Marriage at the Forefront

Alan Wisdom
September 11, 2009

The issue of marriage is very much coming to the fore these days, in our own denomination and others. We at the IRD and Presbyterian Action are in the thick of the action. We are grateful for your support that enables us to play our role in this debate. As crucial developments unfold in the coming days, please keep in touch on the IRD website. Please hold in your prayers all those who are deciding how our beloved church will handle God’s good gift of marriage.

The precedents are not all encouraging. Last month one of our ecumenical partner churches, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), voted to “allow congregations that choose to do so to recognize, support, and hold publicly accountable life-long, monogamous, same-gender relationships.”

The new ELCA policy statement acknowledges that “[t]he historic Christian tradition and the Lutheran Confessions have recognized marriage as a covenant between a man and a woman.” But it leaves open the possibility that the church might change its doctrine of marriage. Among the “different understandings and practices” that the ELCA now promises to “include … within its life” is the view that “same-gender relationships [should be] lived out within lifelong and monogamous commitments that are held to the same rigorous standards, sexual ethics, and status as heterosexual marriage.”

The new ELCA policy asserts that “pastors hold and exercise pastoral discretion for the decision to marry in the church.” Without any stated limits on their “discretion,” it seems clear that Lutheran pastors are now free to bless same-sex couples and declare them “married” in the eyes of the church.

What does all this Lutheran stuff have to do with us as members of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)? A whole lot, as it turns out. First, we are brothers and sisters of the Lutherans in the one Universal Church of Jesus Christ. When their part of Christ’s body injures itself by departing from biblical and historic Christian teaching, we suffer too. That is why the IRD has spoken out in the media to lament the effects of this ELCA decision on the whole church.

Second, we Presbyterians face some of the same threats looming in our own denomination. Let me cite two instances, one late last month and one coming up next week. An August 22 decision of the Permanent Judicial Commission of Boston Presbytery acquitted a minister who had been accused of “violat[ing] the Constitution of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)” by “purporting to perform a Christian marriage between two women.”

According to the PCUSA constitution, “Marriage is a civil contract between a man and a woman. 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” (Directory for Worship, 4.9001). Nevertheless, a 3-2 majority of the Boston judicial commission ruled that “the definition of Christian marriage in W.4.9001 is merely descriptive; there is no mandatory language in this article.” The majority maintained that “there is no mandatory language in the Constitution, nor in any Authoritative Interpretation, prohibiting Ministers of Word and Sacrament from performing same-gender marriages in states where this is allowed by law [as in Massachusetts].”

A dissenting opinion by two commission members countered, “W-4.9001 definitely does define marriage as being between a man and a woman.” We do not yet know whether the Boston decision will be appealed, or how it might fare under appeal to higher PCUSA judicial bodies. I had some involvement in the case, although I am not at liberty to discuss it beyond reporting the result.

What I can tell you is that I will be in Louisville next week to cover another forum in which our understanding of Christian marriage will be up for debate. The PCUSA Special Commission on Civil Unions and Christian Marriage will be meeting to reach a preliminary decision on its recommendations to the 2010 General Assembly.

The key question that the special committee is being asked to answer is: “What is the place of covenanted same-gender partnerships in the Christian community?” Will our denomination follow in the wake of the ELCA, backing away from the historic Christian understanding of marriage and giving license for ministers and churches to bless non-marital sexual relationships?

Presbyterian Action (with many others) has communicated to the committee our desire that it uphold the church’s teaching on marriage. I will be watching the committee next week to see which direction it is going. Please keep in touch and keep this committee in your prayers.