it appears that the other pieces are placed at particular points around the focus of the picture. On the map location is the quantity that carries the significance.

I am inclined to think that the sizing of the region representing the Book of Confessions is inadvertent but telling. It reflects what seems to be the commonly held perception of the PC(USA) Constitution that it is out there and useful at particular points in our life together, but the confessions are just one piece of it like all the others. In particular, our day-to-day business is guided by the Form of Government so that is what we need to know.

In short, I think this mapping of the parts of our constitution is unintentionally all too honest about how we frequently regard the parts of our constitution. It reflects how much attention we pay to the different parts of the constitution — lots of times our books fall open to the Form of Government because that is where we spend the most time while the other sections are less frequently referred to.

Let me affirm that this really is a good diagram overall and those that put it together had a particular point that is neatly brought out by it. The point I am bringing up is that the secondary details may be a Rorschach test for me and I am seeing what I want to in it, or it may be a sort of graphic Freudian slip for the creators who are inadvertently saying something about the day-to-day place of the confessions in the PC(USA).

Affinity Classes In The Reformed Churches

2 Replies

A news article caught my eye earlier this week and the parallels to some discussions in Presbyterian branches induced me to write about it here. But before I dive into this a very short polity note.

This discussion involves a couple of Reformed churches who are very close cousins to the Presbyterian family. Their levels of governing bodies are parallel to those found in Presbyterian branches but with slightly different names: At the congregational level the church is governed by the consistory which is like the session. At the local level the classis is similar to a presbytery. There are regional synods like those in some Presbyterian branches. And at the highest level is a General Synod.

Regarding the classis a couple of details. The first is important for this discussion – the plural of classis is classes, as in the title of this piece. The term classis comes from the Latin where classis means a military group invoking the image of churches as boats journeying together in one fleet. A polity point that is not as important here but is interesting is that unlike a presbytery which continues to exist between meetings a classis only exists during the meeting. And finally, if you have a Google alert set for “classis” what you mostly get are misspellings of “classic/classics” or a typo of “class is” – In case you care.

But, I did got a hit on this interesting news item…

The Christian Reformed Church in North America has had a bit of a discussion going about women as officers of the church. While they are included at the national level and in most classes there are a few churches and classes that believe that women holding ordained offices in the church is contrary to Scripture. This past week the CRC released a news story saying that the Classis of Kalamazoo and the Classis of Grand Rapids North have overtured the 2013 Synod to “allow the formation of a new classis for congregations that exclude women from holding ordained office.” This would be an affinity classis that is non-geographic in structure.

The full text of the two overtures can be found in the Synod 2013 Agenda beginning on page 398. They each give the background, a small portion of which I recount below. The overtures themselves are similar – Overture 3 reads:

Therefore, Classis Grand Rapids North overtures Synod 2013 to direct the Board of Trustees to help establish a new classis in the Michigan area in accordance with Church Order Article 39. The purpose for this would be to create a classis in which churches whose convictions do not allow women to serve in the offices of the church to participate freely.

Each overture is followed by the Grounds section. As part of this the grounds for Overture 3 – the one from Classis Grand Rapids North – it says, in part:

4. We realize that starting a new classis on the ground of theological affinity is weighty and should be done with extreme care, wisdom, and patience. The CRCNA has two opposing positions regarding women serving in the ordained offices, calling for mutual respect and honor.

Synod 1996 did not accede to an overture for a new classis based on theological affinity because of concerns about further fragmentation within the denomination, impairing effective ministry… Sadly, several congregations have split or left the denomination, which is precisely the fragmentation we don’t want. Because this issue has deep-rooted convictions on both sides, realistic unity and mutual respect can be effectively achieved by providing a theological classis for churches serving in the denomination without having to register a protest for their biblical convictions.

It is also interesting to note that in one of the overtures they note that there are ten to twelve churches who would join such an affinity classis.

We will have to wait for the 2013 Synod to see how that works out for them but this is not the first time an alternate arrangement has been requested for churches that have this issue of conscience. Three years ago at Synod 2010 one church from each of the classes who passed the current overtures requested to be transferred to Classis Minnkota, a classis which does not have women in ecclesiastical office. The request was denied that time, at least in part because Classis Minnkota does not border either of the classes of the requesting churches. At the Synod the majority report did recommend for the transfer but the Synod adopted the minority report that did not recommend it. It is unknown if the request had been for a adjoining classis whether the Synod would have granted the transfer.

