wfn.org | Coalition talks of battle for PC(USA)

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Note #7463 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

07-October-2002
02389

Coalition talks of battle for PC(USA)

Smaller 'Gathering' of evangelicals demands enforcement of constitution

by John Filiatreau

ORLANDO, FL - Fewer than 400 people showed up last week for Gathering VII,
the annual Roman-numerated "super bowl" of Presbyterian evangelicals.

That's not necessarily bad news for the sponsoring Presbyterian Coalition,
however.

In his "state of the church" address, the Rev. Jerry Andrews, a former
co-moderator of the Coalition, said, "There's a part of me that's thankful
that our turnout is down this year." Characterizing last year's meeting,
attended by about 1,200 evangelicals, as a "Presbyterian Fire Drill," he said
this year's more placid atmosphere reflected the fact that the evangelical
wing of the Presbyterian Church (USA) "had such a good year last year in our
fight in the presbyteries."

The "fire" the Coalition was organizing to put out last year was Amendment A,
a measure that would have removed from the PC(USA)'s constitution a provision
- G-6.0106b - requiring that candidates for ordination "live either in
fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or
chastity in singleness." Proponents of the amendment hoped to clear the way
for the ordination of gay and lesbian Presbyterians.

"My how things have changed in 12 months," Andrews said. "Carmen Fowler is no
longer in a presbytery, the constitution is no longer being upheld ..."

Those are the issues that came up repeatedly during the Gathering: the recent
refusal of Central Florida Presbytery to admit the Rev. Carmen Fowler, the
Coalition's executive director, to membership; and the several public
announcements by local sessions around the country that they will not abide
by G-6.0106b.

The Rev. J. Howard Edington, the pastor of First Presbyterian Church of
Orlando, the host congregation for the Gathering (for the second year in a
row), said his 5,500-member church "is being battered by this presbytery" and
is a victim of "blatant persecution" at the hands of "a very small group of
people that is making life miserable for us" and seems determined "to halt or
hinder" its mission. 

The presbytery ruled that Fowler "intentionally abandoned the exercise of
ministry" when she left Rabun Gap Church in Georgia to take the job with the
Coalition, which is not a "validated ministry" of the PC(USA).

Edington's church has granted Fowler the privilege of preaching and sharing
in other pastoral duties. "Our congregation loves her," he said.

The Coalition headquarters is in a building at First PC.

Edington made his complaints during a workshop titled, "To Give or Not to
Give, the Question of Per Capita and Mission Giving," during which he said
his church's session decided to withhold the part of its per-capita payment
that goes to support the General Assembly, about $37,000, and redirect it to
a church in Brazil with which it has a formal mission relationship. He said
the session was motivated in part by concern about "people on the WMD
(Worldwide Ministries Division) who do not believe that Jesus Christ is the
only savior."

Edington noted that his church has continued to pay the portion of per-capita
that goes to support the presbytery - but said it may withhold that, too. "If
that happens," he said, "this presbytery will be in serious financial
jeopardy." Edington said the church has asked to discuss the situation with
the presbytery, but "to this day, no one from the presbytery has made the
first contact."

Laurel Blanchard, an elder from Portland, OR, who called Fowler "a new
spiritual heroine" of hers, at one point called Fowler to the front of the
sanctuary and had a crowd of about 20 people lay hands on her. Blanchard
asked God to give PC(USA) evangelicals "the ability to be as wise as serpents
and gentle as doves," and to "call upon the warring angels to be with this
congregation."

Regarding the ordination issue, Andrews pointed out that "the church has
spoken" three times now, upholding the "fidelity/chastity" provision by 20
(presbytery) votes in 1997, 60 votes in 1998 and 80 votes in 2001. He said
the church "is becoming more confident and comfortable in its own
commitment," and has made G-6.0106b "one of the most successfully defended
paragraphs in our Book of Order."

Andrews said the church's "legislative season" may be nearing its end, giving
way to a "pastoral and administrative season" that will bring "a critical and
careful re-examination of the belief of the church." He said that, although
the PC(USA) is experiencing a period of relative peace, "Our common life is
not happy." The church has embraced "peace, but not the truth on which the
peace is based," he said, and its current amity is based on "love of unity
and dread of schism" rather than "love of truth and dread of error."

"The church has not succeeded in defending its own constitution," he said.
"It is not clear if the constitution will hold. If it does not, we will not."

