 Covenant Network board member nominated for moderator The Layman Online Wednesday, November 27, 2002
Endorsed by National Capital Presbytery, Andrews becomes the second nominee for moderator. Former missionary Harold Kurtz earlier was endorsed by Cascades Presbytery. In a statement released by National Capital Presbytery, Andrews said: "I feel called to stand for Moderator because I love our church, because I worry about our church, and because I have great hope for our church. With a pastor's presence and a pilgrim's heart, I seek to serve the whole church with energy, intelligence, imagination and love." "We as a church, in order to be what the Book of Order calls the 'provisional demonstration of what God intends for all of humanity,' need each other in order to embody the fullness of the Gospel – liberals and conservatives, prophets and mystics, traditionalists and innovators," Andrews said. "Shaped by the promises of God, the companionship of the Living Christ, and the power of the Holy Spirit, we can together grow more fully into the Body of Christ resurrected in the world – those who love kindness, do justice, and walk humbly with our God." "As moderator, I want to energize the church for proclamation and service in the world," she said. "I believe that we Presbyterians have a message that can make a difference." 'The Great Center' Earlier this month, at their conference in Minneapolis, leaders of the Covenant Network declared their group the "great center of the church." Then they expressed dismay at the nearly 3-1 defeat they suffered in their attempt to secure ordination for persons who openly engage in sex outside of marriage. They pledged to continue their campaign, forge new alliances and focus on theology. Co-moderator Joanna Adams, co-pastor of Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago, said "The Covenant Network is committed to removal of G-6.0106b … or any other impediment to ordination." Co-moderator Eugene Bay, senior minister of Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church in Bryn Mawr, Pa., said the network would continue its commitment to dismantling the ordination standard, but he said the organization's board had decided recently that the ordination issue would no longer be its only agenda. 'Progressive theology' "We believe the denomination needs a progressive theology," Bay said. Some of that progressive theology was highlighted during the conference, including a denial of the sacrificial death of Jesus as the justifying atonement for sin. At that same conference, people were instructed that the "fidelity/chastity" ordination standard can be rendered meaningless through legal strategies without another referendum, and a pastor – describing a "holy union" he conducted for a lesbian couple – said, "I cannot see any difference between a holy union and a heterosexual wedding." Andrews was one of the speakers at the Covenant Network Commissioner Convocation Dinner at the 214th General Assembly in Columbus, Ohio – speakers who vowed that "we're in this together for as long as it takes" to remove the "big mistake" of the fidelity/chastity clause from the Book of Order. The speakers encouraged participants to work for a church "where gay and lesbian Presbyterians called and gifted for leadership in the church are elected and ordained and installed." During her opening remarks, Deborah Block told the audience to "embrace a particular vision of the church … where the hospitality of Jesus Christ is affirmed at our dining tables and our committee tables and our communion tables." 'A big mistake' Speaking of G-6.0106b, the ordination standard in the PCUSA, she said, "We're five years into a big mistake … And we're coming up on a five-year anniversary of a group of Presbyterians who, working with many others, covenanted and networked to, first, replace Paragraph B, and more recently, remove it. We have not been successful, and this spring's loss of Amendment 01-A is a loss for the Presbyterian Church. But we do not lose heart or hope that we can and will eventually remove Paragraph B and put in its place a new heart in this church we love." Block, the pastor of Immanuel Presbyterian Church in Milwaukee who served as co-moderator of the Covenant Network from 1999 to 2001, said, "Presbyterians change their mind as led by the Spirit, to new interpretations of oppressive texts and new positions on difficult issues. The Covenant Network is people like that." Andrews featured Andrews, the next speaker, "It's hard to believe how different things feel this evening than they did just 12 months ago, when Amendment A passed the Assembly with a 60 percent margin. For just a while it seemed as if the good news of the