Middle Way or Co-Existence?
PCUSA Marriage Committee Struggles to Find Path Forward Together
Alan F.H. Wisdom
June 25, 2009
Additional Commentary:
The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Special Committee on Civil Unions and Christian Marriage, meeting June 17-20 in Louisville, began to wade delicately into the swirling debate about society’s most basic institution. After an organizational meeting in March, the committee was now ready to discuss early, incomplete drafts of its report to the 2010 General Assembly. But committee members tended to side-step direct confrontation over the big question before them: What will the church say and do about the increasing numbers of same-sex couples with state-recognized civil marriages or civil unions? (See “The Elephant in the Room.”)
Some committee members doubted whether there was any “middle way” between accepting and rejecting same-sex marriage. Yet members seemed to be seeking consensus on some things they might be able to say together. They focused on topics where they could be “descriptive,” although even description sometimes proved difficult. (See “Even Describing the Elephant Is Not So Easy.”) They left key “prescriptive” decisions to their next meeting in September. Where perspectives differed, the committee expressed its desire to convey all viewpoints fairly and accurately.
Members aimed at some kind of “co-existence” between proponents and opponents of same-sex marriage; however, the terms of that co-existence were not clear. Would the PCUSA’s constitutional definition of marriage continue to hold authority until the General Assembly and presbyteries were persuaded to change it? Or would every minister and church now be free to redefine marriage at will?
The 2008 General Assembly established the special committee to report and make recommendations to the 2010 assembly on five questions:
- “The history of the laws governing marriage and civil union, including current policy debates;
- “How the theology and practice of marriage have developed in the Reformed and broader Christian tradition;
- “The relationship between civil union and Christian marriage;
- “The effects of current laws on same-gender partners and their children;
- “The place of covenanted same-gender partnerships in the Christian community.”
Last year’s assembly specifically stated that it was not seeking “to redefine the nature of Christian marriage.” Assembly moderator Bruce Reyes-Chow appointed the 13 members of the special committee, who appear to hold diverse views regarding marriage and sexuality.
It is still early in the committee process, and four committee members missed all or substantial parts of the June meeting. Nevertheless, certain patterns seem to be emerging. The committee is operating so far by consensus. It takes no votes. Committee members throw out ideas and test one another’s responses. If someone objects, then an idea is dropped or adjusted to accommodate the objection. If no one objects, then the idea appears to have the group’s support—although one can never be sure that there aren’t secret dissenters.
‘Marriage is a Different Animal’
A prime example of this process is the committee’s treatment of “civil unions” as an option for same-sex couples. The 2008 assembly, while disavowing any attempt to change the definition of Christian marriage, reaffirmed previous assembly resolutions advocating “the right of same-gender persons to civil union.” These unions, and their relationship to marriage, were left undefined. It seemed that the assembly was looking at them as a possible middle ground between full same-sex marriage and no recognition at all for same-sex partners.
But special committee members were not so enthusiastic about civil unions. The Rev. Clayton Allard of Dallas commented, “The original overture is basically obsolete … in the assumption that there is some kind of third path in a second tier of marriage.” Same-sex advocates now demand nothing less than full marriage; giving them all the attributes of marriage without the name seems a gratuitous insult. Nor are the defenders of traditional marriage happy about creating a facsimile of marriage under a different name.
Allard and his small working group presented a chart outlining differences between traditional civil marriage, redefined civil marriage, civil union, and Christian marriage. “What we are basically saying is that marriage is a different animal from civil union,” he said. “Marriage is a social institution,” he stressed. “It is not a private institution. It’s not for two people to be happy.” Civil union, on the other hand, seems mainly to be a private legal arrangement between two people. “Its non-social nature is really problematic for the church … and for society,” according to the Dallas pastor.
None of the other committee members disputed Allard’s analysis. They appeared to agree when he declared, “There is an insoluble conflict that sits in the middle of us [between accepting or rejecting same-sex marriage] and there is no way to massage it out of existence.”
How would the group handle this “insoluble conflict”? For the most part, both sides observed an awkward cease-fire. Nobody in the June meeting pushed openly for the PCUSA to affirm same-sex marriage. On the other hand, nobody on the committee was openly arguing against same-sex marriage. One member, the Rev. Emily Anderson of Maryville, TN, said that she was “tired of the same old arguments” about homosexuality. Others seemed to share the sentiment.
