10 Years Later – Presbyterian Predicament, Presence and Possibilities

When some wonder aloud about the relationship of theological education to the church’s ministries, three cheers for three theological educators — Joe Coalter, John Mulder and Louis Weeks — who envisioned, planned and edited The Presbyterian Presence. At the beginning, they convened consultations around the country to invite input on the shape of the study. At the end, their painstaking editing of essays from more than 60 researchers and writers made available a treasure of rich resources for contemporary ministries. But the purpose of this issue is not to praise the editors, but rather to invite a fresh look at a treasure that is still available for our taking.

In some ways the results of the Presbyterian Presence project have become buried treasure. From the hindsight of 10 years, it is possible to see more clearly that a set of events worked to diminish the impact of The Presbyterian Presence. The 1987 grant from the Lilly Endowment coincided with the move of the General Assembly offices from New York, Philadelphia and Atlanta to Louisville. In 1987 the newly reunited church was unformed and fragile. This time of transition was not always the best of times for General Assembly staff, who were being asked to move to Louisville from years of work and residence in other parts of the country.

The study elicited differing responses from governing bodies and congregations. The various essays challenged some long-held assumptions about Presbyterian priorities and methods. The results were not always received gladly by an assembling General Assembly staff. Although the findings were presented to General Assembly staff members, the editors’ initial consultations could have included more conversation with church leaders in Louisville at the beginning instead of at the end. The Methodists, in a case study that followed the Presbyterians, worked hard to bring denominational leaders in at the beginning of their study. Even as The Presbyterian Presence was saluted by scholars as a monumental case study of an American denomination, the lack of engagement and appreciation from governing body staff contributed to the lack of use of the study.

Predicament

The project was in the first instance a study in pathology, a diagnosis of the problems of a denomination in decline. In 1965 the combined membership of the Northern and Southern Presbyterian churches stood at 4.25 million members. By 1990 the membership of the reunited Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) was 2,856,000. This was a decline of 1.4 million members, or 33 per cent.

Mainstream Protestantism was intended to include those denominations that helped shape American religion and culture in the 19th century. These included American or Northern Baptists, Congregationalists (United Church of Christ and Disciples of Christ), Episcopalians, Methodists and Presbyterians. In the series foreword, the editors observed that in the 20th century all these churches have been “displaced — religiously and culturally — to a significant degree.” All have suffered “severe” losses of membership since the 1960s. All these denominations “experienced significant theological tensions.” All have struggled with organizational problems. And yet each of these denominations continues to be an “influential voice” in a rapidly changing culture.

As one of the researchers, I recall that we were encouraged to explore the forces that have “informed, transformed or deformed” the Presbyterian presence in the 20th century. The researchers included historians, theologians, sociologists, economists and musicians. They represented ministers and lay people, professors, pastors and students. As we looked at everything from Christian education to church-related colleges, from church music to church finances, from theology to organizational structures, the presenting question was: What has been the fate of this idea, practice, movement or institution in the 20th century?

The study was set over against a number of prevailing ideas or myths about the reasons for Presbyterian decline. One of the prevailing ideas was that the Presbyterian commitment to social justice, which grew in the 1960s and 1970s, was responsible for the decline. A related idea was that Presbyterians were leaving the denomination to join more conservative churches that did not espouse a commitment to social justice. The researchers hoped to move from soft myths to hard data that could be useful in encouraging the renewal of the church.

Presence

The series title was selected prudently. A church in decline needed no triumphalist title. “Presence” was a term that had come into use in missiological circles. Christian presence is patterned after God’s presence in the world in the incarnation of Jesus Christ and in the work of the Holy Spirit.

In and under all of the essays was a sense that Presbyterians needed to recover a sense of identity. In colonial times we came primarily from Scotch-Irish and English streams as a minority and sometimes persecuted church with a strong sense of Reformed identity. By the end of the 20th century we were working to open up our denomination to include not only Native Americans, African-Americans and Hispanics, but newer immigrant groups.

A chief concern that emerged early in the research was that we had failed to convey the identity of Reformed theology and a Presbyterian way to our own children. On the one hand, we were declining simply because of demographics: with lower birth rates we were not producing enough children to replace adults. At a more profound level we were declining because we were failing to produce children who grew up to be young adults who took their places in the household of faith. In earlier generations, young people often left the church in their teen-age years only to return when they married and brought their own children for baptism and Christian education. The studies showed that young people were leaving the church, but they were not returning.

