Dissent on a New Creed

At its annual General Assembly in Portland recently, the tiny (12,500 members), fundamentalist Orthodox Presbyterian Church formally extended a hand of welcome to any who would like to leave the 3,300,000-member United Presbyterian Church. The same gesture was made by the equally small Bible Presbyterian Church, headed by Radio Preacher Carl Mclntire. Both churches clearly hope to swell their ranks with conservative Presbyterians dismayed by the "Confession of 1967," approved in principle at the United Presbyterian General Assembly last May (TIME, June 4).

Letters of Support. Mclntire optimistically claims that "anywhere from one-third to one-half of the United Presbyterian members" will defect from the church if the Confession is approved. That hardly seems likely, but there is some evidence for the charge by Executive Editor Nelson Bell of the conservative Protestant biweekly Christianity Today that "dissent will reach into almost every presbytery." Already, members of churches in Pittsburgh, Peoria and San Jose, Calif., have gone on record as opposing the Confession in its present form. In Seattle, the Rev. David Brittain of Foster-Tukwila Presbyterian Church fears that one-fourth of the city's 30,000 Presbyterians might ultimately bolt because of the new creed. The Rev. Edward Stimson, pastor of Omaha's Dundee Presbyterian Church and leader of the opposition to the Confession at the General Assembly, claims to have received letters of support from 250 ministers.

The principal argument against the Confession of 1967--the first new statement of the church's faith since the 1647 Westminster Confession--is that it betrays rather than updates traditional Presbyterian beliefs. Conservatives claim that it downgrades the Bible from the infallible word of God to a mere "normative witness" of revelation, discards the Calvinist teaching on the predestination of God's elect, and conceives of the church primarily as a social organism to further racial and economic justice. Stimson also charges that it provides theological justification for the scuttling of the democratic Presbyterian form of church government--a necessary prelude to merger with other denominations.

Changes Considered. United Presbyterian spokesmen insist that "we are in no way nearing a point of schism." Nonetheless, they acknowledge that conservative feeling about the Confession runs high, and that some congregations may well withdraw from the church in a year or two unless substantial changes are made. Next month, a new 15-member committee of ministers and laymen will begin to study the text; they will consider changes suggested by churches, presbyteries and synods, submit a report to next year's General Assembly in Boston.

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