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Let us not lose our head

Because of our successful remedial complaint (Johnston et al vs. Heartland Presbytery) I have received mail from commissioners to this month's G.A asking my view on the current overture to make per capita payments mandatory. Here is my response.

If the proposal to force all churches to pay per capita is passed:

Where is the church on Thursday and what is it doing?

I have a mischievous habit of asking pastors the question: "What's going on with your church on Thursday afternoon?" Their predictable answer is usually some equivalent of "nothing much."

That question was provoked by the chapter title in a book I read a few years ago, Where Is the Church on Thursday Afternoon? The response of most pastors is a predictable "Christendom" answer. After all, the church is about the clergy and about properly authorized services and sacraments and the custodial care of passive members. Responders think only of the "church gathered" for its meetings and assemblies, and under the supervision of the church's duly ordained leadership.

Why Montreat matters

A few weeks ago I was discussing issues coming before the General Assembly with friends from around the country. We all agreed there were more than a few "hot topics" for the commissioners to debate. Someone brought up how amazed they were by the number of overtures petitioning the Assembly to keep the Montreat Historical Society open. There was laughter as he pointed out what an important issue it was.

I have to admit I was shocked. I thought everyone knew how special the Montreat Historical Society was, how much it meant, how important it was to inspire denominational loyalty. But I realized I was only one of two southerners in the conversation. The two of us began protesting that keeping open the Montreat Historical Society was indeed important, even crucial to the Presbyterian Church(U.S.A.). A friend then kindly said, "We don't get it. Please explain why this is important to the rest of the church. We want to understand the passion and the pain this decision is arousing." So I am writing this to try and convey why keeping the Montreat Historical Society open is important to so many people and to the future of the PC(USA).

Customer Service 101 for churches

c. 2006 Religion News Service

Listen up, church leaders. This parable is for you.

Dell Computer Corp. is losing a repeat customer, because their process and data requirements overwhelmed my need to buy their product.

Last week I wanted to order a $39 USB memory key. Dell's Web site required me to locate a username and password (serving their purposes, not mine). Dell's toll-free number led me into a labyrinth of voice commands. A second toll-free number landed me with a live person who insisted on creating a "profile" for me. No, I said, I simply want to make a $39 purchase.

I persevered long enough to complete my purchase. But I will think twice before making another one. No business can afford to make purchasing its products this difficult.

A prayer

Your Spirit, O Creator God,

your brooding, bright imagining Spirit,

is inviting us, cajoling us, entrancing, inducing,

yes, even seducing us, beyond life into creation,

into imagination, into all the shapes and hues,

the textures, postures, melodies of grace.

So let that flaming, flagrant Spirit

be afire now among us here.

Lift our imaginations through the laughter of the soul.

Restore to us our poetic vision,

that we may see this world anew

as your mighty work-in-progress,

that we may see ourselves as others see us,

that we may see you, the unseen God,

as the source and goal and heart of all delight.

Through these moments of welcoming,

of sustenance, of encouragement, mirth and wisdom,

move up, across, among us once again

with your Spirit of inspiration and of ecstasy.

We ask this in the name of the living Word,

that Word we seek and find and lose,

and then are found by.

Let us say . . . AMEN.

How do you spell relief?

As Americans brace themselves for yet another hurricane season, they might look at one congregation and its response to the Gulf Coast disaster. Perhaps it will become a blueprint for the future.

Suspended between Orlando and Daytona Beach is a small town, DeLand, Fla., home to Stetson University. Across from the campus, along a major tree-lined boulevard, is First Presbyterian Church, a congregation of 550 (Web site: www.firstpresdeland.com .)

In 2004, when hurricanes Charley, Frances, and Jeanne hit Central Florida, residents were sensitized to the pain caused by evacuations, flooding, damaged homes, and lack of electricity.  The face of suffering was personal.  Then Katrina slammed into coastal Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama, touching the hearts of DeLand's people like Jim and Rachael Winter, Mississippi natives.

