A Treasurer's Tale, Part 1

(With apologies to Charles Dickens)

Ebenezer Droodge, church treasurer, awoke with a start from his fitful sleep. That noise – what was it?

It was nothing, he assured himself. Probably a little too much tuna casserole at the church potluck. Sure, that was it. Tuna casserole.

No, wait – he was sure he’d heard it this time.

“Over here, Ebenezer.”

“Where?”

“Over here, on your computer. Where you sit up late every night fussing with the church spreadsheets.”

Ebenezer looked, then rubbed his eyes and looked again. “Farley?”

Staring back at him from the computer monitor – which Ebenezer was sure he’d turned off before retiring for the night – was the bony visage of Jacob Farley, his late friend and partner in church work. Together, the two of them had pretty much run their church for the past 50 years. Droodge managed the accounts, and Farley buildings and grounds – until his untimely and gory death in a regrettable lawnmower accident.

If any major decision had to be made, no one in the church would imagine making it without first appealing to Droodge, Farley & Company. One skeptical word from either man could doom a new undertaking, no matter how worthwhile. Neither of them was much for smiling, but everyone on the Session knew how to look for that little softening at the corners of the mouth that indicated grudging permission to proceed.

Their small church had been through a succession of pastors in recent years, mostly new seminary graduates. Those who had been wise enough to stay on Droodge & Farley’s good side had moved on, in time, to other churches, and were doing well. As for those who had not – well, let’s just say Droodge & Farley were personally responsible for a modest increase in the ranks of insurance agents and junior-high schoolteachers.

“Ebenezer!” The shouted name startled him out of his reverie. “Enough exposition, already. Look at me!”

Ebenezer looked. The gauzy apparition of his friend was surrounded by chains. Attached to the chains were dozens of offering-envelope boxes.

“These are the chains I forged in life,” said Jacob. “It’s too late for me, but I have returned from the Great Beyond to give you fair warning. Amend your ways before it’s too late!”

“You mean, like, a budget amendment?”

“No, you fool! This has nothing to do with squeezing every last penny out of the church’s bank account. It has to do with generosity.”

“So, you’re saying I should increase my pledge?”

“It wouldn’t be a bad idea – you always were a skinflint. But that’s not why I’m here. I’ve come to warn you about something much bigger than your own personal giving. It has to do with the welfare of the entire church. Ebenezer, I have come to you tonight from beyond the grave to warn you about...”

(Here, there arose some spooky organ music, coming from Ebenezer knew not where).

“To warn you about...”

(Now, a clap of thunder so loud, Ebenezer’s seldom-opened 1985 Book of Order fell off the shelf.)

“I have come to warn you about... PER CAPITA!”

“Per capita?”

“Yes, per capita. Owooooooh!”

“You mean that annoying payment the Presbytery tries to get the Session to make every year, but which you and I always found some creative way to avoid?”

“The very same, old friend.”

“Tell me, then, why the powers-that-be in the Great Beyond are concerned with that? Isn’t it just a bothersome little tax that perpetuates a bloated church bureaucracy?”

“No, Ebenezer, that’s where we were both wrong. It’s too late for me now, but for the sake of your immortal soul, I have arranged for three visitors to appear to you tonight, to explain the finer points of the connectional nature of ecclesiastical funding.”

“You mean, like an administrative commission?”

“No, you foolish twit! You and I used to eat administrative commissions for breakfast. These visitors are far scarier. They will be shades, like myself. They have a story to tell that you will never forget. Owooooooh!”

The vision of Farley’s contorted face slowly faded from the computer monitor.

Resigned to his fate, Ebenezer muttered, “Bring it on,” before falling into a deep sleep.

***

The clock struck 1 a.m. and Ebenezer’s eyes opened wide. What dreadful wraith would he encounter next?

There was no one to be seen. His bedroom was silent. Ebenezer closed his eyes. “Blasted tuna casserole...”

“Ebenezer! You will not escape so easily.”

Ebenezer looked and saw, standing at the foot of his bed, the figure of a man in a tricorn hat, waistcoat and knee breeches.

“Nooooo!” said Ebenezer. “It couldn’t be. Don’t tell me you’ve come from the Tea Party! There is no cause for you to haunt me. I made my donation just last week.”

“I haven’t, Ebenezer. And I won't. I am the Ghost of Per Capita Past. Owooooooh!”