gospel had been set free – that the gracious hospitality of a just and whole church was beginning to be proclaimed afresh in this fragile world of the PCUSA." "Last year's general assembly did an absolutely astounding thing. They agreed to disagree on a non-essential of the church. They encouraged a flexible polity that neither prohibited nor required the ordination of spiritually-gifted gay and lesbian pastors. They honored our tradition's freedom of conscience. … "But it was not to be," she said. "Fear instead of faith took over. Whispers of heresy and apostasy and schism and moral decay infiltrated the heart of the church. And Amendment A was overwhelmingly defeated." Later in her speech, Andrews said, "I confess that to love Jesus means to live in faithful, monogamous covenants of love – imitating the dependability and fidelity of Christ's relationship with us. To love Jesus means to glorify God and enjoy God – God, not Jesus – because Jesus always points beyond himself to the much bigger mystery of the Lord of the universe. To love Jesus means to sit at a global, interfaith table, sharing the truth I know about God in Jesus, BUT also listening to the truth about God which comes from other voices." In a January 24, 1999, sermon, Andrews commented on the denomination's ordination standard that has been solidly affirmed by three nationwide referenda in the past five years. Andrews said: "More than anything else, I believe that the Amendment B struggle is about this balance – or lack thereof – between grace and truth. Amendment B changes the tone of our Book of Order into a more legalistic document – focusing on rules instead of values and virtues – defining sin as act rather than condition." In a June 18, 2000, sermon on the Apostles Creed, she said, "Some of you have noticed that from time to time I change the words of the Doxology … and quietly sing 'Creator, Christ and Holy Ghost' while the rest of you sing the traditional 'Father, Son, and Holy Ghost'. Now I do this for two reasons: 1. because Creator and Christ are more dynamic words in my own understanding of the faith and 2. because these alternate words are gender neutral, balancing the male language of God that permeates so much of our biblical and hymnological tradition. … I rarely think of God as mother or father – finding such images as verb, vine, light, water, bread more nourishing for my own faith journey." Defiance issues Andrews' associate at Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church, Rev. Eric Scott Winnette, was accused by Virginia lawyer Paul Rolf Jensen of violating his oath of office by publicly defying the denomination's constitution. According to Jensen's statement to the National Capital Presbytery Investigating Committee, Winnette sent a letter to the congregation that he and Andrews serves and declared that he had "come out of the closet." As a commissioner to the 213th General Assembly, Winnette declared his defiance of the PCUSA's constitutional ordination standards in a speech from the floor of the assembly. National Capital Presbytery, where Andrews was moderator in 1999 and whose General Council she chaired for two years, refused to bring Jensen's accusation against Winnette to trial. Andrews, 53, the daughter and granddaughter of Presbyterian pastors, has served in parish ministry for almost 30 years. Since 1989, she has been senior pastor at Bradley Hills; from 1985-1989, she was the solo pastor of Kitchell Memorial Presbyterian Church in East Hanover, N.J.; from 1979-1985, she served as co-pastor of Kitchell with her husband, the Rev. Simmons Gardner, who now is chaplain at Suburban Hospital in Bethesda; and from 1975-1981 she was the associate pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Allentown, Pa. She is a graduate of Wellesley College and the Harvard Divinity School, and received a Doctor of Ministry degree from McCormick Theological Seminary. In addition to her leadership in National Capital Presbytery, Andrews served as moderator of Newton Presbytery in 1983. She has been a commissioner to three general assemblies, serving as moderator of the Bills and Overtures Committee at the 207th General Assembly in Cincinnati and, from 1989-1994, chairing the Call System Task Force. She was a board member of the Presbyterian Association of Science, Technology and Faith. Andrews was named Preacher of the Year in 2000 by Lectionary Homiletics. Her sermons and essays have been published in Lectionary Homiletics, Preaching Great Texts, The Christian Century, Company of Pastors and The Christian Ministry. She and her husband have two children: Nathan, 24, and Anna, 20, both ordained elders. |
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