It’s T-Minus 10 days and counting until the beginning of the annual meeting of the synod of the CRCNA. Probably it is fair to say that anxiety is palpable in most all quarters. Some worry Synod 2023 will undo last year’s actions while others fret the opposite. No doubt there are also plenty of folks in the middle who may worry about both possibilities or just generally are concerned what may be left of the CRCNA when it’s all over. Like many of you reading this, I have heard all of these sentiments from various people in recent weeks.
Four weeks ago in this blog I noted that there are a total of 76 overtures and that roughly two-thirds of them deal with last year’s actions on the Human Sexuality Report and the conferral of “confessional status” on an interpretive gloss on the Heidelberg Catechism’s reference to “unchastity” in Q&A 108. Of those just over 50 overtures, it’s about a 50-50 split between those asking for some kind of rollback on that decision and those building on it to seek sanctions on those congregations or classes who disagreed with the decision and who continue to seek various forms of ministry with LGBTQ+ individuals. The Neland Avenue CRC may be unilaterally disaffiliated and the entirety of Classis Grand Rapids East could be dismantled and its member congregations scattered to other classes.
Clearly those experiencing anxiety over Synod 2023 on all sides have valid reasons to feel that way. Any clear-eyed assessment of what is coming up leads to at minimum a level of uncertainty and at maximum a feeling of dread. It’s just so very obvious that on certain questions, members of the CRCNA practically all-but inhabit different universes.
Last weekend I weighed in with a comment on a Facebook post that linked to an article claiming that those who think Synod 2022 did not follow proper procedure in its confessional status decision are in error. I pointed out that mostly that article did not mention what I deem to be the top three procedural moves that may be problematic or at least worthy of some manner of scrutiny and reconsideration.
First, it can be argued that the interpretive gloss put on Q&A 108 constituted a de facto change of a Confession and if so, then proper procedure on that is to vote for the change at one synod and then ratify it at the next one. The same goes for changes in the Church Order, which is in part why for about 30 years the CRCNA went back and forth on women in church office with one synod voting to remove the word “male” from the relevant Church Order article and then the subsequent synod refusing to ratify it. Those in favor of last year’s actions claim nothing at all was changed and that the word “unchastity” had always meant everything in the adopted interpretation so there is nothing to see here.
Yet the fact that it was a change was evident last year already in that within a day or two of the decision, that newly adopted confessional status interpretation was invoked on the floor of synod to initiate discipline on various people. That sure made it feel like something was different about that part of a Confession than had been true before. Also, when Synod 2022 had a motion to put the language of that interpretation directly into the text of the Catechism by way of a footnote, the motion was (narrowly) defeated because delegates recognized that if they put into writing what they had decided, that would constitute an obvious change that would need to be ratified at Synod 2023. But if writing it out would have been a change needing subsequent ratification, how is adopting it but not writing it out not a substantive enough new part of a Confession as to need a two-year process?
Second, because the wording of and the function of the motion that made it to the floor of Synod 2022 was not how the HSR dealt with the confessional status question, it could be argued—or again it is worth examining—that this significant matter had not been before the churches for prior consideration. Thus, pausing for a year for further dialogue on the precise action Synod 2022 took could have been warranted.
Third, the original 2016 synodical mandate for the HSR study committee asked the committee to make recommendations on these confessional status questions for future synods to consider. The thinking seemed to be that this is a significant enough matter that the denomination and its synod had best not rush into it. It may be true that no synod is bound by the original mandate of any study committee but more deliberation on this (given that this had been the mandate) could have taken place and could yet take place this year.
In any event, I briefly pointed out these points on Facebook and was quickly informed I was wrong on all counts. Fair enough. We can disagree in any good dialogue or debate. But several people who responded to me as much as said that if I had agreed with the action in the first place, I would not care about the procedure that got the church there. There would be nothing to fret about proper procedures if people like me were happy with the outcome, which seems tantamount to saying that if the goal and eventual outcome are considered right, then even if rules got broken to get it done, it’s OK. That is as troubling as anything.
As it was, Synod 2022 was informed by the Church Order parliamentarian on two occasions that certain actions synod was contemplating against Neland Avenue CRC were improper and went beyond synod’s authority but the motions were passed anyway. And now this year there is an overture for Synod 2023 to take top-down action to dissolve an entire classis, which is also out of order on multiple levels and may even be illegal in that most classes, including Classis GR East, are legally incorporated entities that a synod cannot just dismantle. But will a violation of proper and due synodical procedures and the fundamentals of Reformed polity be taken into account?
One of the individuals who responded to my Facebook comment—again, which focused solely on procedures—said flat out that he and I cannot remain in the same denomination together. He persisted in this even after I mentioned I am quite traditional on my biblical views of how God created sexuality in the beginning but we may part ways in figuring out how to deal pastorally with people we know and love. But he still said that no, we just cannot both be in the same denomination anymore. Time will tell if that is indeed the sad truth of it all and the “time” for discerning that may well be nigh.