“Can’t you guys cool it with the wolfman howls?”

“Sorry, it’s part of our contract. My task is to explain to you why the General Assembly established per capita in the first place, and why those historic purposes are still central to the present-day offering. Take hold of this old communion token, and we’ll embark on a long journey...”

The next thing Ebenezer knew, he and the spirit were standing alongside a country road. It was unpaved, little more than a track through the woods.

“Here we are,” said the ghost. “Deep in the wilderness.”

“And where is that? Wyoming? Montana? Alaska?”

“Try central Pennsylvania. This is the early 1800s. Wait a few moments, and you will perceive the sight I have brought you here to witness.”

True to the spirit’s word, in a minute or so Ebenezer heard the approaching hoofbeats of a horse, its rider directing the beast straight towards them. Ebenezer threw himself backwards in the nick of time, landing in a thicket, feet waving wildly in the air.

Dusting himself off and recovering his dignity, he exclaimed, “That was close!”

“I should have explained. You are as a spirit in his world. He could not have seen you, nor touched you. In fact, had you not leapt backwards off the road, he would have ridden his horse straight through you.”

“So, who was he, and why did you want me to see him?”

“He is a commissioner, on his way to the General Assembly.”

“And the connection to per capita is....?”

“Oats. Per capita money bought oats for that man’s horse. The first per capita offering was established to fund the expenses of the General Assembly, paying the travel expenses of commissioners. Travel was not so easily undertaken in these early years. It took weeks for commissioners like this man to make their way to General Assembly. He is but a poor country schoolteacher, an elder in his backwoods congregation. He could never have accepted the call to serve as a commissioner, had he been forced to pay his own expenses. Were it not for per capita, only the wealthy could have participated in governance, and soon we would have had a dying church, one that in no wise understood the needs of all God’s people. Now, come with me...”

The next thing Ebenezer knew, he and the ghost were in a room full of people. He could tell from the shape of the windows that it had to be a church, although they were clearly in a parlor or meeting room of some sort.

The people – all men – were sitting around tables, with stacks of papers in front of them. From the way the furniture was arranged, the room resembled a courtroom.

It was as though the spirit could read his thoughts. “You’re right, Ebenezer. This is a courtroom. We’re in Cincinnati. The year is 1835. What’s going on here is a judicial case being heard by the Presbytery. See that man sitting over there? His name is Lyman Beecher. He’s a minister accused of heresy. Those other men attending this meeting have traveled far to hear his case.”

“What did he do?”

“Nothing you would consider out of the ordinary in your time. He had a more lively understanding of human free will than most Presbyterians of his day. He was also an abolitionist, a fact that made him no friends in some quarters. Some traditionalists who thought the doctrine of predestination excluded free will brought charges against him. He was acquitted. Lyman Beecher also happened to have a couple of soon-to-be-famous children who were growing into young adulthood at that time: Harriet Beecher Stowe, who wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and Henry Ward Beecher, who grew up to become the most famous preacher in America in his day.”

“What does that have to do with per capita?”

“Hold your horses. I’m getting to that. Imagine what would have happened to Lyman Beecher, and to his family, had the unjust charge against him been sustained. Would his daughter, Harriet, have gone on to write her famous novel – a book some say did more than anything else to marshal public opinion against slavery? Would Henry have persisted in his plans, already under way, to prepare for ministry? Yet, the heresy charge against their father was not sustained. The Presbytery sought God’s will in prayer and found him innocent. Who do you suppose paid the costs of his trial?”

“I think I’m getting the picture. It was all the churches of Cincinnati Presbytery, through their per capita offerings, right?”

“Way to go, Sherlock. Now, off to our next stop.”

The next thing they knew, Ebenezer and his ghostly companion were on a railway carriage, rumbling across the prairie. Ebenezer could see, from the trail of cinders streaming by outside the windows, that this was an old-fashioned steam locomotive.

Seated across the aisle from them was a slight, bearded man with a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. He was hard at work, writing – letters, by the looks of it.

“So, who’s this character?” asked Ebenezer.

“Sheldon Jackson. Got a college named for him in Sitka, Alaska. In the late 1800s, he founded over a hundred churches all across the Rocky Mountain region. When that part of the world got too settled for him, he headed off to Alaska. Jackson just followed the frontier, and wherever he went, churches seemed to spring up like mushrooms.”

“And the role of per capita in his case was...?

