It’s almost like standing in a nursery looking at a plant that’s getting ready to bud. You have some idea what it might look like, but you’re not exactly sure what color it will be, how big it will get, whether it will thrive or struggle when it’s planted in the soil.
From June 15-18, a meeting will be held in Minneapolis of a group called New Wineskins, which is looking for ways to transform the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) These evangelical Christians are ready and willing to think outside the box — they want a new way of being Presbyterian and figure it will take lots of change to get there.
They want a denomination, for example, that connects local churches in regional networks — perhaps across denominational lines — to do mission work together. They’re calling for “greater theological unity and integrity,” and have written statements of essential tenets and ethical imperatives, including opposition to abortion and homosexual relationships, that those involved would be expected in some way to endorse.
And they’re writing a new constitution that will be unveiled and debated at the June meeting and perhaps could be presented through an overture to the General Assembly as an alternative to the current constitution of the PC(USA).
All of this is very much a work in progress — one purpose of the Minneapolis gathering is for people to talk about what’s been proposed and to fine-tune or even remodel it. Even among evangelicals — those who would agree with New Wineskins on ordination standards, for example, or who rallied a year or two ago behind the Confessing Church Movement — it’s not clear yet how much support this new initiative will get.
And the Theological Task Force on the Peace, Unity and Purity of the PC(USA) will release its final report in September. While that’s likely to ignite some kind of response, people don’t know yet what the task force will say or whether its work will bring reconciliation or even more furor.
“I don’t think we know yet” whether New Wineskins is proposing withdrawing from the PC(USA) to form a new denomination or advocating some kind of reformation from within, or even some other strategy, said Tom Edwards, associate pastor at Eastminster Church in Wichita, Kan. and executive coordinator of New Wineskins.
But some of the basic ideas include a flatter, less top-down structure for a denomination; the idea of ministry networks with an emphasis on evangelism and global concerns; and definite statements of theological belief. Edwards argues that the PC(USA) has a lot to learn from the church in the Southern hemisphere, that the growth of Christianity there, compared with the decline of mainline denominations, “really is a wake-up call to say we in the West don’t have it all figured out.”
Edwards described New Wineskins as “a very informal, loose” group of interested Presbyterians who have been meeting for brainstorming and prayer about every six months since the Presbyterian Coalition meeting in Portland, Ore. in October 2003.
At that meeting, New Wineskins leaders — including pastors David Henderson from Covenant Church in West Lafayette, Ind., and Dean Weaver from Knox Church in Buffalo, N.Y. — discussed New Wineskins thinking as one of several alternatives evangelicals might consider (others included “gracious separation” from the PC(USA) and “stay-fight-win,” meaning stay in place and take control.)
A “background and vision” piece posted on the Internet by a New Wineskins task force (available at https://www.newwineconvo.com/papers.html ) states that “the work of New Wineskins is supported by the Coalition as part of its broader vision for denominational renewal. However, while the Coalition has encouraged us in our work and offered a small measure of funding support, it endorses no particular vision or strategy for the future of the denomination, and the New Wineskins Initiative is not part of the formal work of the Coalition.”
But New Wineskins leaders argue that change is inevitable for the PC(USA), both because mainline U.S. denominations are struggling to find their place in a changing world and because the global picture of Christianity is changing.
The Minnesota gathering, at Christ Church, will include speakers from Presbyterian churches in other countries — some of them representing fast-growing congregations that are theologically more conservative than some wings of the PC(USA). In that, New Wineskins is acknowledging the friction that exists in other denominations as well — between the worldwide Anglican Communion, for example, and the Episcopal Church in the U.S.
“We have inherited a denominational structure that is a product of the Industrial Revolution,” the New Wineskins document states. “While it was well-suited to the cultural setting of the time, the world has changed dramatically,” and the PC(USA) needs to do so too. “It is a new day of ministry, one that requires a lean service structure that is adaptive and responsive to sweeping cultural changes.”
