PCA

, , , , , , , , , , ,

When covering women's ordination news, don't ignore the Protestant little guys  

, , , , , , , , , , ,
When covering women's ordination news, don't ignore the Protestant little guys  

One of 2023’s major religion-news events was the decision by the Southern Baptist Convention, by far America’s largest Protestant denomination, to expel two congregations and to exclude any others that ordain women to be “any kind of pastor,” thus barring assistants, educators, chaplains and ordained missionaries as well as lead pastors.

The 2000 rewrite of the SBC’s crucial Baptist Faith and Message document had stated somewhat ambiguously that “the office of pastor is limited to men.” Debate continues to swirl on a new constitutional amendment, which needs second and final approval at next June’s meeting.

That’s a big story. Journalists tend to ignore smaller denominations that also provide news potential on these issues along the following lines.

Many conservative evangelicals are “egalitarians” who favor women clergy and lay office-holders, but an interesting example on the opposite “complementarian” side is the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA),  based in Lawrenceville, Georgia. As it happened, the PCA General Assembly was discussing the role of women in ministry during meetings in Memphis the same week as the Baptists’ New Orleans showdown.

The PCA is a story in and of itself.

This denomination began in 1973 as 41,000 southern Presbyterians broke from a more liberal “mainline” church and then managed notable northern outreach. While the SBC slowly shrinks, as of this year’s 50th anniversary the PCA boasted nearly 400,000 members in 2,000 congregations, 600 career missionaries, annual proceeds exceeding $1 billion and a new church opening on average every two weeks. The career and then death of its well-known New York City Pastor Timothy Keller earned MSM coverage.

From the beginning, the PCA has opposed female clergy. Its Book of Church Order states regarding clergy, lay elders, and lay deacons that “in accord with Scripture, these offices are open to men only.” But there’s continual agitation. Some prominent PCA congregations formally “commission” female deaconesses or deacon “assistants” (.pdf here) who help the fully “ordained” deacons.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

This post really isn't about Mark Galli: Why reporters should know basics about Christian flocks

, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Back in the early 1980s, I worked at The Charlotte Observer during an interesting time in Presbyterian history. I am referring to the final crossing of the “t”s and the dotting of the “i”s that completed the union of the northern United Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. and the southern Presbyterian Church in the United States to create the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), one of the “Seven Sisters” of liberal Protestantism.

At that time, Charlotte was a rare Southern city — in that there were as many, or more, Presbyterians than there were Southern Baptists. Thus, a “Presbyterian” merger was big news.

Ah, but trying to write about this story in a mainstream newspaper was a nightmare, due to the complexity of Presbyterianism in that region. You start with the churches that merged, the UPC and the PCUS. Then you add the PCUSA. For starters, do you also know the differences between the PCUSA, the ARPC (Associate Reformed Presbyterian), the CPC (Cumberland Presbyterian), the PCA (Presbyterian Church in America), the OPC (Orthodox Presbyterian) and the EPC (Evangelical Presbyterian Church)?

You couldn’t cover Charlotte back then without being able to handle this doctrinal alphabet soup.

This brings me to Mark Galli and the firestorm about his Christianity Today editorial (GetReligion “big idea” post here) asking for Donald Trump to be removed from the White House. At the moment, some journalists are acting like CT is part of the Religious Right, while Trump-ites are saying it’s now on the religious left. All of this, of course, is linked to confusion about how to define That Word — “evangelicalism.”

As you would expect, Galli — who is retiring as CT editor — has been in a hot spotlight.

So who is this guy? The Los Angeles Times offered a short profile (yes, the original headline called Galli an “evangelist” editor) that included this:

Galli was born in San Francisco and grew up in Santa Cruz — liberal hotspots and somewhat unlikely cities in which to develop strong evangelical influences. And yet Galli has spent much of his career at Christianity Today, which Billy Graham founded in the 1950s.

“When I was a teenager ... my mother had a conversion experience actually watching Billy Graham on TV,” Galli said.

During a difficult emotional time, Galli’s mother got on her knees in their home, in front of the the television, and accepted Jesus Christ, he said. A few months later, on Dec. 19, 1965 — 54 years, to the day, before Galli published this editorial — he too accepted Christ during an altar call. …

Like those evangelicals who support Trump, Galli shares their anti-abortion stance and support for religious freedom. But he said he doesn’t understand why Trump’s supporters seem to dig in their heels when defending what he considers the president’s immoral behavior. 

This sounds like a rather ordinary, West Coast version of an “evangelical” biography — but one that contains zero specific information about the editor’s denominational or theological background.


Please respect our Commenting Policy
, , , , , , ,

Weaponized Calvinism? Accused shooter said his salvation was assured, no matter what

, , , , , , ,

At this point, I think reporters have no choice but to dig into the Calvinist themes in the manifesto published by John Earnest, the accused shooter at Chabad of Poway.

It’s crucial to find out, of course, what he learned during his many hours in the pews at Escondido Orthodox Presbyterian Church. It would appear that Earnest then blended pieces of Calvinist theology into the white supremacist beliefs that he says that he learned elsewhere.

Here is the key question at this point, as I see it: Was there an online website (a specific writer, even) that twisted Calvinist doctrines into the form that Earnest blended into a radicalized, violent white nationalism that embraced some things that he heard at church, while rejecting others?

Let’s take this one step at a time, starting with the following, from my first GetReligion post on this subject:

Yes, reporters … need to note that Earnest said, in that same manifesto, that he didn’t soak up this twisted version of Christianity while frequenting church pews with his family. His hateful, deadly heresies grew out of a private, secret life online, listening to true radicals. Church members tried to talk to him, but he turned away.

Nevertheless, there is no question that reporters will have to deal with two clashing versions of Christianity when covering this story — that white supremacist brand proclaimed in this digital testimony and the Orthodox Presbyterian — uppercase “O” is part of the name — faith taught in his family’s congregation. In this case, the accused gunman did everything that he could to put the word “Christian” into play.

This brings us to two Washington Post stories that can — by savvy readers — be read together. They cover two parts of the same equation.

Here’s the headline on the first one I’d like readers to study: “Ancient hatreds, modern methods: How social media and political division feed attacks on sacred spaces.” And here is the overture, which covers the crucial ground:

Inspired by the devastating impact of the 9/11 terrorist attacks and enabled by the largely unchecked freedoms of social media, individual extremists have launched a steady series of assaults on religious institutions around the world, the latest at a California synagogue. …


Please respect our Commenting Policy