On May 22, the Way Forward Commission held its second-to-last meeting before the 2018 General Assembly convenes in St. Louis in June – using most of that time to provide updates on its ongoing work, and a sense of how it will proceed in the time it has left. The commission – which has some power to act on its own – has already made its report and formal recommendations to the assembly. It can’t add any new recommendations to that report now, said Mark Hostetter, a minister from New York who serves as the commission’s moderator. What the commission does seem prepared to do is to prepare “a collection of observations,” as Hostetter put it, that it would send to a new Moving Forward Commission, if the assembly decides to create that entity as Way Forward has recommended, or to agencies or other groups within the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). At the commission’s next meeting, June 5, those reports are likely to be presented regarding a number of areas — including communications in … [Read more...]

The Way Forward Commission voted April 30 to send a comment to the 2018 General Assembly opposing a proposal from the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board to divide the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), A Corporation into two separate corporations. The All Agency Review Committee will meet May 1, and is likely to concur with the comment as well, as some of its leaders were involved in drafting it. The comment Way Forward approved (Comments of the WFC and AARC 042918) states that the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board’s recommendations would “take the church in the opposite direction” from what Way Forward and All Agency Review contend are needed. The recommendations “do not promote the entire body of Christ or build up the whole of our denomination,” the comment states.The comment states that the board’s recommendations “would reinforce existing issues of control and accountability” with respect to the Presbyterian Mission Agency Board; are contrary to section G-4.0101 of the Book of … [Read more...]