Leading officials from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) say a report by a conservative group of Presbyterians "mischaracterizes" the denomination's positions on controversial matters.
The PC(USA)’s stated clerk, the Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, and its General Assembly Council executive director, Linda Valentine, addressed a letter to leaders within the denomination clarifying the church's stance on biblical authority, the singular saving Lordship of Jesus Christ, and the Trinity among other issues. The letter, dated June 12, and an attached document deals with a February strategy report released by the New Wineskins Association of Churches (NWAC) – a network of dissident Presbyterians in the PC(USA).
"The New Wineskins Association of Churches has circulated material that mischaracterizes central convictions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s faith and life," the letter stated.
By the request of a number of presbytery executives and stated clerks – middle governing bodies – the Office of Theology and Worship developed a document titled "The Church's One Foundation is Jesus Christ Her Lord" to clearly state the church's position on issues that have caused division and a small exodus of congregations.
Around debate that the General Assembly in 2001 did not clearly affirm that Jesus Christ is the "singular saving Lord" as understood through Scripture, the newly released document by the PC(USA) argues that the denomination has not abandoned a faithful confession of Jesus as Lord. During the 2001 decision, the PC(USA) did not use the "recent, novel expression" of the "singular saving Lordship" of Christ but instead used language of The Book of Confessions when it adopted the statement "the unique authority of Jesus Christ as Lord."
The document further pointed to the 2002 decision by the General Assembly to affirm the Saving Lordship of Jesus Christ "in unmistakable declarations."
While current public attention focuses on the controversy over the ordination of practicing homosexuals within the denomination, the Rev. Dr. D. Dean Weaver, co-moderator of the NWAC and whose Memorial Park Church in Pittsburgh recently voted to split, had said the catalyst for the exodus of churches has not all along been homosexuality.
"The issue all along has been who is Jesus and what the Church believes and what the Bible is – the real bedrock foundational issues of faith," he said after the NWAC winter convocation in February.
Addressing the argument that the PC(USA) has lost biblical authority, the new document by the denomination states that the current constitutional text "demonstrates full confidence in the authority of scripture." Recent confessionals state: "The one sufficient revelation of God is Jesus Christ, the Word of God incarnate, to whom the Holy Spirit bears unique and authoritative witness through the Holy Scriptures, which are received and obeyed as the word of God written. The Scriptures are not a witness among others, but the witness without parallel."
Still, a major and public controversial issue that has wracked most mainline denominations is the ordination of active homosexuals.
More conservative Presbyterian congregations began splitting with the PC(USA) after the General Assembly in 2006 granted some leeway to churches for homosexual ordination. An "authoritative interpretation" of the ordination standard was adopted allowing local and regional governing bodies to have the option to decide that the ordination standard is "not essential." Continue >>
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