Coalition plans no Gathering in '04 The Layman Online Thursday, October 9, 2003 PORTLAND, Ore. – Despite more than 250 people filling Sunset Presbyterian Church for Gathering VIII this week, leaders of the Presbyterian Coalition have announced that no Gathering is planned for 2004. The Rev. Jerry Andrews, pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Glen Ellyn, Ill., who will become co-moderator of the Coalition in January, told the audience that planned meetings began in Chicago in 1996 and continued in Dallas in 1997. Elder Nancy Cross of San Antonio will be the other co-moderator. The thrust of those meetings, as explained on the Web site of the Coalition, "brought many people together to work for the passage of high and clear ordination standards regarding sexuality (Amendment B), and to expose the challenge to those standards (Amendment A). Through worship, fellowship, prayer, workshops on theology and polity, a larger network of like-minded Presbyterians developed at these Gatherings who sought and were committed to the renewal of the whole Church." Gathering III, held in Dallas in 1998, "adopted Union in Christ – A Declaration for the Church, a theological statement which defines the foundations of the Coalition's work." Now, Andrews said, the next planned meeting will be held in 2005 unless a major development occurs in the denomination. "Then we'll probably have a 'ya-all come' meeting," he said. The Coalition describes itself as being "born out of concern for the Church which struggled to witness to historic and Biblical leadership standards and out of hope that the Lord of the Church would work his will through the people and polity of this Church." In response, the Presbyterian Coalition "has gathered individuals, churches, organizations and their leadership into a loosely defined, open, and active movement sharing the conviction that the words of Scripture, interpreted by the Confessions of the Church, reveal the will of God." "The matters of sexuality and ordination, most commonly presented as the question of ordaining practicing homosexuals to the offices of the church, prompted the early participants to coalesce in order to bear witness together to Biblical and Confessional standards on this issue. Soon, this issue was seen to be related to other ones for which we share similar concerns and convictions about our common life in the PCUSA." The Coalition played a major role in 2001-2002 on the vote surrounding Amendment 01-A, which sought to rescind the "fidelity/chastity" clause in the denomination's constitution. The Coalition produced a video that stated the case for retaining the ordination standard and coordinated an informational campaign along those lines. In the third vote on the issue, the presbyteries – by a 3-1 margin – voted to retain the standards.

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