Task force authorized to bar observers from its discussions By John H. Adams The Layman Online Thursday, May 29, 2003 215th General Assembly Denver, Colo. May 24-31, 2003 General Assembly news index DENVER – The Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity and Purity – a panel created to help the denomination discover how to find its way out of its theological thickets – has been authorized to conduct some of its discussions without Presbyterians being privy to what its members are saying. The 215th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) voted 276-219 on Wednesday afternoon to exempt the task force from its open-meetings policy. No other denominational task force or governing body has such an exemption. "I'm frightened … I'm frightened … I'm scared to death," Marge Carpenter, moderator of the 207th General Assembly and the denomination's news officer for 17 years, warned commissioners before the vote. "When we get through beating down the press, maybe someone will tell our preachers what they can preach." Carpenter gave an impassioned plea for commissioners to vote against the proposal, which came to the floor of the General Assembly after it was approved 30-20 by the General Assembly Committee on Theological Issues and Institutions. But another moderator, Jack Rogers of the 213th General Assembly, was just as insistent that the task force needed to do some of its work without observers. "This group is still preparing materials on what are the most sensitive and volatile issues in our denomination," said Rogers, who, with two other former moderators, appointed the 20-member task force. "When they have settled opinions, they can bring them forth in a way that they can be scrutinized," he added. Rogers seemed to be interpreting the exemption more liberally than what it actually says. It does not permit the task force to make decisions behind closed doors. This is what the commissioners approved: "The General Assembly Theological Task Force on Peace, Unity, and Purity of the PC(USA) shall be exempt from this open meeting policy in order to go into closed session solely for the purpose of exchanging views on sensitive theological issues in cases where it is determined by two-third's vote of the members of the task force present in a duly called and constituted meeting." The exemption request came to the General Assembly through an overture from the Presbytery of San Gabriel in California. It was not proposed by the task force, but some of its members, including co-moderator Gary Demarest, supported it. And, from the outset, some task members have complained about reporters covering their deliberations, saying they have not felt free to share their own theological reflections. For almost two years, the task force members have shunned any theological debate and focused, instead, on trying to ensure harmony. But the issues they are assigned – Christology, ordination standards, Biblical authority, and divvying up power among competing interests in the PCUSA – have been searing public disputes. And the task force's attempts to help the denomination find a way out of those disputes should be a public process as well, Carpenter said. "Once the camel gets into this tent, we will have so many task forces that will talk about sensitive things. I can already see the next task force that will want to be closed – the one on baptismal materials they will use in [ cases of ]child abuse." Only a few moments before the debate on the open-meetings exemption, the commissioners had approved a commissioner's resolution calling on the Office of Theology and Worship to prepare such materials. But the Rev. Mary Lynn Tobin disagreed. She talked about a group she meets with regularly to study the Bible and discuss ideas. "We're able to speak honestly, sometimes brutally to each other" because they maintain confidentiality. Furthermore, by closing the door to observers, Tobin added, the task force might "stir the winds of the Holy Spirit." The PCUSA's open-meetings law does not apply to Presbyterians who meet in private studies and who have not been assigned the task of addressing public foment in the denomination. Other comments during the floor debate: John Sterrett, the Presbytery of Shenandoah: "I think you, and all of us, are trying to bring peace to this denomination. It seems to me that any closed session is working against this." Danny Massey, the Presbytery of Charleston: "Both the process and the outcome [of the task force] were to be exemplary to the church … We're in the business of bringing down walls." Harold Kurtz of the Presbytery of the Cascades, a former missionary to Ethiopia: "I lived a good part of my life under repressive regimes. Denying information is a form of censorship. Denial of the press is a form of denial of freedom. Not allowing us to be a part of it is a way of denying the information we need for making proper decisions." Amy Summers-Minette of the Presbytery of the New Covenant: "When people need to reveal parts of themselves, they don't have to feel that their soul-bearing will be in the press the next day. I don't think we have a right to know the souls of these people." Karen Beshears of the Presbytery of Great Rivers, a former reporter: "I commend both the Theological Task Force for its work and the church for having an open-meetings act. But when you say, 'special theological issues,' who's going to say what that is?" The Rev. Stephen Mickey of the Presbytery of Long Island: "I remember that our U.S. Constitution came out of a closed meeting, our own Brief Statement of Faith. This committee … needs protection." (Carpenter rebutted Mickey's argument with a history lesson: The Founding Fathers also proposed the First Amendment and Bill of Rights to ensure the public's right to know what was happening.) Elizabeth Hall of the Presbytery of Newton: "Freedom of the press is the freedom of the press to print anything it wants. It's not always freedom of access." Hall said the fact that the task force could not close its doors to observers without a two-thirds vote was more restraining than the simple majority necessary for the full General Assembly to go into a closed meeting. Even so, the General Assembly and other PCUSA-sponsored groups are permitted to bar observers only for consideration of property negotiations, personnel matters, civil and criminal litigation and security.

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