As I was researching this issue I was interested to find that an affinity classis of a bit different nature was approved in the Reformed Church of America. Back in 2008 it’s General Synod approved the concept of an affinity classis and the Far West Regional Synod created what was then called the City Center Network Classis, now known simply as City Classis. In that RCA news article the idea was described like this:

“The vision of the Center City Network is to be a missionary classis
that will recruit and train urban church planters, start multiple
churches in unreached cities, and form regional coaching networks that
will lead to new, thriving geographic classes in areas currently not
being served and in great need of churches that proclaim the good news
of the kingdom in word and deed,” says Mike Hayes, one of the pastors at
City Church in San Francisco. “The classis is formed out of a dual
commitment to sound ecclesiology and joining in the mission of God
through the expansion of the church.”

What began with three churches has now expanded to ten in cities across the western US.

The idea of a non-geographic classis was met with concerns from within the church that echos the concerns expressed about non-geographic presbyteries. In one collection of concerned statements on The Chicago Invitation blog there is one from Jim Reid who says, in part:

It defies logic that the RCA, which has devoted so much recent energy
to celebrating our diversity and emphasizing inclusiveness of
difference, would now make an about-face and endorse, or even condone, a
classis structure based on sameness—which is what any “affinity
classis” is.

To give a non-geographic classis voice and vote in the General Synod
is to plop an orange in the midst of a bushel of apples claiming, “
..but they are all round.”   Seating an “affinity classis” at GS 2009
will be the death throes of General Synod as an assembly of peer
delegations.

In another expression of concern the author of the Credo <–> Oratio blog writes about City Classis and his concerns with affinity classes:

To be fair, even though I’m a polity curmudgeon, I’m not particularly concerned about this particular creation. What concerns me are the potential implications of allowing the creation of affinity Classes. Here are a couple of them:

  • If it’s appropriate to create an affinity Classis, it is possible
    for Regional Synods to “ghetto-ize” congregations that don’t agree with
    something specific.  For example, a Regional Synod could create a
    Classis that didn’t allow the ordination of women or a Classis that only ordained blondies… or elderly people… or ???
  • The concept of an affinity Classis suggests, at least at a certain
    level, that there is little to be gained in the diversity of the greater
    church.  In other words, it implies that congregations from a
    particular affinity (i.e. Urban) don’t need the checks and balances of
    those from another (i.e. rural)… or poor and wealthy… or white and
    black… or ???

I have not found further review of how City Classis is working out but doing a quick check of the ten churches now a part of it there appears that roughly two thirds were established churches that moved into that classis and one third are new church plants.

To wrap up I am sure that many of you have connected the dots here for the similar developments in Presbyterian circles. The one unique item is the formation of City Classis as I am not aware of an affinity presbytery of similar nature having been approved. The CRC’s discussion of possibly allowing congregations to join an adjoining classis is similar to the agreement that the Evangelical Presbyterian Church has for membership in adjoining presbyteries for those churches with views that differ from their presbytery practice on women’s ordination. Likewise, affinity presbyteries (even on a provisional basis) and transfer of churches to near-by, but not necessarily adjoining, presbyteries has been proposed but regularly rejected by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

So it will be interesting to see how this proposal turns out in the CRC and what develops out of their discernment process. They will be meeting June 7-14 at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, MI.

Moderator Designees Of The Free Church Of Scotland (Continuing) And The Presbyterian Church In Canada

Leave a reply

Over the last couple of weeks we have news of two pastors from North America becoming the Moderator Designees for the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) and the Presbyterian Church in Canada. (Yes, you read that right.)

Free Church of Scotland (Continuing)
First, in what must be a highly unique, if not unprecedented, action in the history of Scottish Presbyterians the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) has named the pastor from the Free Church in Atlanta, Georgia, their Moderator Designee for the 2013 General Assembly. The Rev. Warren Ewing Gardner was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, did his undergraduate work at Geneva College and his theological training at Westminster Theological Seminary (Philadelphia) and Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. Based on the information in the Stornoway Gazette (I don’t see a press release on the denomination’s web site yet) it appears he was ordained by the PCUS in 1972 in Atlanta and he served three churches in that area.  He transferred to the Presbyterian Church in America in 1981 and served as a church planter for them in Georgia, for 23 years shepherding the congregation he founded there.  In 2003 he associated with the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) and again became a church planter founding his current congregation.  The denomination page includes his study at Columbia Theological Seminary so he likely began work on a Doctor of Ministry there (although that is just an educated guess on my part). He and his wife Valerie have five adult children and thirteen grandchildren.

