22 Dec The Ecclesiastical Route 9
9. First Regulated
In previous articles we have seen how general synods of the Canadian Reformed Churches in 2007, 2010, and 2013 struggled with the procedure called “the ecclesiastical route”. GS 2013 settled on a procedure and so we surveyed the general synods of 2016, 2019, and 2022 to observe how well this procedure has served the churches. One has to admit, it’s a confusing procedure, rather messy, and bureaucratically complex. How did this come to be?
CO art. 30
Besides indicating that ecclesiastical assemblies should only deal with ecclesiastical matters in an ecclesiastical way, the original CO art. 30 stated that “a major assembly shall deal with those matters only which could not be finished in the minor assembly or which belong to its churches in common.”
Our focus is on the “common matters”. Common to the churches of the general synod (i.e., the whole federation) are matters such as those pertaining to the confessions, the church order, the church’s song book, and inter-church relations.
In a practical sense the question is: if a church seeks to have a song approved for use in worship or for the CanRC to enter into a sister church relationship with a particular church, how does that proposal find its way to the table of a general synod?
By What Process?
When the CanRC reviewed their church order in the late 1970s, the need was felt to stipulate how matters “which belong to its churches in common” find their way to the agenda of a major assembly.
With a view to this need the following sentence was added to CO art. 30 by GS 1983. “If it concerns a new matter which has not previously been presented to that major assembly, it can be put on the agenda only when the minor assembly has dealt with it.”
The rationale behind adding this sentence has been described as follows.
“2. The last sentence has been taken over from our Netherlands sister Churches. We deem it a valuable addition which would prevent that a General synod suddenly is faced with a proposal from a Church about a matter which has never before been presented to a major assembly, and has to decide about it since it concerns a matter in which all the Churches are involved.
“We do not even have to think of a General Synod in the first place; the same applies to a Regional Synod or even a Classis: it prevents that matters are presented and dealt with which haver not even been discussed by the Consistories.
“The proposed addition does not prevent that a Church addresses itself to a General Synod about a matter already before the broadest assembly; it would prevent that a Church proposes a matter which is completely new, even though it can be said that it concerns the Churches in general and is a matter belonging to all the Churches in common.”
(Draft – Report, Church Order, January, 1979).
In the report submitted to the churches in 1982, the following was said about this last sentence:
Following our Netherlands sister Churches, we consider it a very wise and edifying provision. It may be new in wording, whoever studies the Acts of the General Synods of the Canadian Reformed Churches will discover that more than once a matter was deleted from the provisional agenda because the minor assemblies had no opportunity to discuss or study the matter.
(Provisional Report, Church Order, December 1981)
The report then refers to the very same GS 1977 decision that GS 2010 referred to, stating regarding a certain proposal: “It was just dumped (sic) onto Synod’s table, and Synod should have refused to deal with it on [the ground that no consistory or broader assembly ever had an opportunity to discuss this matter].” Note the “should have”, the fact of the matter is that GS 1977 did not. By the way, GS 2010 used that GS 1977 decision as a “precedent”.
Concerns and Response
Two churches had issues with the proposed change. Burlington-Ebenezer was concerned that prescribing a lengthy route would restrict addressing synod on matters of urgent common concern. Hamilton figured this would prove to be a confusing rule and make a “bureaucratic mess”; the acts have that phrase in quotation marks, so I assume those are Hamilton’s own words.
The wording of the considerations suggest that GS 1983 considered the two concerns similar. It addressed the matter of urgency and noted that adding something on urgent matters of concern “would defeat the purpose of the preceding stipulation, namely, to prevent new issues from being placed before major assemblies hastily and unlawfully before having been dealt with in the minor assemblies.”
Wrong and Insufficient
In my opinion, this response is both in error and insufficient.
It is in error, for GS 1983 claimed something could be placed before the major assemblies “unlawfully”. However, the “law” that would make it “unlawful” had yet to be adopted. Prior to 1983 it was lawful for a local church to submit something common to the churches directly to a general synod. Moreover, if a matter is placed before synod unlawfully, then all synod needs to do is judge that the submission is inadmissible.
The response is insufficient as it does not address the concern that the regulation would create a “bureaucratic mess”. This concern was ignored, but, ever since CO art. 30 has been strictly followed, the concern is proving well-founded.
Why the change?
To understand things better, we need to go back about to the 1970s and cross “the Pond” to the “old country”. For, as with many changes made to the Church Order in 1983, the revision was due to a revision made by our former sister churches in The Netherlands. We’ll review this next time.