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Presbyterians Collapsing, or “Settling Into The New Thing God is Creating”? The 2014 numbers reveal the PCUSA's largest statistical decline to date. A slimmed-down Presbyterian Church (USA) is apparently getting ready for beach season after shedding unwanted excess members, according to a cheery report by the denomination’s top official. “The PC(USA) is a church made up of vibrant congregations doing their best to live out the gospel of Jesus Christ in their communities and in the world,” an apparently unfazed Gradye Parsons, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the PCUSA, soothed. “Membership declines continue, but on a whole the...

From its inception Christianity was a marginalized not a culturally powerful or influential religion. With the death of the mainlines we’re witnessing the last gasp of the informal Constantinianism in America, the gathering of cultural elites in the narthex of tall-steeple PCUSA congregations. The informal coalition of cultural and political power brokers in and with the mainline is dead. The WWII generation was probably the last to care to identify with the mainline or to seek the approval of the mainline. Now that the culture has got what it wanted, capitulation, even the NYT will ignore it. There is no...

Over the last two decades, more than three-fourths of Iraq’s Christians have fled the country, driven out by a combination of Muslim fanaticism and economic and social collapse. Iraq, however, isn’t the only place to experience a mass Christian exodus in recent years. Look at the Presbyterian Church (USA), the 10th largest denomination in this country. But you’d better look fast. The PC(USA), which is the nation’s largest Presbyterian denomination (at least for now), is driving out members through its own brand of leftist fanaticism. From a high of more than 4 million members back in 1965, the Louisville-based PC(USA)...

The Presbyterian Church USA has voted to endorse Kermit Gosnell. Delegates meeting in Detroit at the 221st General Assembly of the 1.8 million–member Presbyterian Church (USA) voted down a measure that would have the church endorse care for babies born alive after abortions.From World Magazine: Also Thursday, 78 percent of the PCUSA General Assembly struck down a resolution condemning the killing of babies born alive during abortions, as occurred with notorious abortionist Kermit Gosnell. Initiated by the South Alabama presbytery, it called for inclusion of pro-life Presbyterians and an investigation into doctrinal and financial support of abortion. Dissenters cited pro-abortion...

In terms of giving insight into the current battles raging within the PC (USA) and the exodus of evangelical churches, the report is quite helpful. Consider the following statement: “only followers of Jesus Christ can be saved.” Among pastors, 45% disagreed or strongly disagreed. 41% agreed or strongly agreed. Among our clergy, there is a clearly demonstrable variance about a fundamental tenet of Christian belief that is central to the mission of the church—the proclamation of the Gospel. The Presbyterian Church (USA) recently released the findings of its “Religious and Demographic Profile of Presbyterians 2011” (the report). More than 6,000...

DETROIT, MICHIGAN, JUNE 19, 2014 – A statement of protest by the Presbyterian Lay Committee repudiating the action of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church USA to redefine marriage. The 221st General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) has approved both an Authoritative Interpretation of the Constitution and an amendment to redefine marriage. In the name of 1.8 million Presbyterians nationwide, the General Assembly has committed an express repudiation of the Bible, the mutually agreed upon Confessions of the PCUSA, thousands of years of faithfulness to God’s clear commands and the denominational ordination vows of each concurring commissioner. This...

The top legislative body of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) voted Thursday to redefine Christian marriage in the church constitution as the union of "two people" instead of only "a man and a woman." The amendment requires approval from a majority of the 172 regional presbyteries, which will vote on the change over the next year. But in a separate vote that will take effect immediately, the Presbyterian General Assembly allowed ministers to preside at gay weddings in states where gay marriage is legal. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia recognize same-sex marriage. Alex McNeill, executive director of More Light...

The largest Presbyterian denomination in the U.S. will allow pastors to preside at gay weddings in states that recognize same-sex marriage. The Presbyterian General Assembly voted 61 percent to 39 percent in favor of allowing ministers to decide whether to perform the ceremonies. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia recognize gay marriage.

I can't cut and paste from the device I'm using, but this article is an interview with the father of Matthew Vines, the author of "God and the Gay Chrisitan." Monte Vines says when his son told him he was "gay" a few years ago, they studied the Bible together and discovered things like the often-cited bad argument that both homosexuality and eating shellfish were abominations in the Old Testament (and on that, God says to the Israelites about things like shellfish that they "shall be abomination for you" - meaning the Jews). So the father changed his mind since...

This is no nursery rhyme but rather the cast of characters lining up to appear at the 2012 Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly meeting in Pittsburgh. ACT I: An assault on marriageThe chameleon:  This character will attempt to lead commissioners to see marriage differently than the Church has historically defined it. Separating marriage from the Biblical narrative of creation and the Biblical witness of Jesus' affirmation between one man and one woman, the assembly will be asked to see a "new normal" that is inclusive of gay marriage. Presented plainly, the redefinition of marriage will arrive at the assembly through...

