By Alexa Smith, Presbyterian News Service, June 6, 1998 LOUISVILLE, Ky – Religious and human rights groups are waiting to see whether frustration and anger about the suicide of a Catholic bishop protesting the Islamic Republic of Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy law can be turned into momentum to repeal the law or not. Thousands of Christians…
Robert L. Howard, Chair , The Presbyterian Lay Committee, March 1, 1998 With conviction and by convincing margins, commissioners from our pulpits and pews are emphatically affirming our historic ordination standards. After wandering in the wilderness of divisive debate over secular sexual conduct, the Holy Spirit has led our denomination to clearly proclaim that God’s…
Trusting the whole people of God January 1, 1998 Presbyterian polity insists on parity between clergy and lay leaders. Our Reformed forbears understood that no human being and no institution is free of hubris. Thus they distributed the power to rule among interlocking governing bodies, preventing any individual, or any group of individuals, from exercising…
The radical center January 1, 1998 Kudos to the more than 80 Presbyterian leaders who gathered under the banner of the Presbyterian Coalition, April 30-May 2 in Colorado Springs to forge a vision for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Through incalculable hours and a multitude of words, participants struggled to chart a course beyond that cacophony…
Unmentionables January 1, 1998 It used to be that sex, politics, and religion were generally excluded from polite conversation. Once sex and politics became the only things that Presbyterians seemed to talk about (any stray mentions of religion being subsumed within the first two topics), we needed a new unmentionable. So the possibility of a…
In Memoriam, Lesslie Newbigin January 1, 1998 “My life without her would have been a poor thing.” Lesslie Newbigin’s tribute to Helen, his wife of 61 years, expresses precisely our sentiments on hearing of his passing from this life to the next. This profoundly Christian missionary, an ecumenist in the only sense that befits the…
Rebuilding community January 1, 1998 While a handful of agitated activists was exacerbating denominational divisions by insisting that the PCUSA conform itself to the moral standards of modern culture, commissioners to the Charlotte Assembly were quietly pursuing another agenda: rebuilding Presbyterian community around historic Christian faith and practice. One step commissioners took toward rebuilding community…
After our likeness January 1, 1998 What is the mission of the Church? How should the Church be organized? Indeed, what is the Church? And who gets to answer such questions? Presbyterians who went to Minnesota in mid-April and those who gathered in Colorado two weeks later (see stories, p. 1) responded very differently to…
Slippery slopes January 1, 1998 Many of the topics and events covered in this issue of The Layman are built on a common foundation – the denial that God’s self-revelation in Scripture, and supremely in Jesus Christ, is authoritative for Christian faith and life. When God’s revelation is repeatedly denied, what results are rapid skids…
Building Community by denying Christ January 1, 1998 Building Community by denying Christ? Building Community Among Strangers is now being circulated as a “churchwide study document” (see stories, pp. 1, 16). It should be read by all who are concerned about the PCUSA’s present and future theological direction. It documents the inevitable outcome of misguided…