Constitutional rewrite proposed
to the next General Assembly
September 25, 2007

A proposal to rewrite the Book of Order is before us once again. By a narrow margin, presbyteries voted this year to accept major changes to Chapter 14 of the Book of Order (the chapter on Ordination). The next General Assembly will be asked to send to the presbyteries for their vote a complete rewrite of the polity section of the Book of Order, all of chapters 1-18 of the Form of Government (hereafter referred to as nFOG).

Delivery of the nFOG was well beyond deadline
The proposed draft of the nFOG was released last week, almost three weeks beyond the deadline set by the 2006 G.A. The release includes nearly 400 pages of draft document and supplementary material. The document that compares the current Form of Government with the proposed version is 170 pages long.

Time to respond is short
The FOG task force produced two study guides, one for sessions and one for presbyteries. The study guides cover only the Foundations section and three of the six chapters on government. Governing bodies have from Sept. 19 until mid-November to send comments to the task force. They have until Feb. 22 to respond by overture to the General Assembly. (You also should be aware that the task force is reserving the right to make changes to the document up to Feb. 22.)

The church has an exceedingly short time frame to absorb and respond well to what a task force co- moderator has described as a "radical" change to our polity.

Some presbyteries meet only twice in a year. My presbytery, National Capital, meets nearly every other month. My church, National Presbyterian, is planning a presbytery-wide discussion of the nFOG, but it will not happen until April of 2008, well beyond every deadline for response. I do not think we are atypical.

GAC considers extention of time frame
Last week the General Assembly Council (GAC) heard presentations from members of the FOG task force. Jim Berkley, Director of Presbyterian Action, reports that after discussion the Council took an action asking the FOG task force to recommend delaying decision about the nFOG until the 2010 G.A.

Now is the time for you to act!
If the rush to adopt a new Form of Government is a concern to you, you may want to reinforce the idea that delay of decision benefits the church. By far the best way to communicate that is by means of overture to the General Assembly. If you'd like help with wording or process for overtures, let me know. I'm happy to help. In the meantime, if you want to start looking at the documents, the link is http://www.pcusa.org/formofgovernment/index.htm

Join the Coalition's efforts for reform
The Coalition is at work not only in following developments around the denomination, but also in actively responding to what is happening with initiatives for reform. The work we do includes you. We need your prayers. We need your financial contributions. And we need your active participation in reform efforts.

I'm encouraged by the active participation of so many of you. May God look with favor on your efforts.

Terry Schlossberg
The Presbyterian Coalition

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