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Originally Posted by greenbaggins  Bruce, it seems to me that the PCA, on paper, is 2 office, but in practice is 3 office, since elders are not allowed to serve communion without a TE present (but are allowed to preach: what is up with that?). If you want 2 office, then go the whole way, I say. If you want 3 office, then go the whole way, and don't let them preach either. But, imo, this half-way house is not especially helpful. |
Definitely, we are 3 in practice. We are 3 with a vengeance. Reason? Because we expend all that energy defending parity, and then more energy defending a TE's uniqueness. We have to do that, or we'll end up in either thoroughgoing congregationalism or clericalism. Meanwhile, the GA turns itself into a Convention, creates a Supreme Court and now a Senate, all the while developing a denominational bureauocracy that rivals anything the mainline ever created. And the OPC, with its open admission of 3 offices and delegated GA rolls along without rampant clericalism, and running their denomination out of a strip mall. And that has little to do with the fact it is 1/10 the size of the PCA, and much to do with the perception of power in the gathered church as exercised at all three levels.
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Rev. Bruce G. Buchanan
ChainOLakes Presbyterian Church, CentralLake, MI
Made both Lord and Christ--Jesus, the Destroyer
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