“How good and pleasant it is when kindred live together in unity.” Psalm 133:1
I became a Presbyterian in 1994. I left the moorings of the Episcopal Church for an affinity with the well-constructed theology that abided in the pulpits and classrooms of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
I didn’t know one important fact about the PC(USA): I was entering a denomination that for years had been arming itself for contestation. I have not known a day as a Presbyterian when the specter of contest and dispute has not been hanging over our church. The standard bearer has been ordination standards and human sexuality. But there have been others: Israel, Iraq, PUP, Washington Office, General Assembly Mission Council politics, and on and on.
Know the tune refrain, “And they’ll know we are Christians by our love?” Yet the rough and tumble tune of contest I have been hearing at the loudest volumes sounds like “And they’ll know that we are serious Presbyterians by our contests, our bouts over Book of Order supremacy, and by how well we can rally our people for the next vote.”
How many of us love the idea of winning — and reciprocally, fear losing — contests like the ordination fight more than we love the thought of having to be the church with those with whom we disagree?
While the ordination standard debate is important, my critique is that some of us are invested only in the contest itself. If it does not appear so to us on the inside, then it certainly appears that way to those on the outside more than we’d care to admit. Why is it that Presbytery meeting attendance (at least in the three presbyteries I have been associated with) seems to multiply every time a G-6 issue is before us? Is it that the other work of the presbytery is less important? I’ll be the first to confess that many presbytery meetings are exhaustingly dull. But I marvel at fellow presbyters we do not lay eyes upon except once every two years when they come to sway the body to their side as G-6 appears on the agenda. Our sinfulness, our love of victory, and our erroneous need to prove an opponent wrong ratchet our adrenaline and spur us on to contest.
Years ago I attend a presbytery meeting where G-6 was on the docket. A missionary from Africa spoke up: the vote would fail to resolve the dispute, he said, because the order of the day called for five minutes of prayer and one hour of debate. He made a failed motion to reverse the two: one hour of prayer and five minutes of debate. The presbytery politely laughed at him. I am convinced some 13 years later that he was right. The presbyters had decided the merits of the arguments and prescribed their votes long before they had arrived. The debate was only for the sake of contestation — the need, the love, or the desire to be argumentative and disputative for the adrenaline rush.
Two paragraphs in an old part of the Book of Order extinguish the idolatrous rush of contest and attempt to right the ship: G-1.0304 and G-1.0305. In the first we are reminded that truth is in order to goodness. In the second we are instructed that while the truth is good, it will remain constant that good people of sound judgment will disagree about the implications of the truth. The church officers I train are usually impressed with this reasonable approach. The paragraph (G-1.0305) ends with a call to forbearing duty when disagreements occur: “And in all these [disagreements] we think it the duty both of private Christians and societies to exercise mutual forbearance toward each other.”
That just might be it — a call to forbearance over and against a call to contest. I for one will welcome it.
CHRISTOPHER H. EDMONSTON is pastor of Howard Memorial Church, Tarboro, N.C.
Response from Paul E. Capetz,
January 24, 2010 Minneapolis MN
I appreciate Rev. Sandalow's correction of my error regarding the context in which Zwingli exclaimed "For God's sake, do something brave!" He is right: I was misled by Karl Barth, though not from the "Church Dogmatics" but from Barth's "Theology of John Calvin." I am happy to be better instructed. Nonetheless, whatever the context, the statement itself is naturally applicable to many situations. The suggestion that courage might be an appropriate expression of fidelity to God is something that the church could stand to contemplate these days.
Response from Rev Al Sandalow,
January 15, 2010 Ellensburg, WA
I am no expert on Zwingli, but I believe you have rather twisted the Zwingli comment.
I believe it is not from any defense of the Reformation, but a part of a letter written to Council of Zurich, where Zwingli argued for strong concessions from the "Five States" (Roman Catholic city states, whom Zwingli had raised an army to attack) to end the First Kappel War.
"I note well how matters stand. Now they make few speeches, pray and beg, for none can do these things better than such people. Let us only quit the field, however, and in one short month they will return and attack us. Act with vigour, I beseech you, in the first instance, do not throw away our advantages, and accept only an honourable peace, and one that will be fruitful of good results. For God's sake do something brave. By my life I will not mislead you, nor yield an inch myself." (Zwingli; or The rise of the Reformation in Switzerland, Raget Christoffel)
Barth takes this rather out of context in Church Dogmatics and applies it to self-denial (4,2), which is where I think most have heard the quote.
If you choose to quote history to make your point, you might want to get it right. Truth matters, at least to some of us.
Response from P.Wilson Gregory,
January 13, 2010 Lambetville, NJ
While I agree with the many fine points Pastor Edmonston makes, the prime difference in the polity structure of an Episcopal form of government, and that of the Presbyterians, is the Federal nature of how we structure the checks and balances on power and authority. Where various elected boards, committies and commissions act as the "bishop" and how we modify and change the Form of Government. As in any elected or representative process politics, debate, hard feelings, disagreement, disharmoney is a by-product of the structure.
The problem of the PUP process of mid-decade, as an example, is that it existed and made policy outside the "due-process" and form of church government where the issues should have been processed and placed before the people, as any change to the FOG should have been. And in that statement is the seeds of our own demise. Presbyterians have had over 8 recorded major schisms over a variety of historical issues since the 1750s.
We presbyterians assume that the structure, mechanics, and process of polity can solve our divisions. That if only we could get the polity or deliberative process refined to the right point, we can solve complex matters of theology, confession, biblical authority. Like a dog chasing its tail, we go round and round over the pole of the DC office, Gays, the nature of marriage, missions, because all those matter exist for many as core confessional or belief values. These issues define the essence of faith and meaning for many. Like the endless abortion debate; These issues do not exist in the area of logic, reason, and rule-of-law, where the polity of church resides, but in the gut of raw emotion, feelings and faith, which is at times very volitile and very ill-logical at times. Polity or the application of G-1, G-6, whatever will not solve the differences or make them go away. And that is the problem, but also a strength of our system.
We may never agree or settle any of the culture war issues of our time. But the primary benefit of our polity is that it does provide a forum to talk, debate, deliberate, even pray when the last thing, the last thing, people in a conflicted situation want to do is talk, debate, or deliberate, or even pray together.
TrackBack URI for this entry
Subscribe to this comment's feed
