Complaints of ordination irregularities, heresy filed with presbyteries on opposite coasts

In the West, some members of Redwoods Presbytery in Northern California are seeking to prevent the ordination of Katie Morrison, a lesbian whose ordination was approved by the presbytery on Sept. 21. Morrison reportedly has said that she will abide by the church’s constitutional requirement that unmarried clergy in the PC(USA) be “chaste.”

In the Baltimore case, a member of the Los Ranchos Presbytery in Southern California alleges that Stroud has willfully and deliberately violated his ordination vows and a clause (G-6.0106b) in the constitution that says unmarried ministers may not be sexually active. The complaint also charges Stroud with heresy.

The PC(USA) prohibits marriage between gay persons.

The complaint against Stroud was brought to the presbytery’s Sept. 26 meeting after Stroud waived his right of confidentiality in what could become a disciplinary action against him. Stroud is a minister of outreach and reconciliation for a group named That All May Freely Serve (TAMFS), which is working to eliminate barriers to gays’ and lesbians’ full participation in the PC(USA).

In the northern California case, Redwoods presbyters who were on the losing end of the 90-37 vote to permit Morrison’s ordination are charging that the process was illegitimate. They say they suspect that Morrison’s understanding of “chastity” is different from the church’s historical position that forbids any sexual activity between unmarried partners.

People unhappy about the outcome of the vote are raising questions about the thoroughness of the examination. They question whether the examiners in Morrison’s case probed deeply enough on sexual matters, beginning with the Committee on Preparation for Ministry (the first church body to confer with ministerial candidates) and continuing through the floor debate during the presbytery meeting.

The PC(USA)’s Permanent Judicial Commission — the denomination’s highest court — is already considering a case from Stamford, Conn., in which a gay elder says he considers himself chaste “in God’s eyes,” although he lives with another man. That case turns on the question of the investigatory responsibility of a church that wants to ordain a member, but has questions about whether the candidate’s sexual life meets denominational requirements.

The hearing in the Stamford case, which was scheduled for Sept. 14-15 in Chicago, was postponed because of the terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington and has not been rescheduled.

Morrison’s presbytery voted to approve her ordination as a “field organizer” for More Light Presbyterians (MLP), an advocacy network for gay and lesbian Presbyterians. She would be MLP’s second field organizer, joining Michael Adee, an elder at First church, Santa Fe, N.M. Mitzi Henderson, a co-moderator of the organization, said it gets so many calls for speakers that it needs another organizer to help congregations learn to provide pastoral care to gays and lesbians and their families and to assist in dialogues about homosexuality — a subject that has been at the center of PC(USA) politics for 30 years.

The constitutional provision at the center of this debate, G-6.0106b, is itself under debate. The provision requires “fidelity within the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness” for church officers.

The church’s 173 presbyteries will vote over the next several months to retain or strike it. In the latter event, the PC(USA) would leave it to congregations and presbyteries to examine candidates and decide on their suitability for ordained ministry. Those who favor striking G-6.0106b say that would merely restore the church’s historical process.

G-6.0106b was put into the constitution in 1997. An attempt to delete it was decisively rejected by the presbyteries the following year.

One day after Baltimore Presbytery announced that it intended to put an investigating committee together to consider the allegations against Stroud, Jane Spahr, a Presbyterian lesbian activist, voiced deep dismay.

“People say things like this: ‘What’s the matter with people like Don Stroud and Jane Spahr and Katie Morrison? What’s the matter with them?’ Well, that’s the wrong question,” Spahr said. “The question is, ‘What’s the matter with a church that keeps excluding its very own children and grandchildren who want to serve?’

“What do people think we are?” asked Spahr, who formed TAMFS to combat stereotyping and work for the inclusion of gay and lesbian Presbyterians in ministerial roles. “This gets down to the mythology of who people think we are. These are good people with tremendous faith in God, and who love Jesus. It is the scapegoating of victims of oppression.”

Stroud, who was in parish ministry until he began working with TAMFS in 1999, said he’s not surprised that someone is trying to oust him. After he served as his presbytery’s commissioner to the General Assembly, he said, he got a letter by certified mail outlining his alleged offenses and demanding that he respond by Aug. 31 or face disciplinary action.

Stroud said the letter was signed, but he doesn’t know the writer. (In disciplinary cases, names are kept confidential; Stroud waived his confidentiality.)

Charles Forbes, the stated clerk of Baltimore Presbytery, said an investigating committee will be named in November.

According to a TAMFS release, that committee could decide against filing formal charges. If charges are filed, there could be a number of possible outcomes: Stroud could be acquitted; rebuked; rebuked with supervision and rehabilitation; temporarily excluded from office; or defrocked.

“You just have to take that chance when you’re working to counter the present constitutional barriers,” Stroud said of his decision to give up confidentiality. “This is something you go into with your eyes wide open … but not that many times have More Light Presbyterians or TAMFS (faced disciplinary action.)”

The complaint does not explain the charge of heresy lodged against Stroud.

In the Redwoods Presbytery case, events — who asked what of whom — are muddled.

The executive presbyter, Brian Tippen, said nobody side-stepped the issue of chastity during the examination. In fact, she said, the subject was broached during the presbytery meeting: “Someone asked Katie directly whether she intended to live in compliance with G-6.0106.b, and her answer was yes. The presbytery, at the conclusion of the exam, voted 90-37 to approve her for ordination. It seems fairly straightforward to me. ŠThe only issue with G-60106.b is whether a person agrees to live in compliance.”

Lucky Phelps, Redwoods’ stated clerk, backed up Tippen’s account, describing the process as “careful” at every turn. “This was not taken lightly,” she said — adding that, after the vote, three protests were filed and three dissents were noted.

However, Ed Hart, of Napa, Calif., a member of the Committee on Ministry, insisted that neither the Committee on Preparation for Ministry nor the Committee on Ministry did its job. In the minutes of the Aug. 23 meeting, he said, Phelps is reported to have described the decision as an “irregularity.” Hart did not attend that meeting. (The Presbyterian News Service has not seen the minutes.)

Hart also said that, when the question of “chastity” was posed to Morrison on the presbytery floor, Chandler Stokes, the chair of the Committee on Ministry, said the matter had been resolved in committee.

“I thought that Ed had asked me Š whether we had inquired specifically with Katie whether she was in compliance with (G-6.0106b),” said Stokes. “I said I didn’t recall, and (that) I wasn’t present for all of the meetings.” Stokes said another committee member responded to Hart’s question.

Stokes said the committee process in Morrison’s case “seemed to be no different from our usual process,” and Morrison met “all of the usual criteria.” He added: “We don’t ask our heterosexual candidates about their fidelity in marriage, or investigate their sexual behavior. I think to do so in this case would clearly have been discriminatory.”

Morrison’s ordination has been scheduled for Oct. 21. However, Hart said he may seek a stay from the Pacific Synod’s Permanent Judicial Commission to block the service.

Larry Ballenger, a member of the presbytery, said he agrees with Hart and believes there is some “re-defining of chastity going on.” Ballenger went on: “It is terrible that in the church we’ve come to this point — where we can’t take what someone says at face value, when we have reason to suspect otherwise.”