"Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment"...have y'all read this???

[Stephen Baldwin]

came across this paper, "Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment", from the Office of Theology & Worship:

http://www.pcusa.org/re-formingministry/papers/rebuilding.pdf

will rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment of the 50's grow our church deep and wide? the author thinks so. i anticipate our community here may disagree. thoughts on the paper?

[Kimberly Henderson]

How much longer will we continue trying to preserve Christendom? This paper seems to me to be an example of the church failing to rightly interpret its context: Christendom is over, and the national structure of the denomination is never going to have the authority it thinks it once had. Weston certainly does have some ideas which would benefit the church: actual parity of ministers and elders, smaller presbyteries, smaller (or non-existent) synods. But the very term “Presbyterian Establishment” connotes a desire to preserve the institution for the institution’s own sake. Do any of the suggestions in “Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment” really help the church adapt to its context in the mission field of post-Christendom North America? Are there better ways to renovate the PC(USA) than by re-roofing a building whose walls are crumbling? Money Affiliate Program

[Barry Ensign-George]

Kimberly,

I'm not sure how to read your note. I got lost somewhere between "Weston certainly does have some ideas which would benefit the church . . ." and "Do any of the suggestions in "Rebuilding . . ." really help the church adapt to its context . . .?" (it seems to clear to me that your answer is a decisive "no").

What ideas do you have for "better ways"? Perhaps a discussion of such ideas would be a good way to move the conversation forward?

Barry

[Skip Dunford]

I read the paper. Credit where credit is due: Dr Weston has got us talking- grousing and grumbling included!- about "Topic A" in the church. He also makes some important points: about Synods; about the need for identifying leadership (could it be that the "tall steeple" Sr Pastor is the only one who has the time these days to study the functions and organizational intricacies of the denomination?); about the need for a creedal foundation (but Westminster? It pronounces usury as a sin. We have just been informed that our economy runs on usury, and nearly everyone has usurious instruments in his or her billfold.!) and i do agree with is suggestion about returning to smaller presbyteries. But my question would be, do they need to be set up geographically?

With all due respect (Dr Weston is well-informed, well-published, and a dedicated servant of our Lord and his church; and might I add, on faculty at my Alma Mater!) but I wonder how this message would preach to other establishment organizations who are suffering the same plight as our beloved denomination. How would this advice and counsel go over with the "big 3" automakers? Or maybe returning to a previous establishment model is the remedy for the failing newspaper industry. And just now I heard a report on NPR about the plight of the network TV industry. Do they need to return to the organizational model that has brought them precisely to the point where they are today?

My point is that there is a major shift taking place among established structures, mainline denominations included. What once served them well no longer works. Do we fall into the fallacy of trying harder to do the same things to make it work? Or do we pursue a different path?

If a return to a previous establishment is in order, perhaps we should refer to the church establishment manual- a.k.a. the B-I-B-L-E. I have been reading with wonder George Barna and Frank Viola's book "Pagan Christianity: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices." It's amazing to learn how much of what we do today has no foundation in Scripture. Acts and Paul's letters cover the period of history when the gospel exploded from a few scared disciples in a locked room in a backwater province of the Empire to be preached right under the very nose of the Emperor in Rome, and all within one generation! Maybe we should mine that literature to see what it was that made the church grow in "spirit and in numbers." Somewhere it begins to come to light that it was people sharing with family and friends something they had found meaningful in their lives.

Following Dr Weston's advice would take us down the road to being the "Church restored and always being restored." In other words, nowhere fast. What we need is to discern what God is doing in this latest round of the Church reformed and alwsy being reformed" and get on board with that. It seems to me that God is reforming the church around a righteous remnant who remember what our Lord Jesus came to say: "Love one another as I have loved you." Perhaps a bit of shrinkage is just exactly what God thinks we need right now.

But then, what do I know?- I'm just a small-town journeyman Pastor.

[Deborah Fair]

50's style of meeting the needs of our community will not work today nor fill our pews.

[Bobbie Giltz McGarey]

I only had time to skim the paper but read page 18+ about Big steeple pastors having proven themselves as leaders. Really?
Because I know some people dedicated to small membership churches that have even more wisdom than some of the ones in the bigger pulpits. I have some doubts they understand the PCUSA as it is today with smaller membership congregations and their 'insights' would be from a whole different ethos.

[Trabajar en Internet]

Two days ago, I opened an envelope from Louisville to find a copy of a new occasional paper from the Office of Theology and Worship: William Weston’s Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment. I cringed. Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment? So I began to read, and my fears were confirmed. “It is time to rebuild the church’s Establishment,” he writes. “Decency and order require it.” (p.12)

Weston’s thesis is this: The anti-establishment attitude of the 1960s is what led to the decline of the denomination. Our preoccupation with political correctness (“a straightjacket for the church” p.12) has removed from power the “tall-steeple” pastors who should rightly lead the denomination, and thus contributed to the PC(USA)’s lack of influence and authority in society. The solutions: remove representation rules, “abolish all the current advisory delegate categories”, and reinstate the core of tall-steeple pastors who lead the Presbyterian Establishment.

How much longer will we continue trying to preserve Christendom? This paper seems to me to be an example of the church failing to rightly interpret its context: Christendom is over, and the national structure of the denomination is never going to have the authority it thinks it once had. Weston certainly does have some ideas which would benefit the church: actual parity of ministers and elders, smaller presbyteries, smaller (or non-existent) synods. But the very term “Presbyterian Establishment” connotes a desire to preserve the institution for the institution’s own sake. Do any of the suggestions in “Rebuilding the Presbyterian Establishment” really help the church adapt to its context in the mission field of post-Christendom North America? Are there better ways to renovate the PC(USA) than by re-roofing a building whose walls are crumbling? Online Business

[Rebeca henderson]

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=18244292338 Credito

[Charles Kennedy]

How about switching the issue from demographics and church politics to growth? Those people who lead should be those persons who have actually lead a congregation in growth. Growth defined by persons baptized (transfers by church letter should not count as growth) and growth spiritually by the members of the congregations led.

Have the members in the congregation become more active in ministry?

Have the members in the congregation begun serving the poor, the powerless and the lost more effectively and more often than prior to the pastor's service to that congregation?

Do the members of the congregation display the spiritual aspects of a true disciple of Christ: humble, loving, giving, active in service to the church and the surrounding community?

If a church is not baptizing new members then I find it hard to believe that the pastor is doing more than moving people around and managing what is in place.