On Saturday, October 8th in Madison, Wisconson, Scott Anderson became the first openly gay ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church. This ordination is especially poignant for Anderson who came out to his California congregation when he was in his late thirties, over twenty years ago. He resigned as a result. Nancy Enderle, the interim executive director of the Covenant Network of Presbyterians, told The Associated Press that the ordination was a glorious celebration that touched everyone, especially Anderson. “He’s a very dignified and poised person but you could tell he was deeply moved,” she said “The Episcopalians, the Lutherans, the...

<p>AP material must be excerpted to 50% of content, if the article is short.</p>

Before returning to New England for the second time, I served two African American Presbyterian Churches. And during that time I never thought, two decades ago, that the entire church body would change its position on LGBTQ worshippers. But a historic yet bittersweet moment happened on October 8th in the Presbyterian Church (USA). And the moment didn’t happened without a long and arduous struggle against the church’s ecclesiastical heterosexism.After decades of open struggle with the church’s recalcitrant attitude and discrimination against its lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) worshippers who wanted to serve as pastors, elders or deacons, the...

Several dozen people partook in a discussion about same-sex marriage Sunday morning at Westminster Presbyterian Church, settling nothing but sharing their opinions openly. It was a part of the church’s series of adult education forums; one last week focused on interfaith marriage. Always a controversial topic, same-sex marriage has become yet more prominent in New York this year since the Legislature passed a law legalizing it. The Ledyard town clerk objected to that law and declined to sign same-sex marriages licenses on religious grounds, thereby putting herself near the center of a nationwide debate and drawing a write-in election challenge....

A man who left the ministry 21 years ago is looking forward to becoming the first openly gay person ordained in the Presbyterian Church USA. At the ceremony Sunday, Scott Anderson, 56, now executive director of the Wisconsin Council of Churches, will take back the stole he wore as pastor of two Presbyterian congregations in California, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. He had donated it to Shower of Stoles, a project meant to demonstrate what the Presbyterian Church had lost by barring homosexuals from the ministry. Anderson, who grew up in California, said he realized he was gay while he...

MILWAUKEE –  A man who left his Presbyterian ministry in California more than 20 years ago after telling his congregation that he is gay was welcomed back into the church leadership on Saturday as its first openly gay ordained minister. In a quavering voice ripe with emotion, 56-year-old Scott Anderson told the hundreds of friends and backers who packed Covenant Presbyterian Church in Madison, Wisconsin for his ordination ceremony that he never thought the day would come. "To the thousands of Presbyterians who have worked and prayed for almost 40 years for this day, I give thanks," Anderson said. "And...

A Wisconsin man is expected to become the first openly gay candidate ordained in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) since the church opened ordination to gay candidates earlier this year. ...“It’s hard to believe it’s finally happening,” Anderson said in a released statement on Friday. The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) officially began allowing the ordination of openly gay and lesbian candidates on July 10. n May, Twin Cities Presbyterians cast the historic vote to allow openly gay and lesbian members to be ordained ministers. Presbyterian leaders say the Twin Cities vote was the action needed to end the 2.1 million-member denomination’s national...

The Presbyterian Church USA (PC USA) has accused Caterpillar, HP and Motorola of supporting the Israeli government in a "non-peaceful way." As a result of those claim, the Church has now indicated that it will divest of the companies' stock. The Church has been trying to convince Caterpillar to cease its indirect engagement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict for years, a PC USA representative wrote in a statement.Caterpillar, a producer of mining equipment, has “profited from sales of its products to Israeli military and civilian authorities, including its D-9 bulldozers which are used to demolish Palestinian homes and construct settlements and...

Top leader of the Presbyterian Church (USA), Moderator Cynthia Bolbach, addressed the first national gathering of More Light Presbyterians since the denomination began allowing the ordination of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. ...Meeting at Third Presbyterian Church in Rochester, New York, September 2-4, Moderator Bolbach encouraged the listeners to be the church by working together. Using the biblical story of the friends who cut a hole in the roof of a house to get a friend to Jesus to be healed of paralysis, the Moderator urged lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people and their allies to be as...

When Jeannine Oakes answered God's call to become a pastor, it was a moment of both clarity and confusion. Though her heart belonged to the Presbyterian Church, she also hoped one day to give her heart to a woman with whom she would share her life. The Presbyterian Church's ban on openly gay clergy did not allow for both. Eventually, she asked the leadership at Fourth Presbyterian Church to endorse her mission and enrolled at McCormick Theological Seminary to complete the necessary coursework."I need to be fully who I am, and the church needs to accept that," said Oakes, 32....