by Pastor Dan Baumgartner

You can’t say I didn’t warn you!

In the June Briefs, I wrote a long article about issues facing the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). I mentioned that when our national governing body (General Assembly) met in Birmingham, AL on June 15-22, there could be some wild decision-making along with some inaccurate reporting in the news media. Sure enough, both happened.

The most publicized issue was the approval of the Peace, Purity and Unity (PUP) report, which was four years in the works. The report tried to find a way to move the denomination out of an impasse over the issue of sexuality.

As a quick review, for the last 30 years our denomination (and most others) has argued about sexuality, in a number of ways. Usually it has revolved around the question of homosexual behavior. The essential question has been: Is homosexuality a gift from God to be celebrated, or brokenness and sin that needs healing and forgiveness?

In recent years, the conversation has centered on ordination…who can be ordained to leadership in the Presbyterian Church?

For the last ten years, our constitution (Book of Order) has had an extremely specific paragraph in it which says that sexual intimacy is intended for a marriage relationship only between a man and a woman. Folks choosing to live in other ways are welcomed into community, but not invited into leadership. Bethany has affirmed a similar position for many years.
In June, the General Assembly approved the Peace, Unity and Purity (PUP) report. It was a strange decision. By approving the report, the Book of Order will actually not change in any way. However, local presbyteries and churches will now have the right to interpret that extremely specific paragraph in the Book of Order however they choose. “Local option” allows for 11,000 different viewpoints. That gets pretty confusing, and it will get more confusing.

Nothing about General Assembly’s action does anything to change our Leadership Statement or practice at Bethany. It remains to be seen what will happen in other places. But it makes me sad that in a culture as totally confused about sexuality as ours, we have simply muddled things even more rather than speak any kind of clear message.

The other major item in the news from General Assembly was a task force report on the Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is the way, of course, in which the church has read and heard scripture describing God for nearly 2,000 years.

The report offers not a replacement but additional possibilities (with Biblical references) for Trinitarian language, like “Rock, Redeemer, Friend” or “Mother, Child, Womb.”

That report was merely “received,” which means the church can read it or study it. It changes nothing. We won’t be changing the words of the Bible, the Apostles Creed or the name into which we baptize people.

General Assembly did other work as well, but these are the issues you probably saw in the news. If you’d like more information about our Presbyterian family, feel free to contact me. In the meantime, we’ll try to keep our eyes on Jesus Christ and His mission in this world.