Andrews added: "We are called to the hardest of tasks - to fight without
hatred, resist without bitterness, and, if God wills it, to triumph without
vindictiveness." He asked his listeners, "Do you have the character?"

The Rev. Casey Jones, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Pearland, TX,
also spoke of an internal struggle Presbyterians must undertake: "If a
society is held together only by law, it will not hold together. We will not
have what we want through discipline and enforcement of the constitution."
What the PC(USA) needs, he said, is "a heart change."

Jones, who said he is "not a polity wonk," said "there needs to be a climate"
in the church to keep officers from departing "from the essentials of
Presbyterian polity and belief."

"There is a certain way of interpreting ... the rules in our constitution ...
that reflect the heart," he said.

Andrews said, "The climate that Casey was talking about, this requires
self-discipline and a character that we have not yet shown."

Charles Wiley, an associate in the PC(USA)'s Office of Theology and Worship,
addressed the group on church discipline. "I read headlines about a
constitutional crisis, the lack of discipline in the church, and calls for
submission to the will of the church," he said. "You are angry that the
system is not working the way you think it should. And I think you are right.
... Discipline in the Presbyterian Church is atrophied because we have failed
to exercise a comprehensive and Biblical notion of the role of discipline in
the Presbyterian Church and in Christian life."

Wiley, who recently earned a doctorate in theology from Princeton Theological
Seminary, made a distinction between what he called "extraordinary
discipline," formal action in response to heresy or heterodoxy, and "ordinary
discipline ... the practice of the church to assist Christians to stay true
to their deepest desires ... to stay true to the vows they make at baptism."

Wiley said "ordinary" discipline, "this mode of holding one another
accountable," is "characterized by discernment, not an adversarial legal
system" - but "almost everything I have heard or read about discipline in the
PC(USA) over the past few years has focused solely on extraordinary
discipline, completely overlooking the more dominant pattern in our
tradition."

"Ordinary discipline is not about 'getting' each other or holding each
other's feet to the fire," he said. "In ordinary church discipline, we care
enough about each other to treat one another with respect, with love and with
the will to risk helping each other grow in Christ."

A familiar worship practice that embodies ordinary discipline, Wiley said, is
the passing of the peace, which he described as "a place in worship that
gives space for reconciliation."

He said discipline is not intended to be "an exercise of power obsessed with
mere moralism."

"When discipline is solely focused on extraordinary discipline and
high-profile offenses," he said, "we have lost the ability to realize it is
in our everyday lives with each other that our sin seeps out. ... Ordinary
discipline implicates those that defy the constitution and those who bring
charges against them."

"During these three days," Wiley concluded, "many of you are here primarily
to discuss the practice of extraordinary discipline. The question for all of
us is whether or not we as individuals ... are faithfully exercising ordinary
discipline as well. ... A discipline marked by a loving community, not by
formal charges in an adversarial system."

In a workshop, the Rev. Sue Cyre presented a number of proposed overtures to
next year's 215th General Assembly, including one that would restore annual
Assemblies.

This year's GA voted 344-167 to go to biennial meetings starting in 2006.

Cyre said her church, Dublin Presbyterian Church in Dublin, VA, has approved
the proposed overture, but hasn't yet presented it to the Presbytery of the
Peaks.

She said every-other-year assemblies would be "less representative of the
grassroots," would leave more policy decisions in the hands of "GA entities
like the GAC" and produce "no obvious cost savings," she said. She called
Assemblies "our connectionalism in action ... an opportunity for the elders
from local congregations to give vision and direction to the church."

Other overtures in the package would assure the randomness of GA committee
assignments; limit staff participation in the work of elected bodies,
including GA committees; restrict the role of the General Assembly Council to
policy implementation, as opposed to policy generation; limit the
participation of advisory delegates to Assemblies by depriving them of the
rights of "voice and vote" in committee deliberations; discontinue the effort
to revise the sexuality curriculum; forbid the use of Board of Pensions
benefits to cover so-called "partial birth" abortions; reduce PC(USA)
contributions to the National Council of Churches and the World Council of
Churches; oppose ordination of certified Christian educators as ministers of
the word and sacrament; impose term limits for PC(USA) leaders ("The same
people are being recycled," she said); and require the Presbyterian Health,
Education and Welfare Association (PHEWA) to achieve financial independence
by the end of 2003.

Cyre said evangelicals must get more involved in their sessions and
presbyteries. If they are "intentional, united and persistent," she said,
"it's not going to take all that much to reform this church."

