New Frequently Asked Questions & Responses Posted
To address some of the most common questions we’re hearing, we’ve created a new FAQ page to share a rolling list of questions and responses. There is nothing inspired about our answers; they’re our best thoughts to date. Join the conversation in the Comments section. View the latest FAQs here.
5 Responses
1. While you use the language of “fellowship” and new reality, it appears to be semantics for new denomination, or a denominational split and using a formula similar to the BGC (Converge Worldwide).
2. You communicate that you would like to stay connected and stand in solidarity with those who differ on the standards of ordination, but the issue of ordination standards ais but a symptom of an increasing abdication of biblical authority. How do you expect to to stand in solidarity, much less exercise judicial discipline, with an organization that you have been in battle with for 35 years?
3. If the seminaries are the factories that produce our future leaders, from where does the fellowship expect to draw it’s ministers given that many of them teach and endorse the change of ordination standards?
4. Do you foresee a change in the ordination process?
Hi George,
Regarding your Question 3: I’m not sure from where the fellowship expects to draw its ministers overall, but I’m a seminary student who is very interested in this discussion, and very opposed to the change in the ordination standards. From talking with fellow students, I know I am not the only one, so perhaps adequate initial leadership for this movement will come from within the PC(USA) as it is, and as long as we’re in God’s will, God will see to the future leadership.
OBVIOUSLY SOMETHING MUST CHANGE IF WE ARE TO CONTINUE TO EVEN PRETEND TO FOLLOW CHRIST. MUST ASK THAT IN ALL THE CONVERSATIONS, ETC, THE CENTURY OLD CLASSIC FROM OUR “FATHERS” NOT BE OVERLOOKED BUT THAT IT BE PART OF IT ALL: THE SIX GREAT ENDS OF THE CHURCH. THAT DOES SAY WHAT ITS ALL ABOUT AND WHY WE ARE HERE.
I am thankful for those of you who met and began to put together a plan for the future because the future is now upon us. My concern is that of a small church two point parish pastor. We are beginning to study the options before us. I think we have to face the reality that schism has already occurred. The denomination has deserted its essential tenets. I has lost the signs that mark the Church Catholic. We have debated all this a long time. Those of us that are left have stayed hoping against hope but now it seems that either we recognize that the ship is going and get off before our conscience goes down too. It is time to stop talking and debating it is time for action. I am not saying we act impulsively but act we must. The congregations I serve cannot survived the loss of members over this. I can guarantee that people will leave if we are perceived to be nothing. We are forming study groups, talking with among the sessions, I will be preaching on Christ, Scripture and the call to holiness as well as the mission before us. Please, please recognize that just going on is not an option. It is only a recipe for death and the defilement of our consciences.
I am a not-current session member elder at First Presbyterian Church, El Paso, TX, and am very interested in attending the August 25-27 gathering in Minneapolis. Am I welcome to attend? I agree wholeheartedly with the premise of this meeting. I have served one term as an elder in our session and am in my third term on our board of deacons.
Comments are closed.