Analyst calls
PCUSA family
report 'crushing disappointment'
By John H.
Adams
The Layman
Online
Monday,
April 28, 2003
A report
titled "Living
Faithfully with Families in Transition" that will be
considered by the 215th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church
(USA) is a "crushing disappointment," says a noted evangelical
analyst.
The conclusions of Alan Wisdom of the Institute on Religion and
Democracy are published in the March-April edition of Theology
That Matters, a Presbyterian theological journal. Wisdom is
also director of Presbyterian Action for Faith and Freedom, one of the
institute's committees.
"Living Faithfully" is a sweeping proposal by the
denomination's Advisory Committee on Social Witness Policy. It calls on
the denomination to give its blessing to "diverse" types of
families – including homosexual couples and single parents who have
children out of wedlock.
Wisdom criticizes "Living Faithfully" because of its lack of
Scriptural and confessional underpinning. And he says the report is
based on a principle called "justice love" that was rejected
by the 1991 General Assembly.
Wisdom asks a series of rhetorical questions:
- "Does this proposal lead men and women into the full meaning
of life together in families? Does it draw deeply from the biblical
and confessional teachings on marriage, child-rearing, adoption,
baptism, and so forth? Does it aid Presbyterians in moral
discernment? Does it point them toward patterns of family life that
are true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, gracious, excellent, and
praiseworthy? Does it extend an effective compassion to those who
have been caught in the moral confusion of our time? Does it direct
church members toward specific actions that they can take in their
own lives, their local churches, and their communities to strengthen
their own and other families?"
His answer:
- "By these standards, the ACSWP proposal is a crushing
disappointment."
The report commends "committed" relationships – even
outside of marriage.
The PCUSA "has heard this same line of thinking before,"
Wisdom notes, citing a report to the 1991 General Assembly from its
Special Committee on Human Sexuality.
The 1991 report said, "The moral norm for Christians ought not be
marriage, but rather justice-love. Rather than inquiring whether sexual
activity is premarital, marital or postmarital, we should be asking
whether the relation is responsible, the dynamics genuinely mutual and
the loving full of joyful caring."
"This 1991 report was defeated overwhelmingly," Wisdom said. "The
Assembly adopted instead a pastoral letter that proclaimed: 'We have
reaffirmed in no uncertain terms the authority of the Scriptures of the
Old and New Testaments. We have strongly reaffirmed the sanctity of the
marriage covenant between one man and one woman to be a God-given
relationship to be honored by marital fidelity. We continue to abide by
the 1978 and 1979 positions of the Presbyterian church on
homosexuality.'"
He urged commissioners to the 215th General Assembly, which will meet on
May 24-30 in Denver, to reject the current report as well.
These are some of Wisdom's observations:
- "[A]t almost every crucial point, the proposed policy
statement refuses to make moral distinctions or offer practical
help. It does not so much deny biblical teachings as it sidesteps
them. Similarly, it ducks the clear implications of social science
research into family problems."
- After quoting from the report – "Ultimately the
structure of one's family is not as important as how we allow God's
life giving and redeeming spirit to shape and work through our
families" – Wisdom says the writers "do not seem to
allow for the possibility that God might be doing two things at
once: sending out his Spirit to penetrate even the most
dysfunctional families, and at the same time working to transform
the unrighteous 'structures' of those families."
- "Clearly, the ethical framework upon which ACSWP has built
its proposal does not come from the biblical and confessional
teachings on marriage, parenthood, and adoption. What, then, is the
framework? The recommendations give only a few glimpses. Most
revealing is the clause which 'calls upon the church to reject
principles or policies that would stigmatize any persons, and
particularly the most vulnerable persons (children, the poor, the
disabled, and so forth), based on family form.'"
- Again, quoting from the report – "Therefore, no
particular form of family that has existed in human history or that
exists today should be privileged as the Christian family form –"
Wisdom says, "The question that commissioners must ask is: Does
this promised 'acceptance' and 'support' imply the church's moral
approval of heterosexual and homosexual relations beyond the bounds
of marriage? If so, ACSWP's proposed 2003 statement harbors a
disguised attempt to undermine the longstanding teachings of the
PCUSA and the Church universal on sexual morality."
- "ACSWP apparently finds it difficult to hear the direct
divine message that Paul and the other biblical authors believed
that they had received."
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