Council’s final approval still needed
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
John H. Adams did a good job of catching the tone of the report to the General Assembly Council on the follow-up to the sexual abuse cases at the Presbyterian Mission School in the Congo. A minor correction would be that council did not yet approve the recommended constitutional changes. This was a first reading and the final approval will take place at the Feb 10-14, 2004 meeting.
Paul J. Masquelier Jr. General Assembly Council member, San Jose, Calif.
Nine sessions supported Baltimore overture
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Your Sept. 18 Online article regarding the overture before the Baltimore Presbytery contained several misleading and incorrect statements. The lead sentence gives the impression that this overture is the work of “activists” only. In fact, the motion to approve the overture was sponsored by the sessions of nine churches – one-eighth of the member churches of the presbytery. While there may be “activist” elders and ministers among those sessions, the overture was brought before presbytery by the action of a wide range of concerned Christians. Incidentally, the overture was approved by 67 percent of the commissioners attending the presbytery meeting, again indicating widespread support.
The third paragraph states that “emboldened by the Episcopal Church, USA’s ordination of a homosexual bishop, they also want the General Assembly to frame a new ‘authoritative interpretation.'”
In fact, the overture (which was completed before the action of the Episcopalians) does not ask for a new authoritative interpretation. The overture itself reads “The Presbytery of Baltimore overtures the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) to: Direct the Stated Clerk to transmit to the presbyteries for their vote the following proposed amendment: Shall G-6.0106b be stricken from the Book of Order?”
Further into the article, there is a claim that “the presbytery approved a policy – which never became effective – of advising church sessions that they did not have to obey church law.” This, presumably, refers to an action taken in June 2002 in which presbytery asked its Council to consider a wide range of possible responses to G-6.0106b. In fact, presbytery has never given the advice that you claim.
The debate regarding ordination standards is contentious enough without the spreading of misinformation. The Layman could best aid that debate by getting the facts straight.
James D. Schroll Pasadena, Md.
Redefining marriage is not the solution
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
I find a few ideas of Jean Snyder’s regarding marriage and marital parameters quite telling. It is interesting in that she makes a strange connection between the way children actually turn out and marriage.
After briefly detailing her own marital experience, Snyder tells us that “she dropped out of the church and raised her children her way. Both of her children have been successful, she said, including a daughter who is a surgeon.”
She then goes on to urge “the committee not to endorse the marriage of one man and one woman as the ideal.” Isn’t it interesting that we are called to discern and embrace “the marital ideal,” or at least the basis for raising family, based on human experience as opposed to seeking God’s will and parameters.
From the logic used in her argument, it seems that we ought to embrace whatever form or understanding of marriage that produces successful children. If the successful outcome of children is what determines the parameters for marriage and/or raising families, one must ask how that view is distinctly Christian.
There are countless people who are atheistic, agnostic or of other religions who successfully raise children. I truly don’t see how her criteria fits as a Christian perspective. Unless I have misunderstood her logic, this precisely illustrates the gulf separating the right and the left in our denomination, not to mention the others with issues similar to ours. For the left, what is experienced and held as true defines theology, but for the right, theology defines what is experienced and held as true. The two are diametrically opposed to one another.
As an aside, it is my contention that in the case of Jean Snyder’s marital situation, there was a man who needed an encounter with the truth and the living Christ leading to repentence, redemption and sanctification. No person in any marriage is without some need of godly betterment, me included. Redefining marriage is not the solution and is not God’s way – changing lives is.
Furthermore, those who continue in the illusion that there is a “middle” or “third” way are faced with reconciling the two seemingly irreconcilable paradigms above. For those who have asserted for how many years now that there is a third way, I’m still listening and waiting.
Rev. Steven Seng First Presbyterian Church, Wellsburg, W.Va.
Gifts designated because of lack of trust
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
It is obvious that John Detterick, executive director of the General Assembly Council, doesn’t have the foggiest idea of what is going on in the rank and file of the church: They don’t like what the General Assembly is doing with their contributions.
Restricted giving is a way of trying to bring the church hierarchy to their senses, but I doubt that is will work. If Detterick and others really think it is just a case of explaining what they want to do with contributions, they truly don’t understand what is motivating the withholding of contributions and the specifying how those funds given are to be used.
Presbyterians simply don’t trust the GA Office, the stated clerk, the moderator and others to use the money to carry out the Christian mission of the church. Rather, they have increasingly seen their money go to left wing, radical, non-Christian purposes which they oppose.
Jack Kime Maryville, Ill.
