 Kirkpatrick praises first biennial assembly as providing 'major benefits to the church' By Craig M. Kibler The Layman Online Saturday, June 17, 2006
The Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick, in presenting an informational overview of the Office of the General Assembly to the Committee on General Assembly Procedures on Friday morning, said that the switch from annual to biennial assemblies will save the denomination "$2 million every other year." He also said that the new format "broke an annual cycle of assemblies adopting overtures on ordination, sexuality and other issues. Frankly, it's given us a little space to build community" throughout the denomination. After his presentation, the committee, which had closed its meeting for the first hour for what was termed a "group-building exercise," voted to recommend to the full General Assembly overtures regarding notes of encouragement to churches and an alternate method of record maintenance. The first overture (093) from the Presbytery of Trinity, recommended by a 33-13-0 vote, involved providing commissioners to the 217th General Assembly with the opportunity to write "brief notes of affirmation and encouragement to churches of their choice." Resource people said that the envelopes and paper already were assembled and on site and, if approved by commissioners, they would be made available. The idea is that a commissioner could take the paper and envelope to their room, write a note, and then return the envelope to staff for mailing. Steve Grace, moderator of the Committee on the General Assembly and an elder from Lake Huron Presbyterian in Michigan, said that the overture is an "invitation for us as a General Assembly to be in communication with the writing of notes of a connectional nature at this very special time in the life of our church." Asked about the costs, Assistant Stated Clerk Loyda Aja said that a "volunteer offering of $3" is contemplated that will cover the stamp and the cost of the paper and envelopes. The second overture (038) from the Presbytery of San Gabriel, recommended by a 46-1-0 vote, concerned the "maintenance and reporting for session membership rolls and registers." Rev. Jim Connor of Arcadia Presbyterian Church, the overture advocate, said that across the denomination, "How we keep church records is a little arcane, what with the manual insertion of names, multiple names, manually deleted names" and similar time-consuming manual actions. He said that many churches have "computerized records, but still are required to keep these manual records." He urged that a study to develop a process for offering alternative means of record keeping be undertaken and a report be brought back to the next General Assembly. "This is an alternate means of reporting, not a replacement," he said. |
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