Overtures Committee Says No to Study Committee on Women's Roles
By a vote of 40 to 34 (with two abstentions) the Overtures Committee rejected Overtures 5 and 10 to the 37th General Assembly this afternoon. Both overtures asked that a study committee be formed to consider women’s roles in PCA churches.
According to the overtures, “the PCA has struggled with the question of how women in the local church are to exercise their God-given gifts within the framework of the Book of Church Order (BCO).” The overtures also state that “many PCA churches are uncertain about how to use appropriately God’s gifts among the many capable women within the membership of those churches” and that “in many PCA churches those gifts are under-utilized.”
Earlier this year, Susquehanna Valley Presbytery (Pennsylvania) and James River Presbytery (Virginia) both overtured the Assembly “to authorize the moderator to appoint a study committee representing the diversity of opinion within the PCA to study and report to the 38th General Assembly.” The overtures were later amended to require the committee to make its report into the form of a pastoral letter. That letter would have addressed four questions:
(1) What sorts of roles may women fill in the life of the church?
(2) What are some models of local church practices that have developed as ways of employing the gifts of women in the lives of their congregations that might be exemplary and encouraging to other local churches?
(3) What elements of organization and accountability to ordained leadership can be commended to PCA churches that are consistent with the BCO?
(4) Does our BCO unnecessarily hinder achieving the best utilization of the gifts of PCA women in light of the teaching of Scripture?
The debate over these overtures was long and impassioned. Ruling elder David Snoke of Pittsburgh Presbytery, appealed to commissioners, saying that churches are confused, that women’s roles is an issue, and that in the absence of pastoral advice it’s an issue that will be resolved by discipline.
Greg Thompson of Trinity Presbyterian Church in Charlottesville, Va., noted that the PCA has a diversity of practice, a diversity of perspectives, and therefore a lack of clarity. These are precisely the conditions, Thompson stated, for which a pastoral letter is intended.
David Coffin spoke for many in the majority, saying that in his opinion, it is implausible that [the PCA] is struggling with the use of women’s gifts. “There’s a plethora of material on this issue,” Coffin said. Fred Kuhl of the Potomac Presbytery agreed, saying that the overtures’ arguments were unpersuasive. And David Jarstfer from Westminster Presbytery (Tennessee and Virginia) added, “As elders we’ve got to shepherd our people. … Let’s be elders. Let’s do the work.”
Coffin later added that “we’ve heard speech after speech insisting there’s not clarity or unity.” But the means proposed, he argued, would not provide the desired ends. The study committee/pastoral letter, “will not provide unity. It will not settle or clarify the subject. People who had different views before will have different views after. This may make matters worse.”
Today’s recommendation of the Overtures Committee will be reported to the General Assembly later this week, and commissioners will vote on whether or not to accept it. A minority report may be presented to the Assembly as well, according to commissioner E.J. Nusbaum.
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Donna
Jackson, MS