Report the good news, too
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
I publicly and privately asked your reporters, Paula Kincaid and Jack Adams, on many occasions during past GAC meetings and this recent GAC meeting in Montreat to report the good things happening in the GAC. This recent meeting was one of the best ones.
Why doesn’t The Layman report to its constituents and to the church about the successful curriculum sales, or the $1.03 million allocated to various ministries across the country as part of the Restricted Funds Oversight Subcommittee’s report. Why not talk about the strategic visioning process and how the whole GAC came together to contribute their thoughts and to collectively discern the ministry priorities of Spiritual Formation, Evangelism, Justice, and Leadership? Why not report about the wonderful ministries in CMD, NMD, and WMD in their reports? Why not report how the Council tried and enjoyed the consensus decision-making process/procedure, and how the Council modeled that for the church?
You have a duty and obligation to let your readers know these good news.
The Rev. Neal D. Presa Pastor, Middlesex Presbyterian Church (Middlesex, N.J.), Vice chair, General Assembly Council
Bishops make a courageous decision
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
It seems to me that it was a courageous decision made by slightly more than 100 Episcoal bishops to install an openly gay bishop. I suspect that if only ministers constituted our General Assembly, the same decision would likely occur in the presbytery. This becomes quite evident when one considers that groups like the Covenant Network are populated with 19 former moderators, and thousands of ministers. As it is though, democracy fails the Presbyterian church.
Don McAdam Atlanta, Ga.
The bureaucrats just don’t get it
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Not unexpectedly, the GAC and Louisville bureaucrats don’t get it.
Staffer Joey Bailey worries that “Presbyterians are telling us how to spend their donation … Fifteen years ago, 70 percent of our income was unrestricted and only 30 percent was restricted. Now it is just the reverse. Do you realize how that ties our hands? It makes a huge impact on how we pay our bills.”
Memo to Joey: Maybe it should impact what bills you pay. Try eliminating gifts to the NCC and WCC and see what that does for your ability to pay for actual missions.
Mission Support Services Committee Chair Bruce Hendrickson chimes in with the observation that “the General Assembly Council can only use 30 percent of its income ‘for what we believe is the mission of the church.'”
Memo to Bruce: The GAC doesn’t determine the mission of the church. Jesus did that 2,000 years ago; our Constitution and Confessions state what Jesus’ words mean to Presbyterians today. Maybe you should listen to what members are telling you instead of trying to tax their gifts so that you can dictate your own vision.
Steve Jones Elder, Kokomo, Ind.
Presbytery didn’t seek ‘authoritative interpretation’
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Your reference to the Baltimore Overture approved by Baltimore Presbytery, Sept. 25, is inaccurate. The overture does not call for any “authoritative interpretation.” Also, the Book of Order section is G-6.0106b.
The motion passed was that:
“The Presbytery of Baltimore Overtures the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) to direct the Stated Clerk to transmit to the presbyteries for their vote the following proposed amendment: That G-6.0106b be stricken from the Book of Order.”
Then the rationale follows for the overture. As mentioned above, there is nothing in the overture calling for an “authoritative interpretation.”
Donald E. Stroud
Why not focus on what Bible says?
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Maybe it’s me, but wouldn’t be easier for the PCUSA, in its policy paper on families, to talk about what the Bible says, rather than trying to reinterpret the Bible in order to reflect the prevailing winds of a secular culture. Those who reject Scriptural authority will do so, no matter how hard we try to make it politically correct.
It’s God’s Word. Can’t we let Scripture stand on its own merit?
L. Rus Howard Peters Creek Church, Venetia, Pa.
Nobody’s meeting anybody’s expectations
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
How very interesting! Four congregations have entered the egress process from the PCUSA since December. All these congregations were adherents to the three CCM tenants and affliated with the movement.
The independant actions taken by these four CCM congregations surely is disturbing to those who thought that CMM was some raging organization intent on schism. Some raging. Some schism. So much for the ideas of certain renewal groups that have felt threatened. How about that? No raging. No schism. And, of course, business as usual, no renewal either.
Seems nobody is meeting anybody’s expectations. Of course, the PCUSA has not been meeting expectations for so long that none of this should be news. After “What’s the big deal about Jesus?”, “end-term abortion of viable babies,” “acquiescence to refusing to believe the bodily resurrection of the Christ,” “rejection of Scripture because it was written by old men in another era,” and, among others, “the adoption of secular humanist or liberation or feminist theology (take your pick or wait a while for a new one).”
