Responses

Layman responds to statement by Moderator and Stated Clerk

The Layman has responded to the letter from the Moderator and the Stated Clerk by posting supportive words from Bob Davis, executive director of the Presbyterian Forum, a conservative organization that works closely with the Lay Committee.

Davis asserts that the General Assembly leaders are mistaken in their criticisms of the Layman's charges, and charges that the leaders are trying "to isolate and alienate The Layman" from other conservative groups. He bases this partly on the fact that Moderator Jack Rogers acknowledged to the recent Denver gathering of evangelicals that there may be many supporters of the confessing church movement who are not supportive of the "apostasy" charges, and who do not appear intent on splitting the church.

Interestingly, the Layman's headline states: "Forum leader says moderator, stated clerk were out of line." Well, yes - Davis does use those words in his statement, but he uses them to summarize what Rogers and Kirkpatrick were saying about the Layman, and not to describe the actions of the two GA leaders themselves.

The rest you can read for yourself.

A visitor comments on Bob Davis' defense of the Layman

We received this note from Jonathan Justice, who describes himself as "a long time MLP activist and gardener, now at home again in Indiana." [8-15-01]

Goodness! Whyever would sensible people conspire to isolate The Lay Committee? How hard would they have to work to beat the Lay Committee's 24 Members, 6 Emerti, and 4 Staffers at something which they have managed to do so well for themselves?

As I have suggested elsewhere, the Lay Committee's grasp of polity is problematical. Having skated along for years on wishful thinking about being in charge, their writers have now done a Napoleon routine and crowned themselves Ecclesiastical Authority. Unfortunately, they have neglected to conquer Italy, or much else. Mr. Bonaparte had both the general excuse of having survived the excesses of the French Revolution and sufficient clout to make it stick for a while.

The Lay Committee seems to suppose that the money that Mr. Pew's Foundation pumps into its budget constitutes a reasonable substitute. (Yes, Mr. Bonaparte did publish a highly partisan 'newspaper' too.) I do suppose that "discovering" and pimping a leadership-oriented Presbyterian version of the Confessing Church movements will keep the money flowing for a while, but we would all do well to remember just how close his little Conquest of Egypt came to killing off Mr. Bonaparte.

I can certainly believe that the Stated Clerk and the Moderator would know what they are talking about, since they are, after all, the chief elected national officers of our church. When they suggest that the professional scofflaws at the Lay Committee would do well to address matters of the life of the our church with a certain judicious moderation, it does not strain my credulity much at all. Unfortunately, neither does the Lay Committee's B-movie performance of Righteous Fury as Generals Pique and Obfuscation.

We should all remember that whatever the outcomes of the initiatives arising from the 213^th General Assembly and the broader PresbyRight's responses to them, the Lay Committee will continue to find noxious tangents to run off on. That is its job.

Jonathan Justice

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