Montreat session files judicial action against GAC
By Robert P. Mills, The Layman Online, May 22, 2001
In a judicial action filed May 11, the session of the Montreat Presbyterian Church, a Confessing Church in Montreat, N.C., has charged the PCUSA’s General Assembly Council with “failing to properly coordinate and then failing to review a conference that, under the guise of opinion, espoused a course of action which defies determined positions of General Assembly, as well as the Scriptures and the constitution of the PC(USA).”
The 17-page complaint was filed as a remedial case with the General Assembly’s Permanent Judicial Commission, the denomination’s highest court. The action stems from the July, 2000 Peacemaking Conference, where, in a plenary address, a Presbyterian minister asked “What’s the big deal about Jesus?”
‘Ethnic cleansing’
The speaker, the Rev. Dirk Ficca of Chicago, went far beyond that rhetorical question. In Montreat’s words, his speech “denies and declares of no ‘integrity,’ the Scriptural and confessional position that forgiveness and restoration come only through the saving work of Jesus Christ.” Moreover, “he also closely links the espousing of this view to the evil of ethnic cleansing.”
Thus, Montreat declared, “Rev. Ficca impugned Presbyterians who would obey their constitutional mandate to bear witness to the Prince of Peace in all the world. He placed the ministry of missions and evangelism to which the Presbyterian Church (USA) has been called by its Book of Order, Directory of Worship, confessions, consistent General Assemblies, and the Scriptures into the same category as those who have murdered hundreds of thousands in Rwanda, East Timor, Bosnia, and Kosovo.”
GAC applauds
In an Oct. 26, 2000 letter, the Montreat session charged the council with three delinquencies. It said the council had failed: 1) to warn or bear witness against error in doctrine or immorality in practice; 2) to review the work of General Assembly agencies and bodies in light of General Assembly mission directions, goals, objectives and priorities; and 3) to uphold the great ends of the church by not declaring the necessity of the proclamation of the gospel for the salvation of all humankind. The session sought several “cures” for the delinquencies.
The council did not merely fail adopt any of the requested cures. In a statement released at its February, 2001 meeting it went so far as to “applaud the Peacemaking Program’s disciplined effort to listen to the world from the position of the reformed/Presbyterian church, and we pray that they will continue to stretch our minds and hearts.”
In response to the council’s applause, the Montreat session’s complaint cites previous remedial ruling from the assembly’s Permanent Judicial Commission and declares, “By first coordinating an official conference of the Presbyterian Church (USA) in such a way that this clear and consistent constitutional standard was demeaned, then offering no review in light of General Assembly mission directions, goals, objectives, and priorities, the General Assembly Council and its agency has, ‘under the guise of opinion,’ in effect adopted ‘a course of action in defiance of an established position of this church.'”
To further establish the council’s delinquency, Montreat also cited other judicial commission decisions, the council’s own “Manual of Operation,” the denomination’s “Organization for Mission of the Presbyterian Church USA” and the policy statements adopted by the 211th General Assembly (1999) entitled “Building Community Among Strangers.”
Requests for relief
Among its “requests for relief” the Montreat session asks that the Permanent Judicial Commission order the General Assembly Council to:
“Ensure that the work of its agencies is coordinated and reviewed in light of General Assembly mission directives, goals, objectives, and priorities;”
“Require annual written adherence by all General Assembly staff to the positions and doctrine of the Presbyterian Church (USA) as defined by the Scriptures, The Book of Confessions, Book of Order, and most recent General Assembly policies;”
“Institute a coordinating committee to which all agencies must submit their plans for official activities to determine if they fall in line with the determined mission directions, goals, objectives, and priorities of the General Assembly;” and
“Form a committee to review all actions of the General Assembly staff to determine if they express the General Assembly mission directives, goals, objectives, and priorities and offer a corrective response to the Presbyterian Church (USA) when necessary.”
No hearing date has been set.