Administration and sexual time bombs

The 2006 General Assembly will be remembered as the Assembly that debated two controversial issues. The first was raised in a petition entitled "A Voice for the Local Church." The petition gave expression to a widely shared concern of congregations that recent administrative changes had fundamentally altered the nature of the Kirk, that too much power had of late been transferred from the local church and Presbytery to a few people within the Central Administration.

Pro choices: Young Presbyterians seek abortion dialogue

Editor's Note: Outlook editors recently interviewed two young Presbyterian members of "Pro-Seed", named after the biblical mustard seed and aimed at spreading the Kingdom of God and creating a new culture within the church. Each represents a different perspective on the issue of abortion. Fairlight Collins Jones is an ordained Minister of Word and Sacrament and co-pastor, with her husband, Scott, of Woodland Church in West Philadelphia, Pa. She graduated from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in 2002. Nancy Neal is an elder ordained at Lafayette Avenue Church in Brooklyn, N. Y. She has an M.Div. from Union Theological Seminary in New York and is a candidate for ministry. She works at The Crossroad Publishing Company in New York. The questions and answers have been edited for length.

The rites and relationships of baptism, the Lord’s Supper

Among the theological questions before the 217th General Assembly will be those in the draft Pastoral letter and list of five sacramental practices recommended by the Sacraments Study Group for a two-year period of discernment in congregations. 

This group was convened by the General Assembly Office of Theology and Worship to address several referrals from previous assemblies having to do with the formula of invitation to the Lord's Supper. Most of these overtures suggested ways of altering the language used in the invitation so that explicit mention of baptism as a requirement for admission to the table would be removed. Apparently, in many congregations, such references to the requirement of prior baptism were seen as barriers to outreach and the welcoming of newcomers to the church. 

Finding a theology of ordination and vocation in baptism

This coming June, the 217th General Assembly will be considering the long-awaited report of the Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity of the Church (PUP). Some left-of-center and right-of-center groups in the church view the report as inadequate in addressing the hot issues before the church, particularly the question of ordination. To be sure, the PUP report affirms some key themes in the Reformed understanding of ordination and vocation, such as mutual self-giving and service, as well as the communal and covenantal nature of God's call upon the Church and those called to serve in ordained leadership (pp. 19-20, Final Report of the Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity and Purity of the Church). Even so, the PUP Task Force expresses a great disappointment:

... Scripture does not provide a thoroughly developed theology of ordination, and a theology of ordination has not been clearly and consistently articulated in the development of Reformed and Presbyterian doctrine. (lines 565-567, Final Report)

Never say “Never”… or “Always”:Continuing the conversation on “The Trinity: God’s Love Overflowing”

When I attended a gathering in Pasadena five years ago to discuss the doctrine of the Trinity, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Charles Wiley and others from the Office of Theology and Worship were holding a series of forums around the country in response to an action of the 2000 General Assembly that a group be constituted to study the doctrine of the Trinity in the theology, life and worship of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). I was intrigued by the idea that the Assembly had called for a theological discussion. Before the Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity and before "Hope in the Lord Jesus Christ," the Trinity Task Force (now a "Work Group") was the first time a theological committee had been formed at the GA level since reunion in 1983.

Reflection on “The Trinity: God’s Love Overflowing”

The task force on the Trinity rightly comments (line 71) that the doctrine of the Trinity is "widely neglected or poorly understood in many of our congregations." This central doctrine of the Christian faith seems optional to some Presbyterians, peripheral to others, and irrelevant to the faith and life of many others. For some ministerial candidates, the doctrine of the Trinity does not appear on their carefully crafted statements of faith presented to their presbyteries. The task force rightly concludes, after observing this reality in our church, that "the doctrine of the Trinity is crucial to our faith, worship and service" and it prays that "Presbyterians will once again find that the doctrine of the Trinity is good and joyful news!" (lines 72-74).