The PCUSA church constitution says that church officers must “live either in fidelity with the covenant of marriage between a man and a woman, or chastity in singleness. Persons refusing to repent of any self-acknowledged practice which the confessions call sin shall not be ordained and/or installed as deacons, elders, or ministers.”
That seems pretty simple, doesn’t it? Regardless of where one stands on the issue of same-sex unions, if a person is a member of the PCUSA, and is a church officer, then they could not “marry” their same-sex partner without violating the constitution and being subject to being defrocked.
The Rev. Erwin Barron, a minister of the PCUSA, “married” his same-sex partner in California in 2008. For whatever reason for the delay, the case finally came to a conclusion this past Monday as he was acquitted of the charges of violating the church constitution.
The church panel concluded in a 3 to 3 vote, and they needed a 2/3 majority to convict. And believe it or not, they took three hours of deliberations! The claim from Barron is that it was only a civil ceremony and that in the eyes of the church he isn’t really married.
Okay, I must be dense or something, but we first have to look at Scripture, which says homosexual behavior is a sin, which immediately makes Barron ineligible for church leadership according to 1 Timothy and Titus. But we all know the PCUSA as a denomination approves of homosexual behavior, so they disagree with the Bible anyway. But their own constitution says Barron was to either be married to a woman or remain chaste. So the question is, how can he have NOT violated the church constitution.
The ruling will be appealed to the synod and then higher if necessary, but the issue should have been settled in 2008 when Barron “married” his same-sex partner. In fact, since he wasn’t practicing chastity before then, he had already violated the church constitution and should have been defrocked prior to his “marriage.”
The PCUSA is an apostate organization, seeking man’s approval rather than God’s.
I've heard that that church is basically dying, anyway. Supposedly their median age is around 60.
ReplyDeletehttp://mondaymorninginsight.com/blog/post/pcusa_membership_down_membership_down_half_since_1965/
Well, I can't see why any real Christians would be in attendance at any PCUSA assembly. No wonder they're dying.
ReplyDeleteIt's not even really that. Obviously real Christians would want to stay away. But even non-Christians would probably stay away. Why wake up early on a Sunday morning to go attend a "religious" event where you study a book that no one believes in, don't really learn anything, don't get called to obey any actual rules that will affect your life, and don't get any encouragement to spread a life-saving gospel or really do anything else productive? It would be more fun to just stay up on Saturday night drinking, or maybe to join the Masons or something.
ReplyDeleteJust to clarify, I think you mean no one in that particular church believes in that book, etc.
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