wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] One thing in common

[PCUSA NEWS <PCUSA.NEWS@ECUNET.ORG>]

Note #8289 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

04304
June 23, 2004

One thing in common

Challengers in stated clerk's race agree that Kirkpatrick has to go

by Jerry L. Van Marter

LOUISVILLE - Occupationally, they are as diverse a group as three
Presbyterians can be: One career-long pastor. One lawyer-minister who leads a
church renewal group. One elder who also is a physician, inventor and
engineer.

	They do have a few things in common: They're all from the evangelical
side of the Presbyterian Church (USA). They're all of the opinion that the
Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, the denomination's stated clerk  for the past eight
years, ought to be replaced. And they all want his job.

	The 544 commissioners to the 216th General Assembly, which starts
this weekend in Richmond, VA, will elect one of the four to the highest
ecclesiastical office in the 2.5-million-member PC(USA).

	Kirkpatrick's challengers in his bid for a third term would bring
strikingly different skills to the office.

	The Rev. Bob Davis, the lawyer-minister, told the Presbyterian News
Service in a recent interview: "Polity and process are my strengths. The
first line of mission and ministry of our church are its congregations, and I
believe the stated clerk must be able to equip, encourage and hold
accountable the churches."

	Davis, from the San Diego Presbytery said the clerk must help PC(USA
pastors and congregations "work through practical problems with theological
understanding and integrity."

	Davis, executive director of the Presbyterian Forum, a conservative
renewal group, said he has "an understanding of how the church can be done
differently."

	The Rev. Linn "Rus" Howard, the lifelong pastor, said in an interview
that his "firmness of belief" and his 23  years as a pastor give him an edge.

	Howard is pastor of Peters Creek Presbyterian Church in Venetia, PA,
in Washington Presbytery.

	"I'm used to having no authority except to preach the word of God,"
he said. "I understand that you've got to be strong and courageous -  to
stand firm on the lordship of Jesus Christ as the world's only savior, and to
stand firm on the Bible as the inspired, authoritative and infallible word of
God -  then lead with a pastoral-care sensibility."

	Alexander Metherell, a member of St. Andrews Presbyterian Church in
Newport Beach, CA, and the only elder in the race, said he believes his
"great variety of life and professional experience" sets him apart from the
others in the race. He told PNS he is "organized, realistic and analytical,"
qualities he has demonstrated as a physician who is also an engineer and
holds patents on a number of inventions.

	"There's a lot of pain in the church," he said, "but pain is a gift
from God, letting us know something's wrong. We cannot treat it by ignoring
it. We have to treat it Biblically and theologically. It's easier than a
physical case -  all it takes is confession and repentance. And we're not
terminal. ... But we're in denial, and it's going to take a change in top
leadership to cure us."

	The challengers agreed that the membership decline that started
before Presbyterian reunion in 1983 and continues today is an illness
awaiting a cure.

	Davis said the stated clerk can do little directly to stem membership
losses, but said the clerk can and should be "actively involved in equipping
people to the discipleship work to which they've been called."

	He said membership has declined because "we've convinced people they
aren't good enough, that evangelism ought to be left to professionals."

	As the spiritual leader of the denomination, Davis said, "The stated
clerk should publish materials to help people understand why their personal
witness is so important -  what they believe, why they believe it and how to
share it with others."

	"The stated clerk can't take a direct personal role," Metherell said,
"but the clerk can sure provide spiritual leadership in taking pro-active
actions when synods, presbyteries and congregations are not doing their
jobs."

	The result is that "trust is broken between the pews and Louisville,"
he said, partly because of "scandals going on all over the denomination ...
and the stated clerk tolerating subversion of the constitution."

	Church growth will come, Howard said, "when pastors see church
leaders speaking and acting courageously -  so the clerk should be preaching
and teaching at every opportunity."

	"There's a perception out there that (Kirkpatrick) is too liberal, or
doesn't know what it believes, or is uncertain or unclear about what it
believes," he said. "The clerk should reestablish clarity of belief."

