Presbyterian Lay Committee issues statement on pluralism
The Layman Online, June 21, 2005
The Presbyterian Lay Committee has released a monograph titled “Can Two Faiths Embrace One Future?” that challenges pluralistic prescriptions for denominational unity.
The statement contends that inclusivist formulas currently being promoted by the Office of the General Assembly and the denomination’s Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity and Purity are both irrational and unfaithful. Pluralist solutions to denominational disunity defy Reformed theology, polity and common sense, it says.
“The word ‘schism,’ once unspeakable in polite Presbyterian circles, is now on everyone’s lips,” says the Rev. Parker T. Williamson, chief executive officer of the Presbyterian Lay Committee and editor in chief of its publications. “People of all persuasions, both inside and outside this rapidly declining denomination, are asking if it can hold together much longer. Those who seek to patch it with politics should know that never in the history of Christendom has politics succeeded in trumping the truth.”