“Well, most of his activities were funded by what was then called National Missions, which wasn’t connected to per capita. The church had no problem raising voluntary gifts from Presbyterians to pay for Jackson’s highly successful mission work. Everybody wanted to say they had a hand in that! But, think on this. Somebody in the national offices had to do the necessary work of maintaining the records of all those new churches. That wasn’t as exciting a task, but it was every bit as important. There wouldn’t have been much point in starting those new congregations if we forgot where we’d put them, would there? Look at him – why, right now he’s writing a letter to somebody back at denominational headquarters, documenting his most recent work.”

“What’s next?” asked Ebenezer.

“We have one more stop to make, to view some more recent history.”

“I don’t have a good feeling about this...”

The ghost removed the tricorn hat from his head and waved it significantly. The sound of the locomotive and the click-clack of the rails became a distant memory. The next thing he knew, Ebenezer and the spirit were sitting toward the front of the balcony in a large church sanctuary. There was a hubbub of conversation, with people milling about just below them.

“I know this church!” said Ebenezer. “That’s First Pres, New Geneva, the biggest one in the Presbytery. I can’t imagine why you’d be taking me – Wait a minute! That man walking down the center aisle towards us looks... like me!”

“Indeed it is. And do you recognize the man you've just stopped beside?”

“Why yes, it’s Farley. I think the Presbytery must have been meeting here. People are milling around getting ready to leave.

“Oh, Mr. Droodge! Mr. Farley!”

“That singsong voice is a dead giveaway. I’d recognize it anywhere. That’s...”

“Alice Adams is the name, and as you may know, I’m serving on the new administrative commission that’s supposed to dialogue with churches that didn’t pay any per capita last year. Your church is without a pastor right now, but I wonder if we could get a date on the calendar for a one-hour meeting with a few significant congregational leaders, because...”

“I don’t see the need for a meeting. What do you need to tell us, Alice, that you can’t say right here?”

“Well, I suppose we could talk right now, if you prefer, but don’t you think that defeats the purpose ...?”

“Please, get on with it. Mr. Farley and I are busy men.”

“Well, if we must talk here, informally, in the center aisle of a church after a Presbytery meeting, I suppose we’d better cut to the chase. We’d like to find out what we can do for your church, at the Presbytery level, to encourage you to start remitting per capita payments...”

“Our Session has no intention of remitting any per capita this year, or any year. Last year, we were protesting the General Assembly's actions. This year, we can't afford it. Next year - who knows?”

“May I be frank, gentlemen? You heard the Finance Committee report at today’s meeting. The Presbytery’s going to have to make some severe staff cutbacks if we don’t see any increase in per capita coming from churches...”

“Let ME be frank, Ms. Adams. We think the Presbytery is in an overstaffed situation. We got by with just a Stated Clerk for most of our history, then we added an Executive Presbyter, and before we knew it, we had all those program specialists in Christian Education, Stewardship and the like. Money doesn’t grow on trees, you know. I’m being perfectly serious when I suggest we ought to let the entire Presbytery staff go – with thanks, of course – except for the part-time Stated Clerk the Constitution requires.”

“Mr. Droodge! May I remind you that some of these people have been with the Presbytery a long time? As an employer, we have a moral obligation to...”

“Are there no interim pastorates? Are there no pulpit-supply lists? If those people really know what they’re doing, they won’t be unemployed for long. And if they don't - better to decrease the surplus population on our organization chart!"

Ebenezer reached out and grasped his ghostly guide by the sleeve. "Please, spirit. I can't stand it any longer! Can't we just move on to our next destination?"

“Indeed we can. This first phase of your night's journey is nearly ended. I will convey you, now, back to your own bedchamber. But don’t expect to get any sleep. Tempus fugit. The next spirit will be on her way to you shortly.”

To be continued...

Copyright © 2010 by Carlos E. Wilton. All rights reserved, although the author gives permission for this story to be reproduced in publications of local congregations or governing bodies of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), as long as proper attribution is given and it is not used for commercial purposes.

What I Want from My Government

Lots of people are wanting things from the government these days. Some neighbors of mine in Point Pleasant Beach are wanting Borough Council meetings to convene with a unison recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, as they have for many years (a practice the ACLU is trying to stop, by means of a recent lawsuit). Speaking as the pastor of a local church, and as a seminary adjunct professor of church history, here’s what I want.

