219^th General Assembly
2010

Committee 3: General Assembly Procedures

An introductory look at some issues coming to this committee

[6-10-10]

Click on any Item number to jump to the full text on the PC-BIZ website.

This committee deals with some of the mundane but vital matters of how the Assembly is conducted. A couple of critical matters will be discussed here which are of special concern to those who are committed to helping our church become more just and more inclusive.

Committee 03 will deal with proposals that would in one way or another simply have us stop talking about making our policies relating to ordination and marriage more inclusive to Presbyterians who are lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. Item 03-07, from the Presbytery of New Harmony, would require that any “amendment to the Constitution that proposes substantially the same action as that which was approved by one of the two previous sessions of the General Assembly” and then was not approved by the presbyteries, may not be considered by an Assembly unless 75% of the commissioners vote to accept it as an item for business.

Item 03-17, from the Presbytery of Foothills, might accomplish the same thing – delay of any change – by having the PC(USA) hold a legislative General Assembly only once every six years, and having an “Annual General Convocation Meeting” with no legislative action in the other years.

We believe these overtures are thinly disguised efforts to prevent Assemblies from regularly reconsidering justice issues. Movements for social justice take time, and hearts are changed as each Assembly wrestles with important issues of the day. Passage of these overtures would bind the Spirit of God from moving in the work of each Assembly.

Item 03-19, from the Presbytery of Santa Barbara, seems to call for the creation of a GA “morals squad,” to require that all Presbyterian organizations and events held at an Assembly or in relation to any other PC(USA) event must be evaluated before they occur and afterwards, to insure that they are “conducted in a manner that honor the constitutional standards of the church.” This is proposed in reaction to the celebration of a wedding during the More Light Presbyterians’ dinner at the 2008 General Assembly – a celebration and affirmation of the marriage of two gay men. Click here to read our report of that celebration.

Not only would this overture be unenforceable; it seeks to regulate affinity groups in the church that are not required to subscribe to constitutional standards that they deem unjust.
 

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