Summary of General Assembly Action on Marriage

The following summary was put together by the General Assembly Mission Agency staff:

Summary of General Assembly Action on Marriage

The 221st General Assembly took two actions regarding marriage:

1. The first was an Authoritative Interpretation allowing pastoral discretion to conduct
same-gender marriages in states where such marriages are legal. This went into effect
immediately on conclusion of the General Assembly.
     o The action that passed by a vote of 371 to 238.
     o Teaching elders are empowered to use their discretion in performing marriage
ceremonies, including civil unions permitted by the law and have the
responsibility to assess the readiness of a couple to be married.
     o This action expressly does not require that congregations, sessions, or teaching
elders perform civil unions or same-gender marriages. Congregations and their
sessions still have the right to decide what happens in their facilities.

2. The second was a recommendation to change language in the Book of Order to indicate
that “marriage involves a unique commitment between two people, traditionally a man
and a woman.”
     o The Book of Order change requires the approval of a majority of presbyteries
within the next year.
     o The action that passed by a vote of 429 to 175.

Both decisions came with much discussion and prayer on the part of the General Assembly
commissioners.

We continue to be in dialogue, both in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and among our
international partners. We will not end relations with a mission partner because of differing
opinions and pray that those who may disagree with this action will remain in relationship to
continue the work of the church.

Tips on Talking to the Media

Wendy Bailey, our Regional Presbyter, has posted some excellent advice on speaking to reporters. Experience has shown that, as the General Assembly makes some of its more controversial decisions, pastors may find themselves contacted by newspaper reporters and other media people, to get their views on the issue.

Publicity is good for local churches, and most pastors I know are more than happy to get the names of their church in the news. In this situation, however, it's important to be precise and thoughtful in replying to questions. Off-the-cuff responses can be easily misinterpreted or taken out of context.

So, it's a good thing to think in advance about what to say. Wendy's best piece of advice, in fact, may be that it's OK to ask the reporter to call back a few minutes later, to buy yourself a little time to formulate a response or scribble out a few rough talking-points for yourself. (Don't wait too long, though, because the reporter probably has a deadline looming.)

Please remember, too, that Wendy and I are more than willing to talk to reporters, if you want to refer them to us. You may also want to suggest that they talk to one of the Presbytery's commissioners to General Assembly. Monmouth's commissioners this year are the the Rev. Doug Chase, Brick; the Rev. Barbara Hicks, Lakewood Hope; Beverly Marsh, East Brunswick; Jim McGuire, Point Pleasant; and Young Adult Advisory Delegate Peter Stelljes, Yardville.

Now, here's Wendy's advice:

As we prepare for General Assembly, it is not unreasonable to expect that commissioners or pastors or presbytery leaders will be called upon to interpret the actions of the Assembly or explain what’s going on.  We will do our best to keep everyone informed of the many happenings of the assembly here on this blog … but I thought it might be a good time to share some tips I’ve put together for dealing with reporters and the media.

There are many times in which leaders in congregations and pastors will be called by the media for comment or information. Whether it’s a crisis or disaster in your congregation or community, an opinion on local politics or social issue, or a decision of the national or regional church, there are tips to make the interview more effective.

1. KNOW THE RIGHT PERSON

Depending on the issue, you may or may not be the best person to speak to the reporter. If your congregation is dealing with a crisis or emergency it is a good idea to identify one person who can answer questions and interview with the media. If you are not that person, it is appropriate to say something like, “I understand you have a lot of questions, the best person to speak to is …” and then give them the name and contact information for that person.

2. PREPARE

If you are the right person to speak, but you are not prepared to talk to the reporter when they call, it’s appropriate to say something like, “I will be happy to talk to you, this is not the best time, I will call you back.” You will also want to ask the scope of the story and ask yourself if there’s anything else you need to know from them in order to prepare. Find out, too, when the deadline is, so that you can reply in a timely manner. Then gather your thoughts, facts and information before calling back.

3. CALL BACK QUICKLY

Reporters are all working on very quick deadlines. Be sure you get back to them as soon as you can. If you miss their deadline, or they move on to someone else, the story will be told without you. If you get back to them right away, even to explain what is keeping you from giving the interview right away, you will be establishing a good rapport with the reporter which will help you in this story and the longer term relationship.

4. TALKING POINTS

Prepare the message you want to get across and make a list of talking points. Remember that although the reporter is gathering a story, you are the one who is telling it. Tell it the way you want it reported.