I want the Lord’s Prayer to be banned at public meetings. We’ll continue to recite it every Sunday in our church, with reverence. But, in Borough Hall? No way. Doesn’t belong there.

A couple weeks ago, I was reminded anew of why it doesn’t. I was teaching my seminary church history class about a nearly-forgotten figure from our nation’s past: a Presbyterian minister by the name of Francis Makemie.

In 1707, Lord Cornbury, Royal Governor of New York, threw Makemie into jail. His crime? “Preaching without a license.” And where had Makemie committed this heinous offense? On some street corner? Blocking pedestrians on the sidewalk, to wave religious tracts in their faces? No, it was at a worship gathering in the private home of some friends in New York City.

As the King’s agent in the Royal Colony of New York, Cornbury considered it his duty to promote the Church of England as the established, state-sanctioned religion. “Dissenters” – non-Anglicans – were permitted to gather for worship, but only as the Governor gave them leave to do so. Makemie – an energetic evangelist based in Maryland, who had established Presbyterian churches all over the Middle Atlantic colonies – had blown into town without first asking the Governor’s permission. (Makemie wasn’t forgetful; the omission was deliberate on his part.)

The problem was that Lord Cornbury was a little behind on his legal reading. He either didn’t know, or more likely didn’t care, that Parliament had approved an Act of Toleration eighteen years earlier. That law forbade discrimination against “dissenting” groups (those other than the two established state religions in the British Isles: Anglicanism in England and Presbyterianism in Scotland).

It’s a little hard for us to comprehend, but in that day the now-familiar idea of a religious denomination was brand-new. It all began with the Act of Toleration of 1689. Before then, it was winner-take-all in the religious wars. If your religious group ended up on top for a while (as Lord Cornbury’s Team Anglican did, in England), you were entitled to say to everyone else: “It’s our way or the highway.” In Scotland – which shared the same monarchs, King William and Queen Mary, with England – Makemie’s Presbyterianism prevailed. Whenever William and Mary crossed the border into Scotland, they became Presbyterians – as Queen Elizabeth still does, to this day. No British monarch had ever visited the far-off American colonies, so what spiritual transformation might take place here, in the event of a royal walkabout, was anybody’s guess.

Cornbury was attempting to establish the legal precedent that New York was an Anglican colony, and that – as the King’s agent – he was entitled to personally regulate all religious gatherings. Makemie, who argued before the court that his only license to preach came from God, had just spent 6 weeks in the slammer trying to prove otherwise.

Makemie had his day in court. He cited the Act of Toleration so convincingly that the judge – evidently a person of some considerable backbone, since the Governor was sitting right there – acquitted him.

So, what do I want from my government, three centuries later? What I want is for my government to zealously guard my First Amendment rights, and those of my church community, to practice our religion unhindered. That means – as the First Amendment unambiguously puts it – “no establishment of religion.” A moment of silence is fine, at the start of a Borough Council meeting, if that’s what people want. Yet, I would feel deeply ashamed of my community if our elected leaders were to continue to forget the principles my distinguished Presbyterian forbear, Mr. Makemie, defended for 6 weeks in a dank, New York City jail cell.

What About Session Records Review?

We've been getting some questions about when Session Records Review is going to take place.

After years of reviewing local church minutes, rolls and registers in September, the Presbytery has made a change, amending its standing rules. Because the annual reports that clerks of Session compile at the end of the calendar year mark a natural division-point, it seems better to review minutes based on a calendar year, rather than an artificial 12-month period that begins and ends mid-year, as has been true in the past.

The next Session records review will be scheduled for sometime in February or March, 2011, and will cover a period of approximately a year and four months - everything from the time of the last review in September, 2009 through December 31, 2010. This longer review period is a special, one-time occurrence, so we can catch up to where we'll need to be. In future years, Session records review will cover the calendar year, from January 1 through December 31.

A further advantage of the new arrangement is that it will create less of a time crunch, allowing clerks more than a month to get their minutes and records in order, using the end of the year as the cut-off point.

We hope this change will be agreeable to all.

Session Meetings: Open or Closed?

One question frequently asked by Clerks of Session is whether Session meetings are open or closed – in other words, whether members of the church (or even the general public) are permitted to observe the meetings.

The Form of Government is permissive on this question. It’s up to the Session to decide. G-10.0201 says, “The Session may invite members of the congregation to attend its meetings if it so desires, without restricting its right to meet in executive session whenever circumstances indicate the wisdom of doing so.”