"The state of the church in part is because of our inattention," she said,
urging evangelicals to take a keen interest in the work of the General
Assembly nominating committee, "a very powerful committee of 16 synod
representatives that decides who will participate in the leadership of this
church and who will not."

Fahed Abu-Akel, the moderator of the 214th GA, appeared at the Gathering just
before setting out for a visit to the Middle East that was to include a
return to his native village near Nazareth. In his address, Abu-Akel,
introduced as "the other man from Galilee," mentioned none of the
controversies raging in the church.

He earned applause by telling his listeners: "I know it so deep it is in my
bones that any attractiveness the church offers to the world must be rooted
in Jesus Christ. I don't understand why Presbyterians are afraid to say
this."

Abu-Akel recognized various groups in his audience, including educators,
missionaries, retired ministers - and elders. "As elders in our church you
are our spiritual leaders," he said. "Please claim your power and your role
in the church."

Abu-Akel said he and his brother as children "formed a coalition against my
mother," who wanted them to memorize the verbose Nicene Creed; they preferred
the Apostles Creed, "which is one line long," he said.

"The most powerful institution is the home," he said. "The home needs to be
the place where children can love God and be accepted."

He recalled his arrival in the United States in 1966, when he "did not know
the difference between a taxi and a limousine," and recalled a driving trip
he took with a companion from Florida to Detroit, MI, when he was surprised
that "nobody from here to Detroit asked for a permit. ... It was the most
liberating experience of my life."

The moderator challenged "each minister, elder, member" of every PC(USA)
congregation to "invite one person to church and to discipleship to Jesus
Christ ... one person, that's not a big deal ... and by next May, that will
be five million Presbyterians who love Jesus Christ. ... We can experience
Pentecost like in the early church. Let's see what God can do in our midst."

Abu-Akel spoke during one of several powerful worship services featuring
stirring performances by an orchestral and choral group from First Church
called The Fellowship. "I wish all our churches had the music and the
attitude of worship we had tonight," he said. "We were lifted up." The
Coalition seemed much less reserved in worship than other Presbyterian
groups.

Representatives of three validated mission agencies - World Mission,
Presbyterian Outreach and the Presbyterian Frontier Fellowship - suggested
that Coalition members and their churches contribute to them through Extra
Commitment Opportunities rather than depending on what one called a
denominational "mission-funding system that simply doesn't work." 

David Hackett, of the Frontier Fellowship, said his organization offers an
"opportunity to get your funds into international mission in ways you can
celebrate and trust" and a way to "participate in Presbyterian mission with
confidence."

The Rev. Doug Pratt, of Memorial Park Presbyterian Church in Allison Park,
PA, expressed disappointment about the denomination's "failing vision" for
missions, particularly "the elimination of 10 percent of our mission force
while we continue to fund curriculum and political lobbying."

During the workshop on per-capita giving, the Rev. Ron McHattie, the pastor
of West Valley Presbyterian Church in Cupertino, CA, said he is sick of the
"blatant refusal on the part of the denomination to listen to the person in
the pew." 
He said denominational leaders "don't give a rip" about anything, "as long as
they can make enough money to raise a family ... as long as they get a check
in the mail." He said a number of families have left his congregation because
of the denomination's "heretical stances."

Another said the elders of his church felt "an obligation to stay connected
to the denomination" but he was "terribly discouraged with what I knew some
of those dollars were going to support." He said the session made its
decision on the basis of this question: "If someone from our denomination
knocked on your door at your home asking for money, would you give it?" and
the clear answer was no.

Another person sparked no disagreement when she said denominational leaders
in Louisville are "agents of Satan."

Peggy Hedden said the withholding of per-capita is not a matter of protest
but of stewardship. Giving unrestricted mission funds to the PC(USA), she
said, is like "going into a department store and saying, 'Just give me
whatever you want.'" She said sessions have a right to know "whether the
money you're giving is being used for God's purposes."

No one actually advocated the withholding of per-capita, but several
participants asserted that such giving "has always been voluntary" on the
part of sessions. 

Hedden said organizers "did try to get somebody who was opposed to
withholding per-capita, but we didn't ask the right people."

Much of the talk at the Gathering was clearly martial - envisioning a battle
for the church, with combatants protected by the "breastplate of
righteousness" standing firm "against the heavenly forces of evil" and
wresting control of the denomination from Presbyterians acting "in opposition
to (God's) Word."

"Jesus is going to win," one said, "so let's focus on him."

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