Overture 30
On Amending Recommendations 4 and 5 of the Theological
Task Force Report—From the Presbytery of Mississippi.
The Presbytery of Mississippi
overtures the 217th General Assembly (2006) to do the following:
1. Receive the report of the Theological Task
Force on Peace, Unity and Purity with thanks.
2. Approve Recommendations 1 through 3, 6,
and 7 without amendment.
Rationale
It is obvious to anyone who has interacted
with the written and audiovisual resources produced by the Theological
Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity (hereafter TTFOPUP) that
this group of Presbyterians has taken their job very seriously.
It is encouraging to see Presbyterians who have such different
theological and hermeneutical points of view nevertheless coming
together to affirm their common faith in the Lord Jesus Christ,
and their common allegiance to the Holy Scriptures. Simply by
meeting together over such an extended period of time, the TTFOPUP
gives the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) much hope for the future.
It is possible for us to learn to live together.
3. Amend Recommendation
4. as follows: [Text to be deleted is show with a strike-through.]
“The Task Force on Peace, Unity, and
Purity of the Church recommends that the 217th General Assembly
(2006) direct the Committee on the Office of the General
Assembly, and urge those who plan and moderate meetings
of other governing bodies, to explore the use of alternative
forms of discernment and decision-making as a complement
to parliamentary procedure, especially in dealing with potentially
divisive issues.”
Rationale
In learning to live together, it is not necessary
or proper for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) to jettison the
time-honored procedures of Roberts’ Rules of Order,
as the TTFOPUP’s fourth recommendation suggests. The Book
of Order is quite clear that “Meetings of governing
bodies, commissions, and committees shall be conducted in accordance
with the most recent edition of Robert’s Rules of Order,
except in those cases where this Constitution provides otherwise”
(G-9.0302). Marianne Wolfe explains the
reason for abiding by this constitutional mandate in “Parliamentary
Procedures in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.):”
Recent moves to adopt consensus decision-making
are antithetical to this principle [of majority rule] and
also to the basic rights of the individual as listed above
and should never be used except in the most routine
of parliamentary transactions. At its worst, consensus decision-making
is manipulative and overpowering to the rights of the minority
because it compels the minority to “break the unity
of the body” in order to disagree. Most church members
will choose to suppress their disagreement rather than risk
this, and, if forced into this dilemma very often, will begin
to harbor resentment toward the body. This latter is far more
destructive to unity than open disagreement and the freedom
of the right to disagree (pp. 4-5).
The amendment preserves the TTFOPUP’s
hearty endorsement of alternative forms of discernment, while
not suggesting that the General Assembly must follow its example.
4. Amend Recommendation 5.c. as follows: [Text
to be deleted is shown with a strike-through;
text to be added or inserted is shown as italics.]
“c. Subject to the requirements of
the Book of Order, Oordaining and installing bodies,
acting as corporate expressions of the church, have the responsibility
to determine their membership by applying these standards to
those elected to office. These determinations include:”
Rationale
It is most encouraging
that the TTFOPUP has held up the presbyteries as the essential
and fundamental units of government in our denomination. Presbyteries
indeed antedate the General Assembly, and presbyteries have
fundamental rights, especially where it comes to examining and
accepting their own members. The Book of Order is quite
clear when it says that presbyteries have the responsibility
and power “to ordain, receive, dismiss, install, remove,
and discipline ministers ...” (G-11.0103n).
But the TTFOPUP has failed to mention that
the Constitution also places limits on sessions’
and presbyteries’ powers of ordination. There are many
places in the Book of Order where certain requirements
are placed on who “shall” or “shall not”
be ordained. Section G-6.0105 states, “Both men and women
shall be eligible to hold church offices. ...” Section
G-14.0201 says, “Every congregation shall elect men and
women from among its active members….” These paragraphs
limit the freedom of sessions to exclude either men or women
from the office of ruling elder.
Similarly, presbyteries are not allowed to
ordain candidates for the office of minister of the Word and
Sacrament unless those men and women are properly qualified.
Section G-14.0310b says, “The candidate’s presbytery
shall require a candidate to fulfill the following requirements
to be certified as to be ready for examination for ordination,
pending a call.” The Book of Order goes on to limit
the presbyteries in their ability to ordain candidates who do
not possess college transcripts, seminary educations, or satisfactory
grades on the Ordination Examinations. These necessary qualifications
can only be set aside with supermajority votes of presbytery
(G-14.0313).