If the Session has taken no action to open their meetings, however, the presumption is that Session meetings are closed. The Session can vote at any time to open its meetings, either by adopting a policy or standing rule to that effect, or by voting to open individual meetings to the public. In the case of a closed meeting, the Session can vote to invite particular individuals (such as a church member who’s making a report) to attend all or a portion of the meeting.

This may sound surprising to readers who are used to “sunshine laws” in civil government. The church has no sunshine law, when it comes to Session meetings.

Sessions sometimes need to discuss confidential matters, such as personnel decisions or matters related to pastoral care. These discussions, which impact the privacy rights of individuals, are best undertaken without observers present. Whether the Session prefers to conduct such confidential business in executive session (which means all observers would be asked to leave the room when that item comes up), or to follow the Form of Government’s implicit suggestion and consider all meetings to be closed, is up to the Session to determine.

Preventing Ministry Burnout

OK, clerks, this one’s for your pastor. (One little hint, though... if you do pass it on to him or her, accompany it with this disclaimer: “Don’t assume, because I’ve giving this to you, that I think you’re showing signs of burnout.” It’s a preventative thing.)

Anne Dilenschneider wrote an article in the August 12 Huffington Post, “Soul Care and the Roots of Clergy Burnout,” that’s well worth reading. She recalls a couple of articles that recently appeared in, of all places, the New York Times, one on the importance of ministerial vacations and the other on surviving through church conflict over the nature of the pastoral role. What I like best is her recalling H. Richard Niebuhr’s observation (in his landmark 1956 book, The Purpose of the Church and Its Ministry) of how ministry in the 20th century increasingly became modeled after secular business-management practices. Niebuhr wrote at mid-century, but the trends he identified back then only grew stronger in the years that followed. As churches (particularly mainline Protestant churches) moved into the new suburbs, most people came to define those spanking-new buildings as places where programs happen. Along with that, the role of the pastor gradually morphed into that of coordinator and manager of those programs. Other ministry tasks became secondary.

After decades of steadily-declining church membership, lots of pastors have given in to a kind of quiet despair, wondering if perhaps they’re personally responsible for the losses (I know I have, at times, but I got over it – especially once I realized it was happening everywhere, even across denominations). Sociologists like Robert Wuthnow, in After the Baby Boomers, have identified certain demographic trends – especially the shrinking birth rate, the postponement of the average age of marriage, and the growth of two-paycheck households – that, on their own, easily account for these numerical losses.

Way back in the 1950s, Niebuhr picked up on the trend of transforming ministry into management, and was critical of it. Calling ministry "the perplexed profession," he warned of a particular abuse of the ministerial office, based on an extreme form of this thinking: the image of the pastor as “Big Operator.” The name says it all.

Many of us who were in seminary in the 1970s and 80s were well aware of the rapid growth of clinical counseling training as a central feature of theological education. The Clinical Pastoral Education movement – valuable in itself, although some people overdid it – presented a whole, new model for pastoral ministry: that of ordained psychotherapist. Again, the introduction of clinical counseling techniques into pastoral counseling brought about some helpful improvements, but if you take it too far, you highjack the minister’s role and claim it for the world of psychology.

Then, along came spiritual direction. That emphasis was just starting to appear when I was in seminary, and has grown steadily stronger since then. Because the Roman Catholics, with their centuries-old traditions of spiritual formation, have been at it a lot longer than we have, most Protestants leading that particular charge have unabashedly borrowed ideas and practices from Rome, tweaking them here and there, when needed, to fit our theology.

Writing as a spiritual director, Dilenschneider naturally believes the solution to ministerial malaise lies in learning how to pray better. For her, this likely means signing on with a trained spiritual director like herself. There’s something to that, of course – for, who wants to go to the Big Operator or the Ordained Psychotherapist to learn how to pray?

I think she’s got something there, but – because she’s a spiritual director herself – I have to confess just a little skepticism about spiritual direction being the cure-all. She kind of reminds me of some chiropractors who are venturing out, these days, way beyond traditional spine adjustments. Some chiropractors are getting into everything from weight loss to treating kids with ADHD. (I’ve never visited a chiropractor, myself, and have no intention of ever going, but that’s what I see in some of the ads.)