	Pastors are the key, Howard said: "When leaders are Biblical and
courageous, pastors will be more Biblical and courageous, and then the church
will grow. As a denomination, we must love people and give them the truth."

	Metherell said truth is self-evident, in Scripture and in the
denomination's Book of Confessions. "We've always relied on the plain meaning
of the texts," he said.

	Today, he said, truth is being distorted and ignored -	as evidenced
by the growing number of church court cases of alleged defiance of the
constitution.

	"In practice, we've abandoned scripture and the confessions as
authoritative," he said. "I can't remember a court case where the Book of
Confessions or the Bible was cited. We've completely forgotten that the Book
of Order is nothing more than a procedural manual. If we forget what we
believe, then we lose who we are."

	The church's judicial system is "built on trust and good faith,"
Davis said, asserting that church courts don't have authority to enforce
their decisions, "and too many middle governing bodies are unwilling to deal
with cases of defiance."

	"If we don't do ordinary discipline locally, then how can we do
extraordinary discipline nationally?"

	Howard said discipline and constitutional interpretation have become
"disordered," and to restore order "we need to start with the Bible, then
with theology as its expressed in the confessions - and then address the
polity issues."

	Davis said the stated clerk is supposed to "preserve and protect the
constitution," and can do so by equipping church governing bodies.

	"Governing bodies need more help procedurally," he said. "Many of
these (constitutional) issues are administrative, not disciplinary. The clerk
must help the synods and presbyteries administer properly."

	With the denomination divided on theological issues and with disputes
arising in church courts in many parts of the country -  particularly around
ordination standards -	the 2001 General Assembly created the Theological
Task Force on Peace, Unity and Purity of the Church.

	None of the challengers expressed much hope for the task force, which
will make a major interim report to this Assembly and its final work product
in 2006.

	"I have no hope that the task force will find the unity we seek,"
Davis said, as he has many times before. "This is not a criticism of the
individuals, but of expectations and structure." He said asking a group of 20
people to solve the church's problems "is like hooking a 20-ton rig to a
Yugo, and then demanding that it pull the load over a mountain. It can't be
done."

	"Still, I pray for the task force," he added, "because I'm afraid
they'll be made the scapegoat when they finish their work and the problems
are still there."

	Metherell dismissed the task force as the product of "a giant
compromise that will produce a report that's a giant compromise."

	He said "scripture and the confessions are what bind us together and
connect us," and unity will be achieved "when scripture is accepted as the
authority" and "people are picked who are faithful to the faith of our
fathers."

	Howard agreed that "the only thing that will bring us back together
is God's word."

	"We are bound to do it God's way," he said. "I know that some will be
hurt by this, but we must be firm while loving them all the more."

	Asked to describe his first term as clerk, Metherell said, "I'll be
the most surprised person in the room if I'm elected, but I'd be satisfied
with a denomination back in compliance with the constitution and a church
that returned to the scriptures and confessions as our only authorities." He
said the "most appalling figure" in a recent annual statistical report was an
adult Baptism rate of less than one per congregation.

	He said there's "a lack of compelling preachin,g and people are so
tied up in this liberal-social-action stuff that they're doing an appalling
job of sharing the Gospel. We need reformation, not renewal."

	Howard said he'd consider his first term a success if the PC(USA)
"came to an agreement that we're going to do it God's way." If that happens,
he said, "Louisville will be perceived as spiritual leaders who support the
ministry of local churches, and local churches will freely support the
ministry of Louisville. Biblical leadership will produce the changes we
seek."

	Returning to his theme that the congregation is the "first line" of
mission, ministry and ecumenism, Davis said he consider a first term a
success if it brought about "a sense of joint direction and trust between the
congregations and the General Assembly, that we are all working to spread the
Gospel and feel supported in that work."

	In that case, he said, "There would be greater integrity in our
witness because the standards have been raised, not reduced to the lowest
common denominator."

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