The requirement that presbyteries observe
constitutional limits on their powers of ordination was upheld
by the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Committee (GAPJC)
in Londonderry v. the Presbytery of Northern New England.
The PJC said, “... there are no constitutional grounds
for a governing body to fail to comply with an express provision
of the Constitution. … Assertions of inconsistency,
confusion, or ambiguity may justify the right to protest. They
do not create a right to disregard any part of the Constitution”
(Minutes, 2001, Part I, pp. 580-81, Paragraph 12.1069).
The suggested amendment restores the balance
between governing bodies’ freedom to ordain and those
governing bodies’ obligation to exercise their powers
according to the limitations expressed in the Book of Order.
If the presbyteries indeed desired to remove some or all of
the limitations placed on their powers of ordination, the appropriate
way to do that would be through the amendment process of the
Book of Order.
5. Amend Recommendation 5.c.(2) as follows:
[Text to be added is shown as italic.]
“(2) Whether any departure of belief
constitutes a failure to adhere to the essentials of Reformed
faith and polity under G-6.0108 of the Book of Order, thus barring
the candidate from ordination and/or installation.”
6. Amend Recommendation 5.c. by adding a new
section “5.c.(3)” to read as follows:
“(3) Whether any conduct bars the
candidate from ordination and/or installation. Such disqualifying
conduct would include any failure on the part of a candidate
to be governed by the church’s polity and abide by its
discipline.”
Rationale
The TTFOPUP has rightly pointed to the historic
tension in Presbyterian polity between the need for adherence
to necessary beliefs and practices on the one hand and the freedom
of conscience for all members of presbytery on the other. It
is true that our Presbyterian family has always been marked
by diversity, and that since the Adopting Act of 1729 we have
always allowed some differences of opinion to exist.
The TTFOPUP is also right to point out that
G-6.0108 is of fundamental importance to the question of who
should be ordained. It is true that individual candidates for
ordination have always had the freedom to declare their disagreement
with the confessions or with the Book of Order. It is
also true that presbyteries have wide latitude in determining
which scruples declared by candidates are acceptable and which
scruples would make candidates ineligible for ordination.
However, the TTFOPUP report does not make
clear the distinction between a candidate’s beliefs and
his or her conduct. For while it is undoubtedly the case that
“God alone is Lord of the conscience” (The Book
of Confessions, 6.109), it is also the case that an officer
of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) “chooses to exercise
freedom of conscience within certain bounds” (Book
of Order, G-6.0108b). That is why the constitutional questions
propounded to ordinands include: “Will you be governed
by our church’s polity, and will you abide by its discipline?”
Diversity of opinion is a precious freedom, but the unity of
the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is impossible without its officers’
obedience to constitutional standards.
This understanding of Presbyterian polity
was recognized by the UPC in 1975 in Maxwell v. Presbytery
of Pittsburgh. The case involved a minister who refused
to participate in the ordination of women as elders. The PJC
said, “Neither a synod nor the General Assembly has any
power to allow a presbytery to grant an exception to an explicit
constitutional provision.” In other words, the minister
was free to believe what he wished, but his practice had to
be governed by the Constitution.
The suggested amendments thus recognize the
necessary distinction between a candidate’s freedom of
conscience and his obligation to govern his conduct according
to the Constitution of the church.
7. Amend Recommendation 5.d. as follows: [Text
to be deleted is shown with a strike-through; text
to be added or inserted is shown as italic.]
“d. Whether the ordaining/installing
body has conducted its examination reasonably, responsibly,
prayerfully, and deliberately in deciding to ordain a candidate
for church office, and whether the result reached accords
with biblical standards and the Constitution of the Presbyterian
Church (U.S.A.), is are subject to review
by higher governing bodies.”
Rationale
The problem with Recommendation 5.d. as presented
by the TTFOPUP is that it is exclusively subjective. It would
be possible for a presbytery to be reasonable, responsible,
prayerful, and deliberate even while ordaining someone who was
nevertheless ineligible for office according
to the standards of the Constitution. Objective measures,
such as whether the examination was conducted “constitutionally,”
or “biblically,” are nowhere to be found in Recommendation
5.d. of the report. A higher governing body could thus find
itself prevented from overturning an unconstitutional ordination,
as long as the examination was carried out with all due decorum.
The suggested amendment would explicitly
allow appropriate objective measures to be used by higher governing
bodies to ensure that the Constitution is faithfully
followed by all governing bodies of the church.
|
