Wednesday Morning, Gearing Up

Yesterday (Tuesday) was a grinding day, until 4:30. That's when my committee finally finished our business for the Assembly. Sort of. After the Assembly finishes its meeting Friday night, my committee will meet afterwards to discuss budget implications. Man, I knew serving for ten years on Administration and Finance at the Presbytery would come handy!

Today will be full. I had breakfast this morning with PFR, and heard Dr. Andrew Purves from Pittsburgh Seminary talk about the Four Markers of Our Faith. Love his Scottish accent and his sense of dry humor. Lunch will be with the folks from Fuller. Then at 1:30, the General Assembly will gather in a plenary session for the first time since Sunday to take up the business of the Assembly.

Oh, the PC(USA) has updated their website. It's about time. Check it out here, some of it is pretty cool and useful, especially the Bible reading section.

Some impressions of committee work, and then on the Assembly prognostications.

The committee work is both invigorating and mind-numbingly boring. Many of the issues before us were simply changing some words in the Book of Order. This is regular house keeping. For example, last year, there was a committee name change, and in the name change "Interfaith" was replaced with "Inter-religious". The implication is that "interfaith" refers to relations between Christians, for example, Methodists or Episcopalians. "Inter-Religious" means relationships with those who are religious, but not in the broader Christian family, like Buddhists, or Hindus, or Muslims. However, the name change on the committee was not reflected throughout the Book of Order, so we were asked to make changes throughout the BOO to reflect the change. Exciting, huh?

Some of the changes were more substantial. There was a motion to limit the scope of the Overture Advocate. When an overture comes to the General Assembly, it is parceled out to the appropriate committee. And the presbytery submitting the overture has the opportunity to send someone to GA as the overture advocate, who will both lobby for its passage, but be a resource person to answer questions about the overture. We thought it inappropriate to limit the input of the overture advocate beyond the limits put on anyone speaking to the committee.

My impression, after two days with the committee, is that people try to work together There are different understandings of many issues, but there is a willingness to debate and change minds, and to achieve clarity. I was deeply moved by people who had strong opinions on an overture, and then changed their minds because of the evidence, or because things were made clear.

Another impression is that the COGA (Committee on Office of the General Assembly) overtures were passed, and those proposed by presbyteries were almost always rejected or referred. Due to the nature of the COGA overtures as cleaning up the BOO and bringing clarity, this makes sense. But I got the sense that the deck was stacked in the favor of the COGA. They had several full-time resource with us all day, and that lent itself to more persuasion. So the cynic in me wants to believe that this is just a dog and pony show.

However, my impression is that many overtures from presbyteries are akin to advocating for a cow to bark. The nature of cows is to moo, not bark. And the nature of the General Assembly is to do certain things, and not other things. So that is why many of the overtures from Presbyteries, as good as they are as ideas, simply will not fly. That's the positive spin on it. We simply have to understand better how the GA works in order to reform it. It is like someone who wants to instruct me about how better to prepare for preaching. I have been doing this for years, and I hope am open to new ideas and new ways to prepare. But for someone who is not a preacher and has not preached to advise me on preparation for preaching seems a bit odd, and mostly I would reject the advice, with appreciation. And the COGA folks have all been gracious in their appreciation, but also firm in their opinions about why something would not work.

However, as positive a spin as this is, I cannot get away from a feeling that this is a small turf war. There seems to be an attitude of "this is our church" and "don't tell us how to run the church." It is not blatant, but I saw glimpses of it. There seems to be an attitude that the General Assembly is doing the work of the church. Well, I would disagree. It is you, dear brothers and sisters, who are doing the work of the church by teaching children, caring for the sick and the needy, praying for God's will to be done, etc.

I talked with a long-time colleague this morning, and he expects the New Form of Government (nFOG) to pass. This would be a mild to severe upset, as no one really expected this to pass this time around. However, the new moderator was on that committee, and according to my friend, Gale, who has been sitting in on that committee, many of the criticisms that have been leveled against the nFOG have been addressed in the committee. We shall see.

If I had to guess, the Middle East Study Report will be approved, with some revisions. I believe the Report on Christian Marriage and Civil Unions will pass as well, which does not change anyone's definition of anything as far as I can tell. And I think the ordination standards will remain the same, though it would not surprise me a bit if G-6.0106b is overturned. However, for that to happen, I believe it would have to be sent to the presbyteries for another vote. We've only been discussing this since 1978 in San Diego, so why not?

 I will try to blog as things progress this afternoon and evening. The power of the church is not at the national level. The power of thc church comes from God's people, filled with the Spirit, empowered to do God's work in the world. Overtures and debates are necessary, I suppose. But they are a poor substitute for the fruit of the Spirit.

Thanks for your continued prayers for Heather and me, and all the commissioners here in Minneapolis. Oh, the people from the San Gabriel Presbytery will be meeting for dinner tonight, so if there are issues to report from that gathering, I will pass those on as well. Thank you, dear APC family, for your support.