Cutting through the FOG
Many Presby-types may recently have gotten a missive in the mail from the Form of Government Task Force, which was charged by the 217th General Assembly with the considerable task of re-writing and restructuring our somewhat convoluted constitution. Well, they’ve completed their draft re-write of the Form of Government, which is now available for all to peruse on the PC(USA) website.
Part of the hope expressed in that letter was that through an intentional modification of the governing documents of our denomination, we’d be able to free congregations to more vigorously express the Gospel. Without pitching in my two cents, I’d be interested in hearing the perspectives of Presbymergent types on this effort.
Will it liberate congregations to assume new and more dynamic forms and help us oldliners find a culturally relevant voice again?
Comment by Shawn Coons on 22 October 2007:
I printed out the revisions and was all set to give it a look, but I just couldn’t bring myself to spend the time on it. I’m a polity geek, or at least thought I was. I think that the revisions, as they have been represented, sound like a good idea, but I question whether this really matters.
What is the real outcome that is hoped from this? How is this supposed to affect the daily ministry of the church?
Comment by Mark on 22 October 2007:
Like Shawn, I downloaded the revisions but found other things to be priority, so I haven’t read them yet.
I was at a meeting recently where a 25+ year veteran of COM was talking about the pros and cons of the FOG rewrite of what is currently called Chapter 14. He and the EP had an interesting take on what was left out. It seems that some of what we find in the current Chapter 14 was written back in as solutions to problems that arose after the 1983 Reunion — the same solutions that were written out of the FOG so that the 1983 Reunion would be more appealing!
That begs the question (for me, at least), is the lack of dynamism in the PCUSA due to a cumbersome FOG or a cumbersome people? Put differently, have the people grown stale while the FOG remains fresh?
Comment by Mark on 22 October 2007:
I thought of an example to illuminate my last post. At a recent presbytery meeting I witnessed the sacrifice…I mean, examination…of two inquirers for candidacy. The FOG outlines a very pastoral, nurturing process leading to ordination. The reality in our presbyteries leaves something to be desired. We seem to enjoy making life a living hell for those we want to make into future leaders of the church.
We can change the FOG all we want, but will is reflect a true change of mind, heart, and spirit in the PCUSA? I think our current FOG is adequate and relevant. I think our implementation of the FOG stinks. I’m afriad that if we overhaul the FOG without overhauling our spirituality, it’ll just be the same old same old.
Comment by ryan pappan on 22 October 2007:
I am in line with Mark. We can change, update, modify, or overhaul all of the polity and it will not matter if we do not change from within.
We are a church desperately in need of a ragamuffins soul. We need to focus less on decency and order and more on relationships and love.
Our mission needs to change. We must serve with vulnerability, compassion, abandon, and prayer. The times have a changed. We need to recognize the changing paradigms of minster/pastor/community/church. We ought to prayerfully consider dying to the almighty Presby god of polity before relationship.
It is my conviction that the only breathing we shall do is upon shedding the apparatus of law (polity) and freely swimming in the ocean of relationship that are deep, penetrating, transforming, and sacrificial.
We must cease the what have you done for me lately . Then move to how may I serve you today.
Comment by David Williams on 23 October 2007:
I read through large portions of it, and while I understand the genuinely well-meaning desire underneath such changes, I don’t think they ultimately change a thing. Polity can be helpful, but I agree that it doesn’t get to the relational heart of the matter. I fear I’ve yet to outgrow that almost anarchistic yearning for a church where the polity is there but functionally invisible, and…though I love it dearly…the Presbyterian church doesn’t do so well at that.
Polity tends to consume us, and comes to so define the way we understand ourselves that we become like that guy at the party who wants to tell you all about the details of how he arranged the financing of his new Harley. It might be a sweet bike, but the joy of the wind in his face and the rumbling torque are lost in the soulcrushing tedium of his story. We have to stop being that guy.
Comment by Drew Ludwig on 23 October 2007:
It’s not all that tough to not be that guy. I mean, when I go to Presbytery, than I have to deal with that stuff? But in the congregation? Hardly. We can make our polity work in the background if we choose.
Comment by Drew Ludwig on 23 October 2007:
Whoops. That first “?” should have been a “.”
Comment by David Williams on 23 October 2007:
Drew: Unless that was a bit of Freudian punctuation…
Your point is well taken. The congregation that ran worship like a Presbytery meeting wouldn’t last long.
I’m thinking less of the activity within our “particular congregations,” and more of 1) how we relate to one another across congregational boundaries and 2) how we use our representative bodies to express ourselves collectively to the outside world. Presbytery has the potential to be so much more than just the place we go to “deal with that [stuff].” It is *church,* dagnabbit.