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Holy Week resources and reflections

“Joyfully submit:” What’s the big deal?

The local folks happened to be the first to cast their votes, so I showed up to observe.

Ratifying Amendment 10-A, the proposed “joyfully submit” ordination standard, was on the docket for the Presbytery of the James meeting here in Richmond, Va., on Oct. 16. Both sides had worked hard to get out the vote. A full sanctuary at St. Giles Church heard thoughtful presentations and civil discussion. The minister- and elder-delegates cast silent ballots. The stated clerk announced the result: 152 yes, 152 no, 3 abstentions. He reminded the stunned crowd that since Roberts Rules require 50-percent-plus-one for approval of such a vote, the motion was defeated.

One no vote, 172 more to decide. What ought those other presbyteries to keep in mind?

For one thing, the proposed amendment presents, on the face of it, an unimpeachable summary of the process and standards to be followed by all ordaining bodies. If it merely were being proposed to be added to the Book of Order it would garner overwhelming support.

Many do oppose it nevertheless.

The opposition ought not to be interpreted as a defense of orthodoxy against heterodoxy. No matter how the vote on this amendment concludes, the essential tenets of the faith will remain intact. Our belief in the holy trinity, the full humanity and divinity of Christ, the salvific death and bodily resurrection of the Savior, and salvation by grace alone through faith alone will be professed with conviction throughout this denomination no matter how this vote concludes. The Apostles and Nicene Creeds will be recited without fingers crossed.

Then again, we followers of Jesus Christ have often crossed our hearts and crucified the church over other, less “essential tenets,” like the meaning and practice of the sacraments, the keeping of the Sabbath, the ordination of divorcees, the owning of slaves, and gender differences in leadership. Although each side’s claims of the other’s apostasy and ignorance usually cooled when a new consensus emerged on each of those past debated issues, battle scars remained on the body of Christ for generations.

Battle scars already show here in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) over the matter being debated, since it marks the fourth time in 13 years that a General Assembly has sent for the presbyteries’ ratification an alternative to the requirement that those being ordained and/or installed into the office of deacon, elder, or minister of Word and Sacrament shall live a life of “fidelity in marriage between a man and a woman or chastity in singleness.”

The disappearance of such language won’t unleash a wave of temple prostitution; we won’t lose the ability or will to prosecute polygamists or abusers. But lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered persons will no longer be denied the possibility of ordained service if they are not living a life of total abstinence.

Some of us feel ashamed to hold membership in a denomination that excludes from leadership LGBT persons who agree that it is “not good for [them] to be alone” but find that the person they think suitable to be their partner doesn’t meet the specifications drawn by the mother hen church.

Some of us shudder to think that our church would arrogantly deign to multiply the options for covenanting intimate relationships relations beyond the one model designed, created, and blessed by God.

Still others of us look down Church Street, wondering if the divisions tearing up the Lutherans and Episcopalians will be duplicated in our Presbyterian church. Will a vote in one direction or the other lead our fragile unity — already suffering some splintering in recent years — into an all-out split? Then again, could this new amendment’s formula actually lead to rapprochement?

This Outlook offers a couple of perspectives. Given the tie vote on the first attempt, the ensuing votes likely will bring some drama of their own. Keep your eyes peeled.

—JHH

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