5. KEEP IT SIMPLE

Think of the words you want to use to explain the issue or situation, but keep your points simple and concise. Remember that electronic media are looking for sound bites … seconds, not minutes, and newspaper reporters and bloggers are looking for quotes. Give them to them. Make their job easy. Most reporters are writing for a large and diverse audience, so this is not the time to use “church-ease” “presbyterian-speak” or show off your post graduate vocabulary

6. LISTEN CAREFULLY

Be sure that you understand the question that you’re being asked and be sure to answer that question. The question may help to suggest ways to focus or phrase your response.

7. TELL THE TRUTH

This sounds like it shouldn’t need to be said, but if there’s bad news or a bad situation, it’s ok to acknowledge that. Be direct and authentic about the situation and how you feel about it

8. BE READY TO EXPLAIN

Most reporters, even those focusing on religion, have no idea how churches operate, let alone the Presbyterian Church. Be prepared to explain even the most basic ideas to them, respecting their competency in the process.

9. DON’T ARGUE

Again, this shouldn’t need to be articulated, but it may be that the natural response is to say something snarky or argue with the reporter. Don’t do this. Always remain respectful.

10. BE PROACTIVE

If there is a story brewing that you know you will be called on, don’t hesitate to make the first step by creating a press release or calling your local reporter. This gives you the ability to shape the story. You can even suggest headlines that better capture the mood and ideas that you think are important about the story. The more work you do for the reporter the more likely the story will run as you would like.

Live Internet streaming of the General Assembly

Live streaming of the 221st General Assembly, meeting in Detroit, Michigan from Saturday, June 14 through Saturday, June 21, is available online on the PCUSA website.

A pdf version of the summary of the General Assembly schedule can be found here.

Only plenary sessions (meetings of the whole General Assembly) will be streamed. That means the only streaming on Sunday, June 15 will be from 2:30-4:30 pm, and there will be no live streaming at all on Monday or Tuesday, June 16-17, because that's when the General Assembly committees will be meeting.

Most observers have found that the most interesting time to watch live streaming is on Saturday evening (June 14), when the new moderator will be elected, and, later, on Wednesday evening (June 18) and all day Thursday and Friday (June 19-20).

It's not clear at this time when the various committees will be reporting. although this information will be available later in the week on PC-Biz. (Search for "docket" under the Explorer tab, or search for the Bills & Overtures Committee report (which recommends docket amendments).

In past years, the most controversial items have been scheduled for Friday afternoon and evening. If there are more than 2 or 3 controversial items, one of them may be scheduled for Thursday as well.

A Hole in the Roof

Anyone who's been watching this blog has undoubtedly noticed there's been a long gap with no new posts. My last post was in October, 2013, just days before I ended up in the hospital with a pulmonary embolism in each lung. Various complications ensued, which led to several hospitalizations and a rehab stay of well over than a month, all told. Then, I had a lengthy period of recuperation at home, during which I was on disability. I returned to my church and presbytery duties a few weeks before Easter.

It's been a whirlwind since then, catching up. My breathing still isn't back to 100%, but I continue to progress.

I thought I'd restart this blog with a couple of photos that have a story behind them.

The first one you'll see is an exterior shot of the Morning Star Presbyterian Church in Bayville. I've been involved with that church since its inception in the 1990s, supporting and encouraging the Rev. Myrlene Hamilton Hess and her late husband and co-pastor, the Rev. Ed Hamilton, as they went about the challenging work of church-planting.

I was honored when they asked me to preach at the congregation's chartering service, as Morning Star officially became a congregation. I preached a sermon called "A Hole in the Roof," in which I told the story of a church that kept an opening at the apex of their dome, as a symbol of the importance of staying open to new things the Holy Spirit may be doing in their midst.

I didn't think too much about that sermon until several years later, when I again attended a worship service at Morning Star for the dedication of their building. I was astonished when Myrlene told me the church had a cupola because of my sermon!

She explained how the concept of a hole in the roof had been an enduring theme in their congregational life. When it came time to design the building, they told the architect they wanted to keep a hole in the roof somehow. His suggestion was a cupola, providing borrowed natural light while still keeping the rain out.

The second photo is an interior shot of the church sanctuary, looking up towards the cupola.

I told Myrlene I'd seen all sorts of things happen as the result of sermons I've preached, but never before have I had a sermon result in architecture!

It was all very gratifying. We preachers don't often know much about how our sermons impact our listeners - especially Presbyterians, who can be a pretty reticent bunch at times.

