The Presbyterian Church U.S.A. will form a committee to draft a new confession of faith that addresses not only ancient Christian beliefs but also contemporary concerns, such as racism and "sexual identity."
Drafted by an Arkansas minister and supported by the Presbytery of Arkansas, the proposal was adopted this month by a vote of 352-44 during the denomination's 225th General Assembly.
The goal is to craft something worthy of inclusion in the church's Book of Confessions, joining a dozen other statements of faith, including the Nicene Creed, the Apostles' Creed, the Westminster Confession of Faith and the Shorter and Longer Catechisms.
If approved, it would be the first confession to be written and adopted by the denomination since the 1983 merger of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America and the United Presbyterian Church of North America.
Matt Bussell, the 37-year-old pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Jonesboro, wrote the new resolution, known as an "overture," that received backing from General Assembly delegates, known as "commissioners." See: tinyurl.com/bdd95c78.
The Arkansas Presbytery had approved the overture in October 2019, but its consideration by the national church was delayed two years because of covid-19 restrictions.
Bussell predicts it will take another decade or more to write the confession and obtain final approval.
'CRAZY, LONG PROCESS'
"It's a crazy long process," he said in an interview with the Democrat-Gazette.
First a committee must be formed; the deadline for that is Dec. 31, 2024.
Next a draft confession must be prepared.
"Once it is written, [another] General Assembly will receive it and create another committee to edit it. And then, two years later ... the next General Assembly will receive those revisions and they'll vote on it. And if it's approved, it will go to the presbyteries, the [170] regional bodies of the church. ... I think two-thirds of them would have to approve of it," Bussell said.
"After they all approve it, then a final General Assembly would have to give their sign-off on it as well," he said.
The Presbyterian Church U.S.A., once one of the largest Protestant denominations in the United States, has seen its membership and attendance fall sharply in recent years.
It reported active membership of 1,193,513 as of Dec. 31, less than half of the membership it claimed two decades ago.
In 2014, the Presbyterian body adopted the Confession of Belhar, an apartheid-era statement adopted in the 1980s by the Dutch Reformed Mission Church in South Africa.
While that document "offers a powerful call for justice rooted in our relationship to Jesus Christ, it does not provide a clear answer to the more basic question of what it means to be human in the 21st century," Bussell stated in a written rationale that accompanied his proposal.
'RACE, GENDER, COMMUNITY'
The new confession would explore traditional theological topics, such as sin, while also addressing "the very real contemporary theological topics such as race, gender, community, and technology. It should incorporate a theological anthropology that leads to the development of an interconnected ethics in topics such as love, justice, sexual identity, equality, immigrant status, ecology, and reconciliation," it stated.
The Confession of Belhar talks about racism, but not "in the American context" and it fails to discuss "how the church is called to address racism and our role in creating the systems of racism in our country," Bussell told the Democrat-Gazette.
The existing confessions also fail to address "LGBTQIA+ inclusion," he said.
"Our old doctrines have defined marriage as between a man and a woman. Ten years ago, the denomination chose to be more inclusive," he said. "It's important for our church standards to reflect the beliefs and practices of the church itself."
Bussell, a lifelong Presbyterian and a Michigan native, has an academic as well as a spiritual interest in the creeds. His doctoral dissertation at Claremont Graduate University was titled "Still Reforming: The Need for a New Confession in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)."
In the document, he credited former Arkansas Presbytery Stated Clerk Leslie Belden with helping him understand the process for bringing an overture to the General Assembly. (As "Stated Clerk," she was the presbytery's official record keeper and parliamentarian.)
In an interview, Belden portrayed Bussell's arguments as persuasive.
'MADE SO MUCH SENSE'
"It was really hard to not be supportive when he came up with the idea because it made so much sense when he talked about it," she said. "I think he's an exceptionally deep thinker."
Jeff Price, pastor of Trinity Presbyterian Church in Little Rock and a General Assembly commissioner, voted to form the committee, noting that it addresses racism as well as the LGBT community.
"[This is] the moment in history when we need to speak to these things in a way we haven't in the past," he said.
Passage of this type of overture isn't unprecedented, but it's rare, he said.
"We don't make these kinds of changes very often," he said. "We go years without that. Decades."
Bussell, who was ordained in Pittsburgh in 2016, has been pastor at First Presbyterian in Jonesboro since September 2018.
"It's a purple church. We've got progressives [and] we've got conservatives in the church," he said.
Congregants share a commitment to serving the poor, he noted.
"We do a lot of food ministry. There's a lot of food insecurity in Jonesboro, so we collect food every Sunday at worship that goes to a local food pantry. During the school year, we do a backpack program that provides food for kids to take home on the weekends when they don't have meals provided by the schools," he said.
The congregation is also looking for ways to better serve the homeless.
"We're looking at trying to make a difference in our community," Bussell said.
First Presbyterian Church in Little Rock, organized in 1828, calls itself the “oldest serving” Presbyterian Church USA congregation west of the Mississippi River. The denomination’s General Assembly has voted to form a committee to draft a new confession (statement of faith). (Arkansas Democrat-Gazette/Frank E. Lockwood)