Description vs. Prescription
The committee chair, the Rev. Jim Szeyller of Charlotte, NC, encouraged the group to try to make its report more “descriptive” rather than “prescriptive.” A Presbyterian News Service story on the meeting quoted Szeyller as giving an example: “’If a same-sex couple comes to a pastor to ask to be married,’ a descriptive report would take the approach of ‘Here are the confessional, theological, legal, and polity issues in play and here’s where you [as a pastor or session] can go to study and reach some kind of conclusion.'”
Several sections of the committee’s draft report—dealing with history and the state of the laws today—could easily be handled in this kind of “descriptive” fashion. But, in a report that is limited to 11,000 words, even these sections require some editorial choices that will be shaped by ideological presuppositions. For example, traditionalists would tend to stress the continuities of biblical teaching and social history regarding marriage, while revisionists would emphasize the diversity and changeability of marriage. Moreover, the other two sections of the committee’s report—covering “the relationship between civil union and Christian marriage” and “the place of covenanted same-gender partnerships in the Christian community”—would seem to call for some “prescriptive” writing about what the church believes and how it intends to live.
Allard and his working group tried to address “the relationship between civil union and Christian marriage” with a chart—which had the appearance of objectivity, but concealed a number of debatable interpretive assumptions. As for “the place of covenanted same-gender partnerships in the Christian community,” the special committee had already decided to delay that difficult conversation until its September meeting.
When interpretations differ, Anderson recommended, “the great gift that we can give to the church is to lay out the different perspectives.” Allard urged, “Let’s lay out the conflict with as little prejudice as possible, in a way that each side is most comfortable…. Let each side write its own view.” Tony De La Rosa, a Los Angeles attorney and elder, concurred: “I want those who take a different position to present their best case.”
Committee members on both sides of the marriage issue complained of being misunderstood by their opponents. The Rev. Tracie Mayes Stewart of Salem Presbytery (North Carolina), evidently a supporter of traditional marriage, said, “It is very painful to me to have people assume that I don’t come to this issue from a justice perspective.” On the other side, Anderson voiced her distress about “people who assume I’m not a Christian” because she disagrees with them on sexuality issues. Szeyller warned the committee on one occasion: “If people come to this section and see that their position is caricatured or misconstrued, it will be easier for them to dismiss our work.”
A Better Way?
Allard hoped for a more positive outcome. “If it is possible to find a way to co-exist,” he said, “we will have done the church a great service.” But the terms of this possible co-existence were not yet clear as the committee’s June meeting adjourned. The looming question was what to say about the church’s constitutional doctrines regarding marriage. Stewart posed that question directly. “Is there any place where we say PCUSA policy?” she asked. “We have to give some clear guidance as to where we stand as a church.”
In fact, there are significant passages about marriage in four of the denomination’s eleven confessions. The Westminster Confession, for instance, defines Christian marriage as “an institution ordained of God, blessed by our Lord Jesus Christ, established and sanctified for the happiness and welfare of mankind, into which spiritual and physical union one man and one woman enter ….” (6.131) The Book of Order also addresses marriage in the Directory for Worship (W-4.9001):
Marriage is a gift God has given to all humankind for the well-being of the entire human family. Marriage is a civil contract between a woman and a man. For Christians marriage is a covenant through which a man and a woman are called to live out together before God their lives of discipleship.
Any approach that merely describes these passages cannot do them justice. Because they are in the PCUSA constitution, they are meant to be prescriptive. Church officers have all vowed to be “instructed and led” by the confessions and to be “governed by our church’s polity.”
If the PCUSA senses God leading it to change its doctrine of marriage, then the proper way to effect such a change would be by amending all the relevant passages in the Book of Confessions and Book of Order. Proponents of same-sex marriage have every opportunity to propose such amendments and persuade the General Assembly and presbyteries to approve them.
This is one way of co-existence in the church, trusting that God will eventually vindicate his truth as ministers and elders struggle to discern it through the Scriptures. This way of co-existence requires patience with one another and with God, as we grapple with “the same old arguments” and wait—for years, decades, and sometimes longer—for God’s light to break forth more clearly upon us all.
Is there a better way of co-existence? The Special Committee on Civil Unions and Marriage will continue the search at its next meeting, scheduled for September 13-17 in Louisville.