Stated clerk issues advisory opinion reinforcing written criteria for presbyteries
By Craig M. Kibler, The Layman Online, April 14, 2005
The Office of the General Assembly has issued an advisory opinion reinforcing a recent ruling by the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission that all 173 presbyteries in the Presbyterian Church (USA) must develop separate written criteria for the validation of ministries.
The opinion, affirming a GAPJC ruling on an appeal by the Rev. Parker Williamson that the Presbytery of Western North Carolina must develop separate written criteria for the validation of ministries, states that “a wide range of written criteria has been adopted” throughout the denomination. “A number of presbyteries reviewed the language of G-11.0403 a-e and determined that language was adequate on its face to enable it to determine who its members should be. It is now clear that the latter approach is not constitutionally adequate.”
“Clearly the Scriptures and The Book of Confessions provide a wide range of examples of ministry that could be included in written criteria. The Williamson decision provides no restrictions on a presbytery’s historic responsibility and right to determine who its members are and what they shall be doing, but rather teaches us that presbyteries must lay out those criteria for the public to see and understand,” the opinion says.
Standing Rule G.2.e provides that the stated clerk of the General Assembly shall “give advisory opinions concerning the meaning of the provisions of the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).”
The GAPJC’s 16-page order, dated April 4, 2005, instructs the Presbytery of Western North Carolina to develop separate written criteria by Jan. 31, 2006.
The stated clerk’s opinion says that the GAPJC ruling in the Williamson case “gives the presbyteries much more detailed advice on what is required by G-11.0403:”
1. Simply incorporating the language of G-11.0403 a-e as a presbytery’s ‘written criteria’ does not constitute compliance with the provisions of the 1997 amendment.
2. There is no constitutional requirement to tailor such criteria to each applicant’s requested ministry.
3. Such criteria should ‘provide applicants with reasonable notice as to what is specifically required for validation that so they have ample opportunity to comply prior to their submission of applications.’
4. When a Committee on Ministry recommends against validating a particular ministry, the minister must be provided ‘an opportunity to be heard and a consideration of [his/her] positions without prejudice.’
5. The criteria may include consideration and review of ‘relevant materials from prior years for the purposes of showing a pattern that has continuity with present statements or actions’ even if that pattern occurred during a period where a ministry had been validated for the minister.
6. ‘[T]he burden is on the minister to demonstrate that the proposed ministry should be validated.'”