While I disagree with Dilenschneider’s easy assumption that pre-1920s Protestant ministers saw themselves as “curates,” engaged in “the cure of souls” above all else (I suspect that’s a more recent import from Roman Catholicism or high-church Anglicanism), I think she’s right on with this statement:

“The witness of spiritual directors over the centuries is that the leader’s need to ‘make a difference’ – the need to find personal significance through effectiveness -- must be set aside in order to be ‘made different’ – the deeper need to discover one’s renewed identity through relationship with God.”

Whether that personal renewal happens through sitting down every couple weeks with a spiritual director, or simply by marveling at the consistent, gentle touch of the Holy Spirit through the weekly discipline of moving from text to sermon (which is more my cup of tea), she’s absolutely right – we pastors have got to allow God to continually nudge us in the direction of personal growth, if we’re going to remain in this joyous, frustrating, inspiring, draining, life-giving occupation for the long haul.

We are indeed grateful to you elders when you help us make space in our lives for the Lord to do that.

Making the Baby Suffer?

A long entry today, but I’ve been asked a complex question that will take a little while to address. It just so happens to be one of the toughest of all questions pastors and sessions must answer: What to do when non-members ask to have their child baptized?

It's an emotion-laden question that must be approached not only with understanding of polity and theology, but also with sensitivity to people.

The Directory for Worship (W-2.3014) has this to say about “parental responsibility”:

“When a child is being presented for Baptism, ordinarily the parent(s) or one(s) rightly exercising parental responsibility shall be an active member of the congregation. Those presenting children for Baptism shall promise to provide nurture and guidance within the community of faith until the child is ready to make a personal profession of faith and assume the responsibility of active church membership.”

The phone rings in the church office. At the other end of the line is an active member of the church, asking if her new granddaughter may be baptized in the church. Her son and daughter-in-law live halfway across the country. Although the son grew up in the church and was confirmed here, the session voted to remove his name from the membership roll a year or two after he graduated from college, when it became apparent he wasn’t going to be returning, and hadn’t made any move to join a church in his new community. Neither he nor his wife has since become a member of any church.

The parents are planning to bring the new baby back for a visit in several months’ time. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, Grandma asks with a proud smile, if her new grandchild could be baptized here - in this church, that has played such a large role in her family’s history?

What’s a session to do, in a situation like this? It’s their responsibility to authorize baptisms. Yet, in addressing parental responsibility, the Directory for Worship stipulates that at least one parent shall ordinarily be an active member of the church.

“Ordinarily” – that blessed Presbyterian word! It’s like sticking a push-pin into a paragraph of the Book of Order, with a little red flag flying from it that screams “LOOPHOLE!”

The book’s saying that, while at least one parent ought to be an active church member, every once in a while the session may waive this requirement if there's a good reason to do so.

Please note well the words I’ve used: “every once in a while.”

From time to time... for some very good reason... on a case-by-case basis, the session may make an exception. It does NOT say it may issue exceptions willy-nilly, to all comers.

“Ordinarily” means it’s your normal practice to do something. If you never do that thing, that means it’s not your normal practice - so, you’re not being faithful to the Constitution.

So, why is it so important that at least one parent of a child being baptized must be an active member?

Think back to the words we’ve just been discussing. The parent(s) “SHALL promise.” There’s no “ordinarily” in sight, here. And what do they promise? “ To provide nurture and guidance WITHIN THE COMMUNITY OF FAITH,” with the eventual goal that their child will “make a personal profession of faith and assume the responsibility of ACTIVE CHURCH MEMBERSHIP.”

It doesn’t mean telling your kid about Jesus in the car, on the way to the grocery store. It means joining a church, so your kid will see, over time, how important Jesus really is to you.

Baptism isn’t just about believing in Jesus (although, of course, that’s a big part of it). It’s about being and becoming a church member. Babies are baptized on the strength of their parents’ membership vows: their solemn promise to do their very best, over the coming years, to lead their children to confess Christ as Lord and Savior and become church members themselves.

Furthermore, there are promises made as part of the baptismal liturgy. Parents pledge to live the Christian faith and to teach the faith to their children. It's hard to take them seriously if they spurn the single, greatest source of help available to them in performing that task, which is the church.

There is also a promise the congregation makes, to partner with the parents in nurturing children in the faith. If the parents are strangers to the congregation and don't even live in the area, and if there's no church elsewhere on whose behalf our folks can make that promise, it's really just a lot of empty air.

