A “Meeting of Understanding,” was held in Atlanta Tuesday, January 17. Some 50 PCA pastors as well as coordinators and presidents of the PCA’s permanent committees and agencies attended. Roy Taylor, stated clerk of the PCA’s General Assembly, in collaboration with other denominational leaders, called the meeting.

“One of the themes of the 2010 PCA Strategic Plan was the necessity for civil conversation,” Taylor said. There’s stress within the denomination, he continued, and there are arguments and rhetoric that may be more divisive than unifying. As stated clerk, Taylor noted that he serves the whole of the denomination. Given the tension within the PCA, he and others believed some civil conversation was needed.

The meeting had two specific goals: “To discuss charitably and forthrightly the causes for conflicts in the PCA that hamper our ministry and unity.” And to discuss solutions to those conflicts. The meeting was conducted under Chatham House Rules, meaning that “participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor affiliation of the speaker(s), nor that of any other participant may be revealed.”

Three of the participants—older men who had been in the denomination for many years – believed the PCA is healthy, that elders were generally united, that our system of government works well and as intended, and that the denomination is less politicized today than it was 10 or 15 years ago.

And while nearly all agreed that more unites the denomination than divides it, many saw deep rifts and simmering tensions.

Civility and Theological Precision

The PCA has set the bar too low, one man said. I’ve seen [ordination candidates] eaten alive at presbytery because they didn’t give the exact right answer; because their response to certain questions weren’t precise enough. Is that what we’re after, he wondered. Is that kind of precision—that level of exactness—a healthy goal?

In this man’s view such strictness leads to idolatry. The proper goal, he stressed—rather than that level of precision—should be love. If the goal isn’t love we don’t have a vehicle for patience and we get scared. If our goal is precision, he told the group, then our goal is too low.

A teaching elder who had come into the PCA from another Reformed denomination, agreed. We exploit some of the vulnerabilities in our [presbytery] system, he believed.

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