It is worth noting that this might represent a certain Presbyterian reciprocity with Scotland as Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary have been know to get the likes of John Witherspoon and Iain Torrance from Scotland to serve as presidents of those institutions.

Presbyterian Church in Canada
The selection of the Rev. Dr. David Sutherland is also a bit unique but in a different way. Rev. Sutherland was the only nominee for the office when nominations were submitted last fall as no other candidate received the multiple presbytery nominations required to appear on the ballot. While not unheard of, this is an unusual occurrence. UPDATE: I inquired about this to the General Assembly Office and the response was that no one remembered this happening before.

With the nomination situation as it was the Rev. Sutherland was know to be the only candidate for Moderator last fall, and a detailed press release was issued by the PCC at that time. But being Presbyterians and being required to do things decently and in order and according to the Book of Forms, the position became official Tuesday as The Committee to Advise the Moderator met at the appointed time and place to make the nomination final.

Rev. Sutherland has been the pastor of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church in St. John’s, Newfoundland for almost 14 years and he has served in other churches in the Atlantic Provinces through his career. (And check out the picture of the church on Panoramio to get a better feel for the setting.)  In his career he has served in positions and on committees at all levels of the church including as a presbytery moderator, presbytery clerk, synod moderator and he now serves as the synod clerk. He has a significant number of initials after his name (B.Comm., M.Div., M.Th., D.Min.) but all the bio tells us is that he studied at Knox College. He and his wife Irma have two adult children and four grandchildren. Rev. Sutherland’s son is a pastor at the Bass River Pastoral Charge in New Brunswick.

He will be formally elected and installed as Moderator of the 139th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Canada when it convenes on May 31 in Toronto.

So our congratulations to both Rev. Gardner and Rev. Sutherland as they prepare for this calling and prayers and best wishes to them for their responsibilities moderating the Assembly and for their whole moderatorial year. May God continue to bless your ministries.

Review Of The BBC Documentary “An Independent People”

1 Reply

I had heard about the BBC – Northern Ireland producing a documentary on Ulster Presbyterians titled “An Independent People.” Well, it is now released and was broadcast on the BBC this past week with the final part airing last night.

Since it was on the BBC it is available on their iPlayer, but that did not help those of us outside the UK. Well, this past weekend I found it on YouTube and spent some time watching it. In short – I was not disappointed!

This is a documentary that presbynerds and those interested in Presbyterian church history will enjoy and I suspect that others with a more passing history of Presbyterianism will as well.  As I will explain in a moment, the first episode is a good general background for any Presbyterian and the second episode has some interesting background for Americans – Presbyterian or not.

This is a three-part documentary, each part one hour long, hosted by BBC NI religion correspondent William Crawley. The program presents the history of the Ulster Presbyterians with a wonderful balance of Mr. Crawley’s narrative, expert quotes, historical and current imagery, and plenty of location shots at historical sites. I don’t think there is a studio shot in the whole three hours.

But beyond the visual richness of the series it does a great job of explaining the history and the individuals behind it without taking sides in the many conflicts and controversies throughout the history. While it seemed to me that it presented a fairly complete history – and helped fill in several holes in my understanding of the Ulster Presbyterians – I do not have a deep enough knowledge of the history to know if there were any glaring errors or omissions.

It is also worthwhile to note that it sticks very close to the Ulster Presbyterians so when it talks about Scottish or American Presbyterians it is only to the extent that the Irish were involved. The primary exception is the very beginning when the origins of Presbyterianism in Geneva and Scotland are discussed.

The first episode titled “Taking Root” begins by recounting that early history and then the first wave of Scots to Ulster in the Plantation movement and resistance they found there. The next episode is “Seeds of Liberty” and talks about the Ulster Presbyterians in American and the ideas of the Enlightenment they brought with them that found expression in the American Revolution. It also discusses how that revolution, the French Revolution and the Enlightenment influenced Ireland. The final episode is “Union and Division” and traces the history in the Union of the UK and the divisions within Ireland as well as touching on the early Presbyterian missionary efforts.

The program was produced by Below the Radar for the BBC. You can find @williamcrawley and the show’s producer Fiona Keane (@fikeane) on Twitter. There are notices from both the Presbyterian Church in Ireland and the Presbyterian Historical Society of Ireland promoting the show. In addition to the BBC the show was funded in part by the Ulster-Scots Broadcast Fund.

A trailer/ad is also available but I’m not sure it does the series justice — but what can you do in 30 seconds?

