At Creidamh (pron. “kray-jif”—Gaelic for “faith”—I’m glad that if Iain is going to speak in tongues he also has the gift of interpretation!)
At Creidamh (pron. “kray-jif”—Gaelic for “faith”—I’m glad that if Iain is going to speak in tongues he also has the gift of interpretation!)
And what of the North American reformed churches? NAPARC is a good start, but what still separates us?
Brian,
This is a very good and important question. The unification of the confessional Reformed and Presbyterian Churches is a worthy goal. Bob Godfrey made an good and important suggestion on the way forward in his essay of a few years back, “A Reformed Dream”. That proposal didn’t get a lot of traction, but perhaps one day it will.
There are real obstacles that cannot be ignored. There remain pockets of FV/Shepherdite influence in the NAPARC denominations. That has to be rooted out and dealt with. There are real differences in polity, background, and ethos that will be hard to overcome. Then there is the problem of relative commitment to the Reformed confessions (and the piety practice they teach). There is also a problem of those who like having a relative degree of influence in their denominations, who would lose a bit of influence in a broader denom. The very mechanism used in some merger attempts has probably frustrated the goal. Here I’m thinking of the PCA’s J&R mechanism which isn’t very attractive to a denom with its own history and culture and practice who would like to negotiate some of that with the larger denom before being swallowed like Jonah.
These are not insuperable difficulties but because we’re flesh and blood sinners we will continue to struggle with them.