A complaint against the NCFIC confession

The National Center for Family-Integrated Churches is the leading voice amongst those who believe the pressing need of the day for Christians is to focus on, well, the family. As such, the organization has produced "A Biblical Confession for Uniting Church and Family." To presbyterians possessed of a high ecclesiology, said confession rather notably fails to stand in the magisterial Reformation tradition of wise reflection and careful use and definition of terms. However, not all presbyterians are possessed of such an ecclesiology, and any number of presbyterian sessions have joined their baptist, evangelical, and congregationalist brethren in affirming said confession.

The advisability of agreeing to any "confession" beyond the ones which define one's membership in a particular denomination is an interesting topic, well worthy of discussion and debate. The advisability of agreeing to this particular confession, however, is not, as it is manifestly unadvisable. Sadly, the meretriciousness of a position is usually far more obvious to the beholder than to its holder, and finding a clear, indisputable failing on which all parties might agree can be extremely difficult. Nonetheless, as two sessions in our presbytery have agreed to the NCFIC's confession, our own session has decided to present a formal complaint against them.

In presbyterian polity, a "complaint" is an instrument by which an individual or a church court (ex. a session or presbytery) alleges a church court has committed a serious error. In this case, our session believes the NCFIC's confession asserts that any activities which segregate participants by age or gender (such as Sunday School programs, men's and women's Bible studies, or youth groups) are in violation of Scripture. Our session alleges that agreement to the NCFIC's confession is a de facto allegation that sister Churches are violating God's Word, and that such an allegation should be adjudicated in the Church courts, not loosely bandied about on the internet.

As other individuals and sessions might be interested in filing similar complaints, I provide a model, based on our own, in .pdf. It was written following the rules of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church's Book of Discipline, but might prove a useful jumping-off point for those in other communions. I have italicized the portions which reference where specific information regarding congregations, etc, must be found on the internet: you'll have to figure out your own hyperlinks.

This complaint was thoroughly discussed in session before its final draft, and earlier versions received comment from outside parties. Several suggested we should also complain against the NCFIC's confession's use of proof texts, largely because a great many of the texts cited do not support the points which they supposedly prove. However, we believed that line of argument, while entirely valid, would get us lost deep in the weeds of exegetical argument and possibly obscure an otherwise straightforward complaint. In Church law as in all law, a clean argument stands a far better chance of success than a complicated and overly detailed one.

The gears of presbyterian courts grind slowly, and I don't know how this complaint will fare or when it will be resolved. In the meantime, I hope and pray this model might prove useful to Church officers similarly distressed by the choice of some brethren to throw in their lot with the National Center for Family-Integrated Churches.

And yes, your questions are welcome.