How is it for the church you know best? Do you keep a hole in the roof, so you can remain open to the Lord's leading in mission?

Seek the Welfare of the City

I've just returned from the PC(USA) Fall Polity Conference, the annual national gathering of Executive Presbyters and Stated Clerks. It was a rich time.

As is the usual practice, we met in the city where the next General Assembly will take place, which happens to be Detroit. The Assembly will meet there from June 14-21, 2014.

Often, the location of the Assembly has an influence on the experience of the commissioners - and, indirectly, on the outcome. It's hard to predict what this will look like in advance, but the "feel" of the host city is something all participants experience.

This time around, the impact of the location is becoming clear well in advance. Tom Hay, a member of the national staff who is in charge of working with the Local Arrangements Committee, mentioned in a presentation a number of anxious communications he has received, questioning whether Detroit is a safe place to meet.

It's no secret that Detroit is a failed city. The municipal government has filed for bankruptcy, and there have been sensationalistic news reports about crime, rampant drug abuse, non-functioning street lights and even packs of wild dogs roaming the streets.

The location of this Assembly was established a number of years ago, before the most recent round of urban problems had become apparent.

Having seen the downtown area around the Convention Center, though, I'm very comfortable in recommending it to commissioners and visitors. While city officials may have failed to provide essential services in some neighborhoods, this part of town, near the General Motors headquarters, is clearly their showpiece, and they have made sure visitors can move around that part of the city freely and with confidence - as much as in the downtown of any other major city. The People Mover - a monorail train that runs in a loop, connecting the principal downtown locations, is especially convenient (it only runs in one direction, but the loop is fairly short). I hope they have the capacity to put additional trains on the tracks during the Assembly's "rush hours," as hundreds of commissioners and visitors travel between their hotels and the convention center.

Several presenters at the conference made reference to the famous line of Jeremiah 29:7: "But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare." With comfortable downtown hotels and a state-of-the-art convention center, the Assembly is hardly an exile experience, but the rest of the verse holds true. "Seeking the welfare of the city" is very much a part of the church's mission. If nothing else, the infusion of cash into the local economy may aid the city's recovery in some small way.

Is it too much to hope for that, as a result of the Detroit location, the 221st General Assembly will have a pronounced missional focus?

Alternative Presbyterians

I love our new Form of Government - most of it. It's lean, efficient, and places our historic principles of Presbyterian governance clearly at the foundations, building upwards from there. Because of the way we had to vote it up or down, though - as a single package - I made the decision to support it, even though I had serious reservations about one aspect. Still do.

My reservations are about the swapping of the term "minister of the Word and Sacrament" for "teaching elder." It's not a total swap: the book uses "teaching elder" throughout, but allows for "minister of the Word and Sacrament" as an alternate title (G-2.0501).

In the couple of years we've been living under our present Form of Government, I've seen us benefit from its simple, intuitive structure in more ways than I can count. I'd never go back to the unnecessary, cobbled-together complexity of the old one.

I dutifully use "teaching elder" in technical discussions about polity. When I teach Presbyterian Polity at Princeton Seminary this fall, I'll use it. But there's a part of me that winces every time I hear the term, or even say it.

It's not that "teaching elder" is without virtue. Laid alongside "ruling elder," the term highlights our central principle of the parity of ministries: in presbytery, synod and General Assembly, equal numbers of teaching elders and ruling elders call the shots. It's a vital check-and-balance that helps define who we are as Presbyterians.

Still and all, I have a feeling that the decision to change this essential terminology solved one problem, but delivered a host of new ones. "Teaching elder" arises out of just one tributary stream that makes up the mighty river of Presbyterianism. It so happened that a lot of the team who wrote the new Form of Government nostalgically recalled their days by the banks of that particular stream. They doggedly made sure the draft document didn't make it to the General Assembly without "teaching elder" becoming the term of choice.

The complexity of crafting an amendment to the draft document that would substitute dozens of occurrences of "teaching elder" for "minister" was a near-impossibility on the floor of the Assembly, and - once the Assembly had recommended it - the presbyteries were required to vote the draft up or down without amendment, so here we are.

It's part of our Constitution, now, and I'm walking with it. But I'm walking with a limp.

Outside of technical polity discussions, I still use "minister" to define who I am and what I do. Since that's the alternative term, I guess that makes me an Alternative Presbyterian.

So, after that lengthy introduction, let me share my...

