The Agnostic Court

Lisa Large is a self described lesbian. She presented herself to a presbytery in Minnesota (then relocated to CA) as someone who is sexually oriented toward physical and emotional relationships with women. This is a fact that is not in dispute by any of the parties in the Remedial Case recently rule on by a Synod level Presbyterian Church court. A synod consists of a number of presbyteries. A remedial case is one that considers the correctness of an action of the session, presbytery, or synod. In this case the disputed action happened in the Presbytery of San Francisco. That presbytery voted to approve the ordination of Ms Large to the office what is now called Teaching Elder - formerly Minister of Word and Sacrament. During her exam she stated that she departs with the confessional and constitutional standards of the Presbyterian Church (USA) regarding its teaching on homosexual behavior as sinful. She asked that this departure be allowed. It was.

Persons from that presbytery filed a remedial complaint with the Presbyterian court called the Synod’s Permanent Judicial Commission. There were thirteen specification of error listed in the original complaint, eleven of that number were ruled moot by the General Assembly Permanent Judicial Commission on the basis of the recent change in our Church’s Constitution. Two were considered beyond the scope of that court’s purview or authority. The reason was that those two specifics turned on the interpretation of bible and the confessions. The highest court sent it to the next court below it to, in essence, retry it.

Here is how the relevant specific complaint reads; “The SPJC erred by not correcting the doctrinal error and abuse of discretion exercised by the Presbytery of San Francisco in this ordination decision.

The reason the synod level court voted to not sustain the complaint was that after hearing testimony from four biblical scholars and one church historian they found that two scholars believed that the bible does not condemn homosexuality and three argued that it does. So the court said that this cannot be an essential tenet of the Reformed (Presbyterian) Faith since there is no agreement among these Presbyterian scholars. This is the same reasoning of the United States Supreme Court used to approve a woman’s right to have an abortion. Since, the best minds in several related fields could not agree on when life began and, thereby, when a fetus becomes a citizen then neither could the Justices of the court.

The rationale of the Synod Court, if followed consistently, would mean that unless an ethical, doctrinal or procedural tenet is agreed upon by every Presbyterian Scholars that tenet is non-essential to the Christian faith or the Reformed branch of that Religion. If it is not essential, then a minister can declare it as an allowed departure from the Confessions and/or the Book of Order. Since there is no agreement on any doctrinal or ethical question among Presbyterian scholars then no doctrine is sacred and always right in every circumstance.

The court listened to two opposite interpretations of Scripture and Christian tradition, then came to the conclusion these two set of scholars differ. Rather than saying this interpretation is correct and this one incorrect, they dodge the question entirely. There declared the question itself to be one of indifference, that is, adiaphora. It is on the same level as the question of prayer posture. In prayer it is a matter of indifference if one stand, sits, bows or prostrates one’s self.

Agnosticism once again wins. The answer to every challenge to a theological assertion is “who knows, maybe it is true, maybe it is false.” Since we can’t decide, then we will permit every statement as true, even when they directly contradict each other. A questions are simply a matter of personal preference.

I say this with confidence because I sat in on a General Assembly committee charged to entertain a request from a presbytery that the General Assembly list a certain set of very cardinal statements to be essential and necessary to the Christian faith. The General Assembly as much as said, “We have essential and necessary tenets but we don’t know what they are.”