wfn.org | [PCUSAnews] Rogers calls 91 percent vote for task force

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Note #6694 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

Rogers calls 91 percent vote for task force
a ‘very significant matter’
14-June-2001
GA01138

Rogers calls 91 percent vote for task force
a ‘very significant matter’

by Bill Lancaster
LOUISVILLE, June 14—Jack Rogers, moderator of the 213th General
Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), said it was a “very
significant matter” that 91 percent of the commissioners voted for
formation of a task force to seek the peace, unity and purity of the church.
 He answered questions at a press conference Thursday.

	He said it was important because “I had been told by people who could
be characterized as both right and left that they didn’t want a task
force at all.  I think there’s a difference between the commissioners
this year and the surrounding advocacy groups.  I view these commissioners
to be a wonderful cross section of ordinary Presbyterian ministers and
elders.”  He said, “I think they’re representing the
church as it is. . .  Most Presbyterians know that life is complicated, and
sometimes you have to take a deep breath and work at it a while before we
know exactly how to proceed.”

	In his introductory remarks, Rogers said the debate and action of the
Assembly on the task force “have made it much more a gathering of
information from the church as a whole and a reporting back to the church as
a whole.  Instead of a group of wise people closeting themselves for four
years and producing a report saying this is what we ought to do, the
Assembly has mandated that these people consult very widely in the church,
and that their results be reported back, not just to a General Assembly, but
to the church at large. I welcome those modifications to the original task
force idea.”

	A reporter asked Rogers if it would be appropriate for the Assembly to
refer matters dealing with G-6.0106b (the fidelity and chastity requirements
for officers) to the task force.  “It’s so difficult to know, it
depends on what happens, what the Assembly does.  If that remains a matter
of great disagreement and great tension in the church I think it would quite
naturally become the task force’s work.  But the task force is not
designed to deal particularly with that issue.  The task force is to look at
all the variety of concerns that seem to be troubling us, so that we can
figure out how to deal with them as a whole body.”

 	When asked what criteria would be used to select people for the task
force, Rogers said, “My own secret hope is that we can surprise people
and find some people that nobody expects to be on that task force, but that
who everybody later will say, that was a good idea.  I don’t have
those people in mind.  I just think that would be a lovely thing it if could
happen.”

	A reporter asked Rogers if an underlying, fundamental issue was at work in
the church’s conflicts.  Rogers said, “One way to put it would
be to say that there are some people who feel that the church is in very bad
shape and has strayed far from its original character. Other people say, no,
that is not true, the church is healthy and strong and is meant to represent
a diversity of opinion on all but the most centrally essential parts.

	“Another way to say it might be, we spent the last couple of years
having unity and diversity conferences.  Some people are much more
comfortable in a homogeneous grouping of people, and they want to focus on
everyone being united on most everything.  And there are other people who
are more comfortable in a diverse group saying, ‘we’re united on
the essentials, but it’s enriching for us also to tolerate many
diverse perspectives on things that aren’t absolutely
essential.’ That would be my feeling, and I’m just one person.
You asked me the question, and that would be my response.”

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