Andrews shares celebrations and concerns with the GAC
By Paula R. Kincaid, The Layman Online, September 29, 2003
MONTREAT, N.C. – General Assembly Moderator Susan Andrews shared her celebrations and concerns with the General Assembly Council during their opening plenary session Wednesday at Montreat Conference Center in North Carolina.
Her first celebration, is the “fact that we as a Presbyterian church are a worshipful and worshipping gathering of disciples.” She said worship in the various places she had been has been lively and creative. “I have sensed a variety of worship styles and a variety of music happening all over our church,” she said. “But as I go around I have noticed some concerns,” she said
Andrews said that some worship services have been “Reformed – focusing on God. Some are not as Reformed because they focused on us.” She said some creative things are happening, but questioned “how we as Reformed Christians can be creative.”
Her second celebration was the growing congregations across the denomination, not only in numbers, but in diversity and theological depth. Andrews said she noticed that the congregations that were growing were the ones that understood their context and their community and that they made a decision to grow.
“We still have a long way to go,” she continued. She mentioned the lack of 18-30 year olds in the pews. She mentioned the disabled and the fact that many churches are inaccessible to them because of architecture, liturgy or teaching. “We have within our churches the baptism of gays and lesbians who don’t feel a part of the denomination,” she said. “The 30 percent drop in 30 years is not a good thing.”
Andrews said that small churches are showing some incredible creativity. There are commissioned lay pastors who are doing great jobs. She said her concern was that the “folks out there don’t know about the great resources the agencies and divisions have created. That is a challenge before us.”
Another concern Andrews had about small churches is the survivor mentality. “Until we solve the compensation issue we will not solve the leadership issue in small churches,” she said.
“There is no one place I have gone – conservative, moderate, liberal – that is not excited about mission outreach,” she said. She said she was sensing more global partnerships in churches and presbyteries, and that many were realizing that “our mission field is not just overseas but in our own backyards. … My celebration about this, is that it is an area where we are in unison and agreement in our church.”
She suggested that every presbytery should pair a conservative church with a liberal church to work on a mission project together for a year. The church members couldn’t talk about conflict or theology, only about missions. “It might go along way to building bridges,” she said.
She celebrated the leadership of the church, but was concerned about the alarming rate of burnout and lack of self care. Andrews was also concerned that many leaders seemed disconnected from resources, presbyteries and the larger church.
“It concerns me as a local church leader. I could not survive within my ministry if I was not aggressively and joyfully connected with the presbytery and General Assembly. I’m concerned when other pastors are isolated from that support.”
Andrews also praised the “staff that serve us so well in Louisville, the presbyteries and synods. … Each is engaged thoroughly in their own church. They love Scripture, love God … They are not just bureaucrats in office.”
The concerns she listed about the staff included that the church “continues to cut budgets and staff without cutting programs and priorities, so our staff is spread too thin. They have too much to do and not enough time to do it.”
Andrews called the debates and conflicts in the church both a celebration and concern. She said some people were talking about it in creative and healthy ways. Some people were not talking about it because they want it to go away or are waiting for someone else to solve it. And some people are talking about it in anger and with judgment, without trying to be constructive.
“The theological task force is trying to build community within themselves so when they do begin to wrestle with the task we have given them, they can do it in love,” she said. “They are setting for us an example of what we should be doing in every congregation, presbytery, synod, GA entity.”
“As Presbyterians we like structure,” Andrews said, but continued by saying that “we are being called to be a liquid church, more flexible.” She said the church would have “clear standards and accountability, but be open to hear the nuances of people’s opinions.”