A session that routinely grants requests for baptism to all comers, regardless of membership status, probably hasn't thought through the theological reasons behind this provision of the Constitution.

No doubt, it’s a tough decision to make – saying no (or, at least, “not now”) to such a request. Grandparents have a way of getting irritated at that sort of thing. They look on a grandchild’s baptism as a family milestone (which, on one level, it is). If the session says no, then “They’ve quit preachin’ and gone to meddlin’!"

And what is it the session’s meddling in? Family business.

Well, guess what? Baptism doesn’t belong to the family. It belongs to the church. The Book of Order is crystal-clear on that account.

Let’s say you carefully explain it that way, and you’re so successful, the grandparents concede the point. But then, they’re likely to come back with a plaintive cry that’s so common, it ought to be given a name: “The Grandparents’ Psalm of Lament.”

Are you ready for it? Here it comes: “Yes, I know my son hasn’t been diligent about pursuing church membership, but that’s no reason to make the baby suffer!”

Let’s unpack that. How, pray tell, is the baby going to suffer, if the baptism is postponed for a while?

The unspoken thought, of course, is that - God forbid - the child could get sick and die, without having been baptized.

We Presbyterians don’t believe baptism is instrumentally necessary for salvation – that it's a ticket that must be punched, in order to cross over into the promised land. We believe God loves all children, even (and maybe especially) those who tragically die before anybody brings them to the font.

What’s more, we Presbyterians have NEVER believed baptism is instrumentally necessary for salvation. Why, not even the Roman Catholics believe it anymore! (Back in the days before the Second Vatican Council of 1962-1965, you’d find plenty of Catholics who believed it, but no longer.)

"Well, OK," say the grandparents, "we’ll concede that point, too. Yet, won’t our granddaughter suffer from knowing she’s unbaptized?"

Not likely. If church membership means so little to the girl’s parents, it’s not likely she’ll have an inkling she’s missing out on anything.

Here’s what the session could say to the grandmother: “Don’t you want your son and his wife to become active in a church? We’ve got an excellent opportunity, right here and now, to hold their feet to the fire, so they finally do something about joining a church. We can be in touch with their new congregation and arrange to celebrate the baptism here, on their behalf. Let’s work together to apply some gentle, loving pressure so they’ll do the right thing!"

The baby’s not going to suffer from not having been baptized. She’s more likely to suffer, in the long term, from never having learned from her parents' example that Christian faith demands commitment.

Just remember: baptism’s not primarily about the family. It’s about the church.

Want to read more on this subject? Check out this detailed paper, Indiscriminate Baptism and Baptismal Integrity, by Ronald P. Byars, on the PC(USA) website.

Finding Stewardship Resources

One of the biggest challenges for church leadership is finding good Stewardship resources for worship and education – and, yes, for that annual campaign that most of us start to get really concerned about this time of year, as we move ahead with planning for the fall.

Maybe you already know, in your church, what your Stewardship campaign is going to be about, this year. If so, blessings be upon you!

Or, maybe your Stewardship thinking right now sounds more like this: “Hmmmm... What to do with Stewardship, this year? Haven’t our people – especially our longtime members – heard it all before?”

There’s a wonderful website called Stewardship Kaleidoscope. It’s an outgrowth of a national Presbyterian Stewardship conference that took place last spring. It doesn’t look like much, at first. It appears to be little more than a place to hang an announcement about next year’s conference (which will take place from February 28 through March 2 in Phoenix).

Click on the link, though, that says “Resources from 2010 Stewardship Kaleidoscope.” You’ll open the door to a wealth of resources to stimulate your thinking about how to present the joy of Christian Stewardship to your congregation.

The extensive outline of Bob Sheldon’s workshop, “Annual Campaigns That Really Work,” is especially thought-provoking.

Check out, too, the notes from M. Thomas Norwood Jr.’s workshop, “Rethinking Stewardship: New Strategies for a Changing World.” His simple pie chart, “The Stewardship Process,” contains an incredibly valuable visual lesson for church leaders: how small a piece of the stewardship pie the infamous “Asking” really is. A lot of us burn up all our energy obsessing over how to do that one thing. It’s important – but not the whole story, by any means!

Good stuff, here. Check it out!

What's your church planning this year, by way of a Stewardship campaign? How about writing a comment, below, to share your ideas?