RICHMOND, June 26 - "Do you really enjoy fighting?" William Stacy Johnson asked the 400 General Assembly participants who attended a pre-Assembly conference Saturday morning hosted by the Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity and Purity of the Church (TTF).

Assuming that most Presbyterians would answer in the negative, Johnson, a professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, joined several other members of the 20-member TTF in outlining their efforts to lead the Presbyterian Church

(USA) in what member John Wilkinson called "doing church in a different way."

The mistake many contentious Presbyterians make, said TTF member P. Mark Achtemeier, a professor at Dubuque Theological Seminary, is thinking "that the search for unity is all about us."

Echoing the central affirmation of the group's preliminary report, Achtemeier said Presbyterians cannot achieve peace, unity and purity on their own, but "can only be held together because they all reside in Jesus Christ."

Reflecting on the Gospel of John, task force member Frances Taylor Gench, a professor at Union Theological Seminary/Presbyterian School of Christian Education, said its "primary language and only ethical commandment is love for each other." Jesus's prayer in John 17, "that they all may be one," reflects the Gospel's assertion that "God is the source of unity" and our "mutual experienced love of God in Christ calls us to mutual love for each other," Gench said.

Showing that love "is the most difficult thing Jesus could have asked us to do," she said, noting that this love is "more than a feeling or emotion - it is something we do . redefined by Jesus's own act of self-giving. We love in spite of, not because of, our feelings for each other."

Recounting the group's experience, Gary Demarest, a task force co-moderator, said the 20 members were "chosen because of our differences - it sure wasn't a choice we'd have made on our own." So it is with the church, he said: "God has chosen us; we don't choose who's to be in the family."

View a video of task force co-moderator Gary Demarest.

Conference participants were asked to discuss two questions:

• How can we continue to live together as a church in the face of our differences?
• How would the life of the PC(USA) change if we saw the peace, unity and purity of the church as a given, made available in Christ, rather than as something we create ourselves?

The task force, in its interim report to the Assembly, is asking the whole church to engage in dialogue just as it has. Its only recommendation is that every session and presbytery "create intentional gatherings of Presbyterians of varied theological views to covenant together to discuss the affirmations in the task force's preliminary report, utilizing the resources being developed by the task force."

"Our hope is not to produce an impressive report - to be faithful to Jesus Christ cannot conclude with a report - but to address our disagreements in such a way that our identity is affirmed, our mission is enhanced and our witness is strengthened," said member Jack Haberer, the pastor of Clear Lake Presbyterian Church in Houston, TX.