Leader of renewal group says task force proposal will create ‘a more rather than less divided church’
The Layman Online, August 31, 2005
The leader of a renewal organization within the Presbyterian Church (USA) is calling a recommendation by the Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity of the Church “a disappointment,” saying that it will create “a more rather than less divided church.”
Michael R. Walker, executive director of Presbyterians For Renewal, says the recommendation in the task force’s report for a new Authoritative Interpretation of G-6.0108 in the Book of Order “would give local governing bodies the license to overlook an individual’s clear violations of national ordination standards.”
Calling his response to the report initial because some of its recommendations “will need to continue to be carefully weighed,” Walker praises portions of the theological section as affirming “God’s eternal triunity, the full humanity and divinity of Jesus Christ, the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, the calling of Christians to live lives of holiness and self-denial, and the singular saving Lordship of Christ. It also makes strong statements about biblical authority and makes clear that all ordained officers have an obligation to obey and uphold the constitution of our church.”
He then says that the report’s recommendation for a new Authoritative Interpretation “is disappointing and troubling, as it is not consistent with the report’s own theological affirmations, intentions and goals.” The proposal, he says, “would not obviously change our ordination standards, but it would introduce significant changes into the way in which our ordination standards are applied by ordaining bodies. It intends to give local governing bodies much wider latitude in the application of ordination standards by changing the way in which G-6.0108 relates to other ordination standards, including G-6.0106b.”
G-6.0108, Walker says, “gives governing bodies the responsibility for discerning whether or not the candidates for ordination or the ordained officers serving in their bodies ‘adhere to the essentials of the reformed faith and polity.’ The proposed A.I. apparently seeks to make this standard for holding office the standard above all others, the standard into which all others may be collapsed, such that the violation of any other ordination standard is turned into the following question: does this person’s violation(s) of the church’s ordination standards constitute a violation of the ‘essentials of the reformed faith and polity?’ The ordaining body would have the responsibility to answer that question. In other words, ‘any departure’ from an ordination standard, including the requirement to live in fidelity in marriage or chastity in singleness expressed in G-6.0106b, could be deemed an inessential departure from reformed faith and polity, and therefore no bar to ordination, at the discretion of the ordaining governing body. To coin a phrase, this A.I. would result in ‘local license.'”
The proposal, he says, “confuses the right to ‘declare a scruple’ or take an exception on a matter of teaching with the right to disobey an explicit national polity standard. The church has chosen not to spell out a list of ‘the essentials of reformed faith and polity,’ and so G-6.0108 gives presbyteries the responsibility of discerning those things that the national church has not spelled out. This authoritative interpretation, on the other hand, would allow local governing bodies to effectively set aside that which the national church has spelled out, including the fidelity-chastity requirement.”
Walker concludes: “Herein lies the real danger. While the larger Church has declared its discernment of the Holy Spirit with an increasing voice, this AI would permit lower governing bodies to act as if they are not part of the body of the Christ but rather separate, disembodied entities. This is a direct violation of the Historic Principles of Church Government, G-1.0400. It is also a mechanism for ultimately making the larger Church nothing more than a dog composed of many wagging tails.”