As you can probably figure out, the title reference to an independent people works on many levels. For those that think Presbyterian realignments are a new phenomenon this series makes it clear that it is not.  Mr. Crawley begins the third episode with this lede:

[P]resbyterianism has always been a fractious faith. The democracy that defines it also creates division and dissent.

While the Ulster Presbyterians have components of their history that are unique in the Presbyterian universe, much of their history has interesting influences and parallels throughout global, and especially western, Presbyterianism. This documentary does a good job of helping us see where those puzzle pieces fit in the larger picture.

UPDATE: After posting this I found that Gladys Ganiel had written about the series. Some interesting insights from her background living in both The States as well as currently in Belfast. She did alert me to one error in the program – the statement that Francis Makemie founded the first Presbyterian Church in America. The program could have meant the oldest active congregation but a Long Island congregation founded by English Presbyterians in the 1640’s is generally regarded as the first. Makemie did however organize the first presbytery. But Gladys has a good point that I remember no mention of Amy Carmichael in the third episode and generally little coverage of the role of women in the history. She has also written some thoughts on the first episode.

UPDATE: Another insightful review and discussion of the program by Steve Stockman on his blog Soul Surmise. (And thanks to @alaninbelfast for bringing it to my attention.)

New Officers Of The Church Of Scotland National Youth Assembly

Leave a reply

Congratulations are in order to Elder Lynsey Martin and Esther Nisbet who were recently named as the new Moderator and Clerk of the Church of Scotland’s 2013 National Youth Assembly. I have not found a formal press release but the NYA officers web page was recently updated. It has been a little while since they were nominated since Lynsey’s appointment is mentioned in her church’s January/February newsletter.

Moderator Designate Lynsey Martin is a ruling elder for the Barnhill St. Margaret’s Church in Dundee and she has recently completed five years of law training and as the bio says she “is slowly adjusting to not being a student any more” and now doing administrative work at a law firm.

She has been extensively involved with the NYA and its mission trips since 2005 and has attended the General Assembly three times. Looking forward, the web page includes this quote from her about the upcoming NYA:

I’m really excited to have been invited to be the next Moderator of the
National Youth Assembly. One of the wonderful things about NYA is that
it’s constantly evolving. In our worship and discussion we take time to
learn about our Church, its work, our God and ourselves. That is why I’m
so happy that the theme this year shall be: ‘Identity: Who do you say
that I am?’ I think it’s important that we take time to reflect on our
identity, as individuals and as a Church and it’s brilliant that the NYA
is able to be a safe place for that through providing opportunity,
space, time and community. It is my hope that those attending NYA will
be encouraged to respond to this theme not only at NYA but throughout
their lives.

Clerk Designate Esther Nisbet is active in her congregation of St. Leonards Parish Church in Dunfermline. She is a music student at the University of Glasgow and also has extensive experience with the NYA having also gone on the mission trips and participated with the General Assembly twice. About this opportunity she is quoted as saying:

I am delighted to have been asked to be the Clerk of the National Youth
Assembly and I’m looking forwards to developing the role and working
with the Moderator, Lynsey!

One thing that struck me about both of the officers is that they share a love of music. Esther is not just a music student but plays violin in the praise band at her church. Lynsey is also active musically and recently began serving as the organist at Coldside Parish Church in Dundee. I suspect from the number of instruments each plays they must be active in other music groups as well.

They will be installed when the 2013 National Youth Assembly convenes on Friday 16 August in Dundee and they will help run the Assembly through the following Monday. As the quote from Lynsey said, the theme is “Identity” and the NYA page adds a bit more:

Our theme for 2013 is ‘Identity – who do you say I am?’ so we’ll be
exploring what it is to be me, what it is to be in the Church of
Scotland and what it is to be Scottish.

The page also talks about a bit of a change in the format — “For NYA 2013 our focus will be shifting from debates to other forms of learning and decision making.” It will be interesting to see how that goes.

And don’t worry, the page also says that all the usual fun social events will be there as well.

As Presbyterian youth events go this is a significant one because the topics discussed are related not just to the lives of the youth but also to the life of the Kirk and Scottish society in general. What will come out of their deliberations will be sent to the 2014 General Assembly and Lynsey will have the responsibility of presenting much of it. This event is also usually live streamed and I am looking forward to that and have blocked out the weekend on my calendar to watch. I don’t know how the new format will work with live streaming but I am interested to see.

As always, our blessings upon the Lynsey and Esther as they take up this calling and prayers for your Assembly and your year in office.

