Confessions during recess
The Presbyterian Layman July 2001 Volume 34, Number 5, July 6, 2001
The stated clerk may have said more than he intended. He begins his column of this issue by noting that the Louisville General Assembly “repeatedly used portions of the Book of Confessions during recesses and at the end of business sessions.”
That explains it!
Instead of using the confessions to guide their discussions and decisions in committee and on the plenary floor, commissioners partook of them rather like after dinner mints: Once the substantive main course had been digested, a refreshing but non-essential morsel was popped out of its wrapper and into their mouths.
Given such casual use of the confessions, it is little wonder that the Louisville Assembly refused to declare that Jesus Christ alone is Lord and savior of all yet could swallow adultery, fornication and homosexual behavior by its officers.
Just after the vote that denied the lordship of Christ, the moderator led a recess recitation from one of the confessions. As he did, one distraught commissioner left the hall. Fighting to maintain his composure he asked, “How can they say those words after voting to say that they aren’t true?”
A very good question.
Perhaps the accelerating growth of the Confessing Church Movement will encourage the leaders of next year’s General Assembly to answer by putting the confessions a little higher up on the agenda.