But the document also talks about the difficulty of holding together a denomination “divided over fundamental theological issues” — a denomination that continues to lose thousands of members year after year and whose internal wars, over gay ordination and other issues, now including a controversy over possible divestiture in some companies doing business in Israel, seem unending.
And it openly discusses the possibilities of either reconfiguring the PC(USA) entirely or providing the structure for a new denomination should the disagreements result in a split of the PC(USA).
“Is New Wineskins schismatic?” the document asks, and then answers: “New Wineskins is not creating disunity within the denomination. Rather, it is seeking to respond to disunity that already exists.”
It says “we intend to work as much as possible through existing denominational mechanisms for change. However, we have reservations about the capacity for the existing PC(USA) to restructure and reconfigure itself in so different a form.” Whether or not a denomination so diverse could reach agreement about theology, ethics and mission is an additional question.
“Another scenario which could make the New Wineskins vision a reality is if a precipitating crisis within the PC(USA) were to drive the denomination apart, forcing a whole block of churches to withdraw their membership and requiring the creation of a new identity,” the document states. “Some believe that such a separation is possible, even likely. Though this is not what we desire, we wish to be prepared for such a possibility.”
Where exactly New Wineskins fits into the broader picture of denominational politics, including a range of evangelical renewal groups, is still difficult to say.
Clark Cowden, who is evangelist presbyter of San Joaquin presbytery (Visalia, Calif.) and will be one of the speakers at the Minnesota gathering, said New Wineskins is “very separate” from the Confessing Church Movement, although “there’ll be a lot of Confessing Church type people who will go to see what they’re doing.”
Cowden added: “The Confessing Church stuff has been really quiet for the last year … I don’t know if that’s going to get revitalized or that’s going to fade away.”
Edwards said he expects 300 to 400 people to come to the Minneapolis meeting — including perhaps 50 official “delegates” from sessions that have officially endorsed in principle the drafts of key New Wineskins documents, making them eligible to vote on the proposed documents or revisions of them.
Others, he said, will come to see what the talk is about — they may buy in to the ideas to a greater or lesser extent.
“One of the things that’s driving the potential success of the New Wineskins is the imminence of the Theological Task Force report” and a sense in some places that it could be “the breaking point, the tipping point” for evangelicals, if the task force suggests permitting either local option or the ordination of sexually-active gays and lesbians, said Bob Davis, a minister from San Diego who formerly led the Presbyterian Forum and was a candidate last year for stated clerk of the PC(USA).
“I believe it,” Edwards said. “I really believe that, without being malicious, we are in a sense functioning in a house divided. The Bible is pretty clear that it can’t stand forever.” And while some continue to advocate for the “stay-fight-win” strategy, Edwards said he knows lots of younger evangelicals who aren’t willing to keep arguing about ordaining gays and lesbians and who say, “I can’t stand it for another generation.”
There also may be discussion about the proposed ethical imperatives and essential tenets.
The ethical imperatives, for example, list as sins idolatry, sexual immorality and bloodshed.
Under the sin of idolatry, the document states in part that “we reject the worship of anything other than God, including: work; wealth; health; success; progress; family; race; nation; political ideologies; economic systems; religious institutions and structures. We reject the practice of tolerance that refuses to discriminate between good and evil, and of embracing sin in the name of diversity.”
The document supports the sanctity of marriage and says all sexual interaction outside of marriage between one man and one woman — including homosexual, premarital and extramarital relationships — falls outside biblical norms.
Under the sin of bloodshed, the document states: “We affirm all human life to be sacred to God. We therefore reject all practices in which life is diminished, demeaned or destroyed. Abortion, euthanasia, infanticide, domestic violence, oppression, acts of revenge, unjust wars are symptoms of an ethos of death that repudiates God’s culture of life.”
And the list of essential tenets of Reformed faith includes an affirmation of belief in the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ and the statement: “The Bible is the only infallible rule of faith and practice.” Even within New Wineskins, Edwards said, there has been considerable debate about what “infallible” means and whether that phrasing is the right way to go.
More information about the New Wineskins gathering is available online at https://www.newwineconvo.com/index.html.
