Standing for Unity - By Communicating Our Protest?
Last week Better Together published a template that can be used by congregations and members of the CRCNA to communicate concerns to Synod 2024. If you happened to miss it you can find the details here.
The reality though is that sometimes the idea of voicing opposition makes us uncomfortable. We often do not set out to be disagreeable people. Many of us are conflict averse. We don’t like to be argumentative. And yet, communicating a protest - in the church world - is a completely appropriate, even responsible way, for members within the CRCNA to communicate their views to Synod.
There are typically two ways a congregation can communicate with Synod. The first, and most well known, is by way of an Overture. Overtures request Synod to take a specific action. In the last few years Synod has received an overwhelming number of overtures. The second way to communicate with Synod is by submitting a Communication. While a communication does not explicitly ask Synod to take a specific action, a communication allows Synod to hear the will and concern of classes, congregations, or members.
Here are how Synod’s very own rules of procedure describe this kind of communication:
A communication is a document presenting information, ideas, thoughts, opinions, complaints, or objections for consideration of the assemblies. A communication is distinguished from an overture in that an overture proposes specific action, and a communication does not. One type of communication is a protest, which expresses a complaint or objection to a decision or course of action followed by an assembly. An assembly is not required to take any action with respect to a communication.
(Rules for Synodical Procedure 2022; pg. 9)
Obviously, this kind of communication is entirely proper and well within the appropriate bounds of communicating with Synod.
With that in mind, the next question is what exactly are we, as Better Together, encouraging? What exactly is this communication protesting? The answer to this question is likely two fold.
First, we at Better Together recognize that many congregations hold that their members who do not unreservedly agree with the decisions of Synods 2022 & 2023 are still members in good standing. Many congregations exist in the CRCNA that allow for a diversity of belief among their membership. In fact, many congregations believe that members who currently serve as officebearers and who have followed the appropriate procedures outlined in the Church Order (i.e. filing a confessional difficulty gravamen with their local church council) are in complete compliance and therefore have no need to have their beliefs challenged or “guided.” Such congregations may desire to voice their opposition to these decisions and/or their assumed implications.
Second, we at Better Together also recognize that many congregations also have found great value in the provisions in the Church Order for gravamina. A gravamen allows an officebearer to express a difficulty they may have with a theological point found within one of the confessions. This difficulty is then entrusted to the local church council who considers whether or not that particular difficulty should limit the individual’s eligibility to serve.
We see the wisdom in this localized model for considering theological difficulties as we recognize the deeply pastoral nature of such conversations. In our current system, a local church council can accept that individual’s difficulty and discern what, if any, guardrails ought to be placed around the individual’s participation and leadership. Additionally, the local church council has the right to determine if the individual’s difficulty makes them ineligible to serve as an officebearer. Finally, a local church council may decide they feel ill equipped to pass a judgment on any particular confessional difficulty and refer it to their classis for consideration.
This model for engaging confessional difficulties has served the CRCNA for multiple generations as it has allowed individuals to faithfully serve as leaders in our congregations despite having confessional difficulties. These difficulties vary and have included, but are not limited to: infant baptism, eternal security, predestination, and same-sex sex defined as unchastity.
In spite of the wisdom and pastoral nature of gravamina there is an effort at work to virtually eliminate their use within local congregations. This effort strikes us as an effort to exert a top down authoritarianism that reaches into the local church effectively dismissing individuals who have previously faithfully served as officebearers. Unfortunately, this potential example of Synodical overreach threatens to betray the trust and responsibility found in our local congregations. To us, this grab for power does not resemble the way of Jesus. It also stands in direct opposition to the historic and Reformed belief that authority originates at the local congregational level and is subsequently delegated first to classes and then to Synod. And yet even with these troubling challenges, our concern extends to the pastoral responsibilities found in a local congregation. We believe that your local congregation is best equipped, in a pastoral and confidential setting, to discern and address the confessional difficulties of your fellow church member and their subsequent eligibility to serve as a faithful officebearer.
Therefore, we as Better Together stand against this effort that, if adopted, will lead to greater division within our local congregations, classes, and the denomination. As an organization committed to calling the CRCNA to unity across disagreement, we find we must encourage the churches and members within the denomination to communicate these protests to Synod 2024.
This question remains:
Will you join us?
Will you and your church communicate your concerns to Synod?
Will you stand with us for unity?
For the Unity of the Christ’s Church,
Better Together
P.S. - Next week we’ll unpack the flexibility of this communication as it simply serves as a template that any congregation or member of the CRCNA can freely edit, adapt, and utilize. More on that later…
