What is the 1967 WCF?

shackleton · #1 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:27 PM

While listening to WHI this month they were talking about a WCF from 1967 and alluded to the fact that it was not good. Anyone have any info on it?

I know the Evangelical Pres. uses one that has sections added on the Holy Spirit and evangelism but they said that came from 1903. It is the same except for these two additions. This group is not completely liberal...yet, they do leave it up to the individual churches whether or not they want to ordain women and there are some women pastors in their group. Plus, a lot of PCUSA churches are joining their ranks so I think that is going to bode poorly for them

panta dokimazete · #2 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:32 PM

I think this is it...

VirginiaHuguenot · #3 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:32 PM

Confession of 1967 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

toddpedlar · #4 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shackleton

While listening to WHI this month they were talking about a WCF from 1967 and alluded to the fact that it was not good. Anyone have any info on it?

Lest anyone be confused, it's not a revision of the Westminster at all, but a wholly new, wholly Barthian confessional document. Van Til ripped it to shreds in a book published either the same year or the following year - good analysis and well worth reading concerning the slide in the 20th century of the mainline.

Backwoods Presbyterian · #5 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:40 PM

I actually, before I left the PC(USA), cut it out of my Book of Confessions.

yeutter · #6 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 07:43 PM

The mainstream Presbyterian Church [then styled the United Presbyterian Church] moved from being an officially confessional body to full apostasy in 1967. They ditched the Westminster Larger Catechism and adopted an apostate confession in 1967, along with accepting the Heidelberg Catechism, the Second Helvetic Confession and the Scots Confession.
The way the Confession of 67 talks about reconciliation is in particular objectionable. John H. Gerstner wrote a series of tracts opposing it especially A Primer on Reconciliation. Presbyterians United for a Biblical Confession [later called Presbyterians United for Biblical Concerns] and the Presbyterian Lay Committee were formed to oppose this supposed confession.

DMcFadden · #7 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 09:24 PM

In seminary back in the mid 70's my presbyterian profs spoke positively of C-67. It is interesting that after 200 years of "settling" for the WCF, the largest body of presbyterians has made C-67 so "revered and worthy."

While we don't want to determine orthodoxy by counting hands, it is interesting that the adoption of C-67 has done little to assist the denomination in its growth. Instead, the groups holding to the older WCF such as the Presbyterian Church in America and the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, are actually fast-growing evangelical denominations! Who wouldof thunk it?

John H. Adams (Confession of 1967 gets top billing by committee - 6/19/02) observed:

Quote:

Theologically, C-67, which was born in the national turmoils of Vietnam and the civil rights movements, is limited. Instead of the traditional confessional emphasis on the nature of God, the person and work of Christ, the witness of the Holy Spirit and the authority of Scripture, C-67 was stitched together around a single theme: reconciliation.

That is acknowledged in the preface: "Modestly titled, the Confession of 1967 is built around a single passage of Scripture: "'In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself. …'" The three sections of C-67 are titled "God's Work of Reconciliation," "The Ministry of Reconciliation" and "The Fulfillment of Reconciliation."

While all confessions are reflections of the time in which they were written, anything written in reaction to Vietnam should be suspect as to the potential for enduring value.

KMK · #8 (**permalink**) 03-22-2008, 11:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by DMcFadden

In seminary back in the mid 70's my presbyterian profs spoke positively of C-67. It is interesting that after 200 years of "settling" for the WCF, the largest body of presbyterians has made C-67 so "revered and worthy."

While we don't want to determine orthodoxy by counting hands, it is interesting that the adoption of C-67 has done little to assist the denomination in its growth. Instead, the groups holding to the older WCF such as the Presbyterian Church in America and the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, are actually fast-growing evangelical denominations! Who wouldof thunk it?

John H. Adams (Confession of 1967 gets top billing by committee - 6/19/02) observed:

Quote:

Theologically, C-67, which was born in the national turmoils of Vietnam and the civil rights movements, is limited. Instead of the traditional confessional emphasis on the nature of God, the person and work of Christ, the witness of the Holy Spirit and the authority of Scripture, C-67 was stitched together around a single theme: reconciliation.

That is acknowledged in the preface: "Modestly titled, the Confession of 1967 is built around a single passage of Scripture: "'In Christ God was reconciling the world to himself. …'" The three sections of C-67 are titled "God's Work of Reconciliation," "The Ministry of Reconciliation" and "The Fulfillment of Reconciliation."

While all confessions are reflections of the time in which they were written, anything written in reaction to Vietnam should be suspect as to the potential for enduring value.

Amazing.How arbitrary. I had no idea the PCUSA was this far gone.

jfschultz · #9 (**permalink**) 03-26-2008, 11:49 PM

I had a bit of a quiet laugh while listening to this week's White Horse Inn. Horton referred to Machen's statement that liberal "christianity" is as remote from orthodoxy as is Hinduism.

I recalled having read the Confession of 1967 back when it was still a proposal and thinking a Hindu could affirm this! I had been saved during Summer vacation at what would later become one of the early PCA churches in South Florida and just returned to Ann Arbor, Michigan for college.