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Originally Posted by Semper Fidelis  I have a few questions for those that question the validity to the American revisions of the WCF:
1. Was the American Presbyterian Church, properly speaking, a Church or not when she made the revisions?
2. Does not Chapter XXXI admit to the American Church's authority to settle a matter of controversy as to whether or not the inclusion of a particular paragraph is something the Church ought to be confessing?
3. If no to question 1, what authority did the Church of England have to confess the 1647 Confession to begin with? Is it because they were English and not American?
4. If no to question 2, how can a new visible Church with no direct historical connection to the Church of England adopt the original Westminster Confession of Faith? Wouldn't a micro-Presbytery in the USA founded by 2-3 Churches be assuming the authority of a Church to declare a Confession of Faith even if they were adopting something that had been adopted previously.
I'm trying to get behind some of the implied snobbery that goes along with assuming that anything but the original WCF is out of bounds. The WCF itself admits to being "amendable" provided that it is the Church doing the amending. We can all agree that it becomes questionable when we have individuals picking and choosing and standing outside of the visible Church in the process of selective Confessionalism but how do we reconcile what visible Church does/does not have the authority to settle a matter of the Confession? It seems the individual(s) who go off and form micro-Presbyteries apart from a larger American Church have to answer the issue as to what authority they have to stand in isolation from the American Presbyterian Church at large.  |
I too would have to add my objection to that last paragraph. The fact that the American churches recognize the WCF in the first place, that they would amend it to better reflect what they believe, is a testimony to the superiority of that assembly to whose ruling they confessionally adhered and submitted.
The real question, it seems to me, is whether the amendments remained faithful to the original. For all doctrinal statements made by churches, of whatever hierarchical status, are susceptible to cultural revisions so as to maintain the original doctrines and to keep them wholly intact from generation to generation. In that sense Andrew's sentiments are as suspect as those of the American presbyterian churches. And since we do not delve into the minds of the men who wrote the original, but rather delve into the mind of the Spirit who moved the men to write the original, we turn naturally to the Word of God, trusting that God has sufficiently and perspicuously revealed His Word to us.