wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] Neglecting nurture?

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Note #7700 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Neglecting nurture?
GA03005

Neglecting nurture?

Retiring chair urges GAC to emphasize faith development

by Alexa Smith

DENVER  At the end of her term as president of the General Assembly Council
(GAC), Barbara Renton had three questions:

	What is the GAC doing to nurture congregations, leaders and families
in the faith? What kinds of spiritual nurture are not available through
presbyteries and synods? How do church agencies help people find the
spiritual resources they need?

	Renton, of Bainbridge, NY, included those questions in her final
report to the GACs executive committee, which met here for two days before
the opening of the 215th General Assembly, suggesting that spiritual nurture
ought to be a priority of the Presbyterian Church (USA).

	The GAC has been feverishly prioritizing for a decade, juggling
focus points and initiatives. The churchs current priorities, set by the
GA, are justice, evangelism, partnership and spiritual formation.

	What is it that the GAC needs to do, be a resource for? Renton
asked. The word nurture keeps coming to mind.

	Renton said churches should be cultivating qualities like
forgiveness, thoughtfulness and kindness in their members as a parent strives
to cultivate them in a child.

	Nurture as an organizing priority isnt an idea thats original to
Renton. 

	She credits it to Vital Signs, a book published in 1996 by Eerdmans
Publishing (reissued in 2001 by FaithWalk Publishing) that recommended ways
of revitalizing the PC(USA). Its authors are the Louisville Presbyterian
Theological Seminary team of M. Joe Coalter, John Mulder and Louis Weeks.

	Renton said the Vital Signs authors research  catalogued in the
multi-volume series, The Presbyterian Presence, published by Westminster/John
Knox Press  suggests that the church should concentrate on nurturing
Presbyterians in the faith and helping them develop spiritually.

	The GAC has been a responsive entity, and it has dealt thoughtfully
and prayerfully with all of the matters that have been presented to it,
Renton said in a recent interview. It has been guided by the decisions of
the General Assembly (GA), and it cannot work outside those decisions.

	What it lacks, she said, it time to reflect on the issues that affect
the church. Given that time, she said, the GAC could do a better job of
advising the GA  by recommending alternative ways of accomplishing its aims.

	Theres pressure to make decisions on the matter at hand, on a
potential project or program to implement GA directives, she said  which
means there is seldom much time to devote to reflecting on how the programs
are working and how they could be improved.

	Renton, a retired presbytery executive, suggested that programs be
evaluated in terms of nurture  which led to another question: How can the
GAC get feedback from members and congregations on what is lacking and what
is most needed.

	She said a reliable information loop between the GAC and other
governing bodies is just now being created.

	Renton said it isnt easy to get information about programming that
works  or even to find out how to make financial gifts to the church. People
dont know whom to ask, or how to ask, she said.

	Theres something amiss here, she said.

	Renton said she is now working on a survey of pastors that indicates
they are unaware of GAC resources and not very good at articulating their own
needs.

	Renton said it isnt easy to set priorities for the church.

	Our church is so large that our understandings of where we are vary
from place to place according to the history of the (specific) place, she
said. Last Sunday I was in Rhode Island, where there are churches so old
that they predate the Book of Order. Yet I can travel to California and
places in between where there is less than 100 years of Presbyterian
presence.

	And that makes a difference in the way we perceive ourselves and our
place in the world, our place in Gods plan and what our responsibility is.

	Rentons service on the GAC is ending after six years. She has served
as chair of the Committee on Mission Responsibility Through Investment (MRTI)
and the Czech Working Group, and has served on the Advisory Committee on
Ecumenical Relations and the Restricted Funds Oversight Committee.
	She plans to visit the Czech Republic in July to polish her language
skills and do some additional study.

	Youll do what you want next year, she told the executive committee
after presenting her report, but I commend this report to you.

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