Two News Stories About Churches And Their Worship Space

Leave a reply

Last week two different news stories caught my attention and they both  were related to changes in the church and how they were working out their need and vision for worship space.

The first story is about the Gilcomston South Church, now referred to as just the Gilcomston Church, in Aberdeen, Scotland. This congregation had been making the news recently because of its discernment about whether to withdraw from the Church of Scotland. Well, it did so on February 15 and unlike the earlier withdraw of St. George’s Tron in Glasgow, it appears Gilcomston was prepared to walk away from the property. The few members of the continuing congregation are now meeting with the South Holburn Church until new leadership is in place and the future prospects are evaluated.

When Gilcomston left their building they began by meeting in a local hotel ballroom but complaints from guests resulted in the hotel management asking them to leave. (Their Facebook page has some pictures of the first Lord’s Day away from their building.)

Being without a home the Aberdeen Presbytery made them a very gracious offer (from an article in the Scotsman):

In a remarkable gesture, the members of the Aberdeen Presbytery of the
Church of Scotland have agreed to offer members of the former
congregation at the city’s Gilcomston South Church the temporary use of
the city centre building while they find a permanent base for their
breakaway church.

And a BBC article contains this quote from the convener of the Presbytery’s special committee considering the property:

The Rev George Cowie, committee convener, said: “‘It is deeply sad
when people choose to leave the Church of Scotland. We believe that the
Church of Scotland is a broad church and that it can accommodate people
who hold differing views.

“In this case, however, the situation has not involved conflict, scandal or litigation.

“All parties have shown respect for one another and it has
been a good Christian witness for us to engage with one another in this
manner.”

While I could say a lot about this situation, and the benefits to both parties, I am going to leave that last sentence to speak for itself about the witness. It will be interesting to see in what sort of worship space they finally move into. And that is part of the next story as well…

The second story is about three Georgia churches uniting – brought to us by the Marietta Daily Journal.

Yesterday was the last Lord’s Day with the three separate worship services and this coming week they will join together and charter as the new Light of Hope Presbyterian Church on Resurrection Sunday. Having a look at the PC(USA) statistics for these churches you can see the value of joining forces. (And in the discussion below, since the churches are being dissolved, there is no certainty how long the links will still be good.)

Southminster Presbyterian of Marietta shows in the PC(USA) statistics a membership of 86 members in 2011 and average worship attendance of 43, both declining from about twice those numbers seven years ago.

Woodlawn Presbyterian of Mableton has similar numbers with a membership of  69 and average worship attendance of 38. Their decline is not as sharp with only about a 25% drop over the last ten years, a number similar to the PC(USA) as a whole.

Calvary Presbyterian (official website already gone) of Marietta is the smallest of the three with a membership of 45 and average worship of 37. Their membership decline has two phases, a major drop in 2003 and then a steady loss of about half their members since then.  Since the worship attendance does not show the large 2003 drop that is probably just a cleaning of the membership rolls.

Let me highlight a few details from the news report:  First, all three churches are said to have been founded in the 1960’s so these are not historic churches but more likely represent the mainline expansion into suburbia as the city spread. (They are all on the southwest side of Marietta.)  Second, the pastors speak of their congregations getting older so these churches reflect the graying of the PC(USA). (The comment is made that the average age of one of the congregations is 65 which is only slightly older than the median age for the denomination of 63 determined by the latest Presbyterian Panel Snapshot.) Third, Southminster and Calvary share a pastor – managing with dwindling resources. Finally, both of the pastors of these three churches are at retirement age and with the closings will go into retirement.

But what caught my attention was the future plans for the new church. The first is the new pastor coming in to work with the new church – The Rev. Edwin Gonzalez-Gertz. He is transferring from the Presbytery of Tropical Florida and the summary of the November meeting of Cherokee Presbytery indicates that they were conducting a presbytery level search to fill a designated pastor position. The 2013 Mission Yearbook lists Rev. Gonzalez-Gertz as being on the Tropical Florida Presbytery staff as the Associate Missional Presbyter. A 2006 article in the Sun Sentinel describes him and his earlier work at Cypress Presbyterian Church in Pompano Beach. Lots of good stuff in the article but here is his quote describing that church:

This church has been transformed into a bilingual, multicultural
community that fits the projected demographics for the nation in 2050,
so it is a project that the Presbyterian General Assembly is supporting
to test the different ways of doing church.

Looking to the future the other aspect is all three properties are for sale. So what does this mean for their worship space? Here is what the current pastors say in the article:

The Southminster church building will house the new Light of Hope
congregation for no more than two years, Paulsen said. It will then move
to a new location that’s not a traditional church building.

