NNPCW closes Leadership Event to press and observers By Paula R. Kincaid The Layman Online Wednesday, August 4, 1999 The National Network of Presbyterian College Women, in disregard of the 1997 General Assembly's open meeting policy, has notified the press that it will not be allowed to cover most of the Network's five-day Leadership Event. The restricted press coverage - only two and one-half hours of a five-day event, Aug. 4-8 - also runs contrary to the probationary status of the Network established by the 1999 General Assembly, which calls for more accountability and theological oversight. The press is even prohibited from covering worship services. Two days before the National Network of Presbyterian College Women's 1999 Leadership Event, organizers sent a document labeled "Open Meeting Policy" to reporters, closing almost all of the five-day event. The NNPCW's policy specifically violates the PCUSA Open Meeting Policy, approved by the 1997 General Assembly, which states that subjects dealt with in a closed meeting "must be limited to property negotiation, personnel, civil and criminal litigation or security." It also violates the provision that meetings must be closed "by a majority vote of the members present." Laurie Johnson, a reporter for Voices of Orthodox Women received an initial event packet on July 30. She received a revised open meetings policy on August 2, which began, "Please note: This policy replaces any previous statements regarding the open meeting policy for the 1999 NNPCW Leadership Event: July 30, 1999." Ruling by Stated Clerk Mark Tammen, manager of polity guidance training for the Office of the General Assembly, said he attended a meeting with Stated Clerk Clifton Kirkpatrick, NNPCW intern Gusti Newquist and Women's Ministries Program Area Associate Director Barbara Dua in which Kirkpatrick said the same policy that governed the Unity and Diversity Conference earlier this year would be applicable to the NNPCW event. The Unity and Diversity open meetings policy would apply to plenary meetings where any kind of business would be transacted, but small group sharing would not be subject to the policy if the particular group decided against it. The NNPCW policy, though, goes beyond the Unity and Diversity policy in stating "All activities beyond the 8:45 - 10:00 sessions on Thursday and Friday mornings are times in which the learning experience is specifically oriented to the personal and spiritual growth of the individual participants and are closed to non-members under the terms of the Open Meeting Policy." It also requires prior approval by the NNPCW Planning Team of all interviews with student participants and facilitators. Tammen said he was not sure if Kirkpatrick, who is on vacation until Aug. 16, had seen the final version of the NNPCW policy. Multiple open meetings policies "How many open meeting policies shall our denomination have?" asked Terry Schlossberg, executive director of Presbyterians Pro-Life. "General Assembly adopted a truly open meeting policy in 1997. What the NNPCW has done is to flaunt that policy with its own closed meeting policy. The General Assembly's policy applies, it says, to 'the General Assembly; the General Assembly Council, its Ministries Divisions and Mission Support Services, and [to] the entities and work groups related to them....' The NNPCW is an entity of the National Ministries Division. Presbyterians will naturally want to know what the NNPCW is hiding behind its closed doors," she said. Schlossberg, who has attended meetings of General Assembly entities for more than ten years, continued, "I have found that the only General Assembly entities that write their own press policies to try to exclude press have been those who wish to promote an agenda that defies the constitutional stance of our church. Of course they do not want to be observed doing that. No one should mistake this policy as excluding the press alone. It excludes every Presbyterian whose tithes and offerings support this program. The policy keeps us all from seeing what happens at the NNPCW leadership event." Clear violation of PCUSA policy "The policy proposed by the Network clearly violates the Open Meeting Policy adopted by the 1997 General Assembly. It also violates the principles of accountability and supervision the 1999 Assembly required as a condition for continuing to fund the NNPCW," said Parker T. Williamson, executive editor of The Presbyterian Layman. He continued, "When NNPCW created a website that was a gateway to hardcore pornography, its supporters said that happened because of lack of oversight. When [former GA moderator] Douglas Oldenburg admitted that some of NNPCW's materials were 'inconsistent with the policies andtheology of the church,' supporters said that what was needed was more money and more accountability. Now that the Assembly has continued the organization and doubled its budget, less than three hours of a five-day meeting will be open to observers. That's not the kind of oversight and accountability most Presbyterians are expecting." Trust has been broken Sylvia Dooling of Voices of Orthodox Women agreed. "When trust has been broken, you need to shine the light on everyone." At this particular time in the life of the NNPCW, said Dooling, "it is very bad policy to close out the very people who are concerned with it. … GA commissioners were assured that the NNPCW was going to be overseen." The NNPCW is under the direction of the Women's Ministries Program Area (WMPA) of the National Ministries Division. "This impacts for me the whole WMPA and the review that is coming up," Dooling said. NNPCW and WMPA under scrutiny The NNPCW was briefly shut down by the 1998 General Assembly because commissioners concluded that its resources espoused ReImagining God theology, same-gender sex, pre-marital sex and defiance of the "fidelity/chastity" clause in the PCUSA constitution. Nonetheless, convinced by the 1998 GA Moderator Douglas Oldenburg, other members of the task force and members of the 1999 Assembly's Mission Coordination Committee that the Network has cleaned up its act, the 1999 Assembly voted 344-178-16 to continue PCUSA sponsorship of the campus organization. Commissioners also voted to direct the Women's Ministry Program Area and representatives of the Evangelism, Justice and Partnership subcommittees of the National Ministries Division to conduct annual reviews of the NNPCW. The General Assembly then referred to the General Assembly Council a Commissioner's Resolution calling for the formation of "a fact-finding committee" to look into concerns and questions raised about the denomination's Women's Ministries Program Area. Specific concerns include: The Women of Faith Awards given by the WMPA to lesbians Jane Spahr and Letty Russell; the failure of WMPA to provide proper supervision of the National Network of Presbyterian College Women and the promotion of positions "contrary to our church's biblical and constitutional standards" at the triennial Churchwide Gathering of Presbyterian Women. Related stories NNPCW Leadership Event agenda NNPCW: No stranger to controversy

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