Top Ten Reasons Why I Continue to Use “Minister” Rather Than “Teaching Elder”

10. Ministry is about so much more than teaching.

9. Sticking with “minister” means I can still say, simply, “elder” — which doesn't require a wonky linguistic discourse on the word "ruling" before ordinary people can understand what those leaders do (G-2.0301).

8. I’d rather celebrate how the names of two of our three orders (minister and deacon) have direct linguistic ties to biblical diakonia - "servanthood" - instead of just one.

7. I’m proud of my Scottish heritage, but not at the expense of Dutch, French, German, Czech and other Reformed traditions that make up the PC(USA) - and not even the Scots, who thought up "teaching elder," ever officially adopted it as their term of choice.

6. One word: Sacraments.

5. “Minister” doesn't muddy the waters of the World Council of Churches' historic Baptism, Eucharist and Ministry agreement the way “teaching elder” does.

4. Better to stick close to the trunk of our theological tree (John Calvin) rather than one of its several branches (Andrew Melville).*

3. I love the Presbyterian idea of parity of ministries, but there are far more important things we need to be saying to the world right now than “Check it out! We've got a really cool system of government.”

2. Other churches of the Reformed Tradition have no idea what we’re talking about.

And now, the number one reason why I continue to use “Minister” Rather Than “Teaching Elder”....

1. I’ll never see the day when someone from our local hospital calls up and says: “Can you come down here? One of our patients is dying and needs to speak with a teaching elder.”

* = Andrew Melville was the great Scottish systematizer of Presbyterian governance, but even he didn't succeed in getting the Church of Scotland to forgo "minister" in favor of "teaching elder" - it was only some of his wide-eyed true believers in the New World who did that.

The Presbytery Consolidation that Never Was

Here's something I ran across as we were cleaning out old files, as we were preparing for the move of the Presbytery Office from Tennent to New Egypt. I meant to post it earlier, but somehow never got around to it.

It's  a map of the old Synod of New Jersey, dating back to around 1959. There were 8 presbyteries in New Jersey at that time, and a special committee had been working to pare that number down to 4. The map indicates where the boundaries of these 4 new presbyteries were to go.

The special committee considered the question long and hard. They learned that the original boundary lines of many presbyteries had been drawn with railroad lines in mind. Towns along a given rail line were clustered together in the same presbytery, so commissioners could travel to presbytery meetings by train.

Even in 1959, many of those original rail lines no longer existed.  America's love affair with the automobile was in full swing. The presbytery boundaries that had once made perfect sense had come to seem random and arbitrary.

The special committee was also trying to create larger presbyteries, so resources could be concentrated and deployed more effectively.

The plan was never implemented. It came up for a vote in the Synod Assembly, but went down in flames. Never again would there to be a move to rethink presbytery boundaries in New Jersey.

There aren't so many people around today who can give first-hand accounts of the debate in the Synod Assembly. (I was only 3 or 4 years old at the time.) I do remember talking with some old-timers in more recent years, who did have firsthand recollections of the vote. They told a tale of an acrimonious debate that left many on both sides feeling bitter.

This was even more widely-known because the old Synod of New Jersey was a "non-delegated synod." When the Synod met, every minister in the state was in attendance, with a corresponding number of elder commissioners.

New Jersey now has seven presbyteries (not counting the non-geographic Eastern Korean Presbytery, which technically covers the whole Synod, but has the majority of its churches in New Jersey).

CLICK ON THIS LINK for a full-size version of the map and take a look at the shaded gray lines. They indicate the proposed new boundary lines of 1959. Today, the overall number of Presbyterians in the state is a good deal less than half of what it was when the special committee was developing its realignment plan. Increasingly, presbyteries today are strapped for funds. You'd think the idea of boundary realignment would come up again: especially since it could be a way of restoring presbyteries to roughly the same overall number of church members each one had before the membership declines of the last quarter of the twentieth century began.

It's interesting to observe the shape of what the committee was calling "Central Jersey Presbytery" (Roman numeral III on the map). Most of Monmouth Presbytery (with the exception of the Southernmost part of Ocean County and a sliver of Burlington County) would have fallen in this new presbytery. All of New Brunswick Presbytery would have, too. Today, Monmouth and New Brunswick Presbyteries are sharing a Regional Presbyter. There are no merger discussions under way, but we all know that topic could come up for discussion in the future.

Maybe the members of the Synod's special committee were ahead of their time. Would it be a good thing to dust this historic artifact off and give it a fresh look?

What do you think?