The question I pose is “What’s the big deal about PCUSA?” An illustration, if I may:
A sister in Christ visited her doctor. While in the waiting room, a conversation with another patient occurred. The small talk turned to religion, whereas our sister in Christ indicated she was a Presbyterian. The other patient looked puzzled and asked, “How can you be born again and be a Presbyterian?”
How interesting when a perfect stranger can sum up “a moment” and cause one to pause.
Excuse me. I’m going to go think on that one. Hmmm. Only four churches since December?
Karl Everett
Another reason to leave the PCUSA
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
This is just one more reason why any church or person who chooses to believe in God’s Holy Bible would want to leave the Presbyterian Church (USA).
2 Timothy 3:16 – “The whole Bible was given to us by inspiration from God and is useful to teach what is true and to make us realize what is wrong in our lives; it straightens us out and helps us to do what is right.”
Hank Adams South Bend, Ind.
Witherspoon Society is a ‘justice-seeking’ group
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
As a member of the board of the Witherspoon Society, I was interested to discover in your report of Sept. 26 (“Baltimore Presbytery approves overture to allow gay ordination”) that Witherspoon is “another gay activist group.”
As our mission statement states pretty clearly, “we are a society of justice-seeking Presbyterians,” and among our specific missions is “advocating for peace, justice, the integrity of creation, and the full inclusion of all God’s people in church and society.”
As one part of that mission – and only one part – we strongly support all efforts to bring some measure of justice and inclusiveness to our church in the matter of ordination.
If working for peace and justice makes us “another gay activist group,” well, we’re proud to be counted among their number.
May the peace of God be in your minds and hearts.
Douglas King
Why Presbyterians designate gifts
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
In a recent discussion of the proposed 5 percent tax on restricted gifts to the PCUSA, Mission Support Services staff member Joey Bailey declares, “We have a real problem, folks. Presbyterians are telling us how to spend their donations. … Fifteen years ago, 70 percent of our income was unrestricted and only 30 percent was restricted. Now it is just the reverse. Do you realize how that ties our hands? It makes a huge impact on how we pay our bills.”
Referring to the restrictions that donors have applied to their gifts, Bruce Hendrickson, chair of the committee, lamented that the General Assembly Council can only use 30 percent of its income “for what we believe is the mission of the church.”
Though I wasn’t in that committee meeting at Montreat, I wonder if the members of the committee gave serious thought and discussion to “why” Presbyterians are directing 70 percent of their donations to the PCUSA. The answer, of course, is that the “us” and “we” referred to by these committee members have spent millions of dollars in those 15 years on support to the World Council of Churches, National Council of Churches, the PCUSA Washington lobby, a Re-Imagining conference to worship the goddess Sophia, and on and on.
At the same time missionaries to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ were cut from the budget. The current administrators of the PCUSA can’t be trusted to support programs that further God’s Kingdom; instead they are using unrestricted funds to promote the goals of their own earthly kingdom. Imagine the nerve of Presbyterians telling them how to spend their donations! My only question is why 30 percent of the gifts are still unrestricted.
Reed Siebenthal Muncie, Ind.
Instructions to a financial officer
Posted Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Memo to Joey Bailey, a financial officer in the PCUSA’s Mission Support Services:
I realize that it really ties your hands to have us Presbyterians who send you our money and pay your salary having the audacity to tell you how to spend our money. It would be so much easier if we folks in the pews would just blindly send you our money – lots of it.
But here’s the take-home point, Joey: Start spending our money in accordance with our values and our directions and we may untie your hands. Keep disregarding our instructions and our values as you spend our money and you’ll be find yourself learning more knots than a First Class Boy Scout.
Have a nice day!
Donald D. Denton Jr.
A modest proposal regarding the stated clerk
Posted Friday, September 26, 2003
Stated clerk reviews
Reviews of the stated clerk’s performance should be mailed to: Rev. Kathy Runyeon Presbytery of San Francisco 2024 Durant Avenue Berkeley, CA 94704
The Layman Online welcomes copies of your review and, with your permission, will publish them on its Web site, www.layman.org. Send your reviews by e-mail, either as an attachment or within the body of the E-mail, to laymanletters@layman.org. I have a modest proposal.
Clifton Kirkpatrick, by many of his own statements, seems to have no power, control or authority over activities within the PCUSA. Outside the church, he’s principally been involved in signing on to “feel-good” statements that have no practical impact.
Therefore, I think a case could be made not for replacing him, but simply eliminating the position of stated clerk entirely, for it seems as if the position serves no useful function.
This would not only save some money for the church, but would help to dispel the illusion that there is any actual coherent authority or responsibility – “the buck stops here” – vested in the institutional church. A win-win situation all around.