“Traditional
church buildings aren’t built for ministries,” Paulsen said. “We need
to add some elements to the program to make it more attractive to young
families.”

The new elements will be more contemporary, but won’t stray from the “classic Presbyterian DNA,” as Paulsen put it.

Each
church has promised that the site starting out at Light of Hope will
only be temporary, and they intend to find a vacated building – possibly
an old bookstore or Home Depot site – to draw a new crowd, Spangler
said.

New ways of doing church, and you don’t know how it will work out until you try.

We wish both of these congregations well as they move forward and will try to remember to stop back in to see how they are doing. And a big thanks to Aberdeen Presbytery for your gracious Christian Witness.

And a bit more on church growth in the next day or two…

A New Presbyterian Leader… At Fuller Seminary

3 Replies

Well, the white smoke drifted over Rome yesterday but on you could be forgiven if on Tuesday you thought you saw a tiny bit wafting over Pasadena as Fuller Theological Seminary announced that Teaching Elder Mark Labberton would become the fifth person to hold the position of President of the Seminary beginning on July 1.

Mark is a bit of an insider at Fuller holding an M.Div. from there as well as currently serving on the faculty as the Lloyd
John Ogilvie Associate Professor of Preaching and Director of the Lloyd John
Ogilvie Institute of Preaching. (Not bad – going from Associate Professor to President. I presume the new job will come with a bump in status up to full prof.) TE Labberton has served as the pastor at Wayne Presbyterian Church and First Presbyterian Church, Berkeley before joining the Fuller faculty. (And First Pres Berkeley has posted a nice little announcement on their web site as well as a letter he wrote to them about the new position.)

I am sure that many of you know that Fuller Seminary is a multidenominational institution and according to the Association of Theological Schools list of members in the Fall of 2011 they had 3708 students with a Full Time Equivalent (FTE) of 1772. That guide says that there are 88 full time faculty and including the part-time instructors the faculty FTE is about 203.

What many people don’t appreciate is the very strong connection that Fuller has to Presbyterianism. Fuller was co-founded by Harold Ockenga who began his pastoral training at Princeton Theological Seminary but departed in the midst of the fundamentalist-modernist controversy and finished at the brand new Westminster Theological Seminary. After seminary he served a few different churches including two Presbyterian churches. In addition to being the co-founder he also served as the first president of Fuller and took up the post again a few years after he had stepped down from the first term.

Fast-forward to today when, according to the web page for Fuller’s Office of Presbyterian Ministries, the largest denomination group on campus is the Presbyterians and more faculty, including the current President Richard Mouw, come from Presbyterian churches than any other tradition.

The FAQ page tells us that the number of Presbyterian students has averaged about 300 over the last ten years of which about 130 are in the M.Div. program. And they do point out that these students come from multiple Presbyterian branches.

Let’s turn back to that ATS member list and look at a couple of PC(USA) seminaries. For comparison purposes the three seminaries with enrollments greater than 300 are Princeton with 539 and an FTE of 526, Columbia Theological Seminary with 387 and an FTE of 243, and Pittsburgh Theological Seminary with 307 and an FTE of 222. To be fair, San Francisco Theological Seminary is just below the cut-off at 292 with an FTE of 151. For other schools with Presbyterian connections Covenant Theological Seminary has 689 students with an FTE of 391, Westminster (PA) has 630 students with an FET of 412 and Reformed Theological Seminary has 1135 students with an FTE of 593.

The comparison of the number enrolled with the FTE would be an interesting study – very close for Princeton and about 2:1 for SFTS, RTS and Fuller – but that is a topic for another day. The bottom line here is just to make the point that Fuller holds its own in Presbyterian circles right up there with denominational seminaries.  And yes, I have counted total students at the other seminaries so the total Presbyterians at Fuller are probably greater than the Presbyterian majority at the other PC(USA) seminaries and probably at most of the others as well. But having said that, I have heard multiple stories about how PC(USA) presbyteries are hesitant to accept Fuller grads because it is an independent school with an evangelical history. This must be an issue since the FAQ page has an answer to the question “My Presbytery knows little or nothing about Fuller Seminary. Is there a convenient way to help it
understand what Fuller has to offer?”

So with that we want to extend our congratulations and best wishes to Rev. Labberton as he prepares to assume the office of President of Fuller Seminary. Our prayers are with you in this calling and we look forward to seeing more of you around our presbytery.