This conversation heated up on Voices again. These are a few thoughts for today.
1. There were a number of possible paths that the Study committee could have taken. They choose to give guidelines to outline the implied limits of what the current 1973 report allows. The committee did so with elegance and legal precision. As I’ve said before the report has a haunted quality at points of wishing the CRC would “move the line” but that was beyond its mandate. If the Report is accepted the result will be legal clarification. Now the specific behavioral limits on councils and clergy are implied. If the report is passed they will be explicit. There is comfort, resolution and danger in overly specific clarification and the report knows this. In a number of areas they propose local options and local discretion.
It is important to watch the RCA in this debate. They for a long time have allowed congregations to allow gay couples into membership. Even many conservative churches and pastors would say “I don’t police the private sex lives of our members.” This is a sort of “don’t ask, don’t tell” that is common in many churches and it covers straight and LGBTQ individuals. They seem, however, to hold office bearers to a different standard.
It was interesting in reading the Wikipedia post on Abraham Kuyper how some of these subtle differences between the CRC and the RCA go back into that history.
The RCA it appears is heading towards a showdown on this issue centering around the “council” that will meet this Spring. It may result in whole classes leaving the RCA. If that showdown does not occur there are indications that there may be a quiet, de facto split by conservative congregations and especially Asian, African-American and Hispanic congregations leaving. Unless the “council” can arrive at some new word or way it seems this is what is coming for them. Continue reading →
