wfn.org | Bid to block lesbian's ordination fails

[PCUSA NEWS <PCUSA.NEWS@ecunet.org>]

Note #6912 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

22-October-2001
01395

Bid to block lesbian's ordination fails

Not enough COM members object, so Redwoods Presbytery ordains Katie Morrison 

by John Filiatreau

LOUISVILLE - Presbyterians who opposed the ordination of Katie Morrison, a
lesbian ministerial candidate endorsed by Redwoods Presbytery in Northern
California in September, failed in their effort to prevent or delay it.
Morrison's ordination took place as scheduled on Oct. 21.

Her ordination could have been blocked if three or more of the 10 voting
members of the presbytery's Committee on Ministry had signed a request for a
stay from the Permanent Judicial Commission (PJC) of the Synod of the
Pacific.

Wayne Fuller, the PJC chairman, said on Oct. 20 that only two members had
requested such an order, "and that is not enough persons to stay the action"
through the process provided in the Book of Order.

Morrison has said she will abide by the Presbyterian Church (USA)'s
constitutional requirement that unmarried clergy be "chaste."

Redwoods presbyters on the losing end of the 90-37 vote to proceed with
Morrison's ordination charged that the process was illegitimate, voicing a
suspicion that her understanding of "chastity" is different from the
church's historical position that forbids any sexual activity between
unmarried partners.

They questioned whether the examiners in Morrison's case probed deeply
enough into sexual matters, beginning with the Committee on Preparation for
Ministry and continuing through the floor debate at a presbytery meeting.

Though the stay was denied, the complaint filed by those opposed to  the
ordination itself will still be heard by the synod's PJC. The hearing has
not yet been scheduled.

Redwoods Presbytery voted to approve Morrison's ordination as a "field
organizer" for More Light Presbyterians (MLP), an advocacy network for gay
and lesbian Presbyterians. She would be MLP's second field organizer.

Mitzi Henderson, a co-moderator of the organization, said it gets so many
calls for speakers that it needs another organizer to help congregations
learn to provide pastoral care to gays and lesbians and their families and
to assist in dialogues about homosexuality - a subject that has been at the
center of PC(USA) political debates for nearly three decades.

The constitutional provision at the center of the debate, G-6.0106b, is
itself in dispute. The provision, which requires "fidelity within the
covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness"
for church officers, was added to the constitution in 1997. An attempt to
delete it was decisively rejected by the presbyteries the following year. It
is now facing another challenge: This year's General Assembly asked the
church's 173 presbyteries to vote over the next several months to retain or
strike it. A majority vote is needed to settle the matter.

The Rev. Chandler Stokes, the chairman of the presbytery's Committee on
Ministry, said the examination process in Morrison's case "seemed to be no
different from our usual process," and Morrison met "all of the usual
criteria" for ordination He added: "We don't ask our heterosexual candidates
about their fidelity in marriage, or investigate their sexual behavior. I
think to do so in this case would clearly have been discriminatory."

The Rev. Ed Hart, of Napa, CA, a member of the Committee on Ministry, had
said he would seek a stay from the synod PJC to stop the Oct. 20 ordination
ceremony.

Efforts to reach Morrison for comment were unsuccessful.
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