We are a denomination where theology matters, but James H. Moorhead’s essay, “Redefining Confessionalism” points to some unintended consequences of the adoption of the Confession of 1967 (C-67) and the Book of Confessions. Those who argued for a Book of Confessions did so to enlarge the theological landscape. Many of the framers of C-67 had been nurtured in the vigorous theological climate of biblical realism or neo-orthodoxy. Moorhead observes that ironically, C-67 came into being just as the neo-orthodox consensus was giving way to a host of contextual theologies. He wonders if expanding this framework unintentionally opened the door to “do theology” in various ad hoc fashions in the future. Or, quoting William Butler Yeats, Moorhead asks what does the church do when “the center cannot hold”?

The editors wanted us to know that “presence” was not a passive term, but several essays point out that Presbyterians had become passive in their witness to non-churched people. Historian Milton J Coalter’s essay, “Presbyterian Evangelism: A Case of Parallel Allegiances Diverging,” illuminates the tensions that surfaced from the 1960s onward in the attempt to be faithful to the twin mandates of the salvation of individuals and the transformation of society. Presbyterians have had a longstanding commitment to these parallel allegiances, but Coalter suggests that in recent years evangelism and social justice are no longer concurrent and are often “conflicting options.”

Robert H. Bullock’s chronicling of the changes in new church development between 1940 and 1980 was one of the most startling essays. His statistics (in box above right) speak loudly.

In the 1980s new church development improved to an average of 58 per year. Recent studies show a considerable correlation between new church development and growth in membership in denominations such as the Assemblies of God and the Southern Baptist Convention.

Different essays point out that we have often spent more time in criticizing each other than in witnessing to our neighbor. In the final volume the three editors, all American religious historians, observe that “the bitter legacy of the fundamentalist fissures in American Presbyterianism has often made Presbyterian leaders instinctively defensive and hostile to conservative and evangelical movements and blind to the variety and change within evangelicalism itself.”

Craig Dykstra and James Hudnut-Beumler, in “The National Organizational Structures of Protestant Denominations” lead us through the development of denominational structures from a “Constitutional Confederacy” to the “Corporate Model” that was operative from the middle of the 19th century into the 1960s. They observe that the corporate model depended on a high degree of trust between congregations and governing bodies. The corporate denomination, once the producer of most goods and services for congregations, has been replaced in recent years by everything from the Alban Institute to Youth Specialties to Christian education curriculum produced by independent publishing companies. No longer exercising a monopoly on goods and services, this corporate model gave way to what the authors call the denomination as “regulatory agency.” As membership declined and denominations retrenched, the regulatory activity grew. Denominations developed patterns of governance that exercised more control over budgets and denominationally related institutions. The acceptance of the corporate model in the 19th century had been done with an enthusiastic embrace. The shift to regulatory activities had happened with less intention and enthusiasm. They would also produce economic backlashes — the withholding of financial support — when trust of the denomination and its organizational structures diminished at the end of the century.

Possibility

If all of the denominational case studies began as attempts to get at the problems, suggestions if not solutions also emerge. What I learned as a person who interpreted The Presbyterian Presence to congregations and pastors’ gatherings was that unless we take the time and hard work to understand the Presbyterian predicament, we are not fully prepared to embrace new possibilities. Like reviewing a good movie, I will leave it to you to discover many of the possibilities. The editors also expanded their focus in speaking to the prospects of mainstream Protestantism in Vital Signs (1996) — recently reissued.

Presbyterians are living through a time when we have experienced multiple new challenges from society even as we have been fragmenting, both theologically and organizationally, from within. Although there needs to be a variety of responses to these manifold challenges, in the end Coalter, Mulder and Weeks call us to theological renewal and reform. Reform begins with repentance. The combined studies puncture the myth that Presbyterians were leaving because of our social justice witness to join more conservative denominations. The Presbyterians that went out the back door of our churches did not join any church. In fact, those new members who did join Presbyterian churches often came from more conservative churches. Repentance means facing up to the ways the evangelistic impulses have been stifled in the last half of the century.

Reform means openness to evangelism and growth. Reform means revitalizing education and nurture. Reform means that an historically white denomination reaches out to blacks, Hispanics and Asians. A missing piece in this study is a strong essay or essays on empowering youth ministries, to what can no longer be called youth culture but youth cultures. There is also need for encouragement of ministries on college campuses and through college-related congregations.

Finally, a re-forming Presbyterianism will mean the recovery of theological vision. The editors argue that Presbyterians have been ready to embrace a theological pluralism as a way forward from the rigidities of a scholastic Calvinism. In dethroning an older Calvinism, however, contemporary Presbyterian theologians have been “far more open to liberal than to conservative formulations of the Christian faith.” For a tradition which stands in a confessional tradition a persistent question is: What are the boundaries of Christian faith?

Ronald C. White Jr. is Professor of American Intellectual and Religious History at San Francisco Seminary, Southern California. He is the author of Lincoln’s Greatest Speech: The Second Inaugural. His next book, Lincoln’s American Eloquence (tentative title) will be published in 2004 by Random House.