wfn.org | Stay in COCU, Assembly Committee Recommends

[PCUSA.NEWS@pcusa.org]

Title Stay in COCU, Assembly Committee Recommends 
18-June-1997 
GA97072 
 
           Stay in COCU, Assembly Committee Recommends 
 
                    by Jerry Van Marter 
 
SYRACUSE--The Assembly Committee on Ecumenical Relations rejected Overture 
97-35 from Plains and Peaks Presbytery Tuesday that calls for immediate 
Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) withdrawal from the Consultation on Church 
Union, or COCU.  The committee also rejected a motion that the denomination 
remain in COCU until its next plenary, scheduled for January 1999, and then 
withdraw. 
 
    Instead, the committee is proposing that the PCUSA remain in COCU and 
that the General Assembly's Special Committee on COCU work within the 
organization to try and come up with a plan to implement the consultation's 
"covenanting" proposals, which were approved by the 1993 Assembly.  A set 
of proposed amendments to implement "covenanting" was soundly defeated in 
voting by the presbyteries this year. 
 
    COCU opponents argued in the committee that the rejection of the 
amendments means the PCUSA should get out of COCU.  "Do we need COCU and 
its documents and structures?" asked overture advocate the Rev. Esther Berg 
of Plains and Peaks Presbytery.  "Plains and Peaks thinks not.  Documents 
and structures will not produce Christian unity -- what we must do is cross 
every boundary.  We are thankful to COCU for bringing us to where we are, 
but now the time for COCU has passed." 
 
    The Rev. John Wilkerson of Salem Presbytery disagreed.  "COCU has never 
precluded any other expression of Christian unity," he said.  "Let's go 
beyond COCU but not desert COCU -- if we desert COCU, we won't go beyond 
it." 
 
    Other opponents objected to COCU's cost, estimated at $1.6 million over 
the last 20 years.  "That is a lot of money," said Edna Jackson of Grace 
Presbytery, "money that we don't have." 
 
    But Kelly Wiant, a Theological Student Advisory Delegate from 
Presbyterian School of Christian Education, countered, "Christian unity is 
a mandatory mission and the money spent is a sign of the value we place on 
unity." 
 
    Scot McGuire, a Youth Advisory Delegate from Providence Presbytery, 
questioned the value of "top down" ecumenical efforts.  "I don't see the 
point of doing it up here [the denominational level] if it doesn't make it 
down to the local level." 
 
    Eugenia Webb responded with a metaphor from the construction industry. 
"When a new building is going up, the roof goes on first so the workers 
inside will have shelter for their work on the rest of the structure." 

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