# Did TR Presbyterianism ever flourish in the American South?



## Jash Comstock (Jun 12, 2014)

I've been reading some articles concerning the founding of the PCA (see links below). And it seems the general consensus is that Confessionally committed Presbyterianism was nonexistent in the American South for a long time leading up to the PCUS/PCA split. Even after the founding of the PCA, though its documents were staunchly confessional, in practice it seems they were more broadly evangelical or even fundamentalist until recent times.

*Aforementioned Articles* 

The Way It Really Was in the PCA in 1973
I Don’t Have a Dog in the PCA Fight: But That Doesn’t Keep Me from Having an Opinion

*Here are my questions;*

1. What was the last "heyday" of Confessional Presbyterianism in the South before modern times? In the North it seems it was the time of the great Princeton Presbyterians (Warfield, Hodge, Machen etc) Was there a period of Confessional Presbyterian strength in the South?

2. What elements contributed to the downfall of Confessionalism (if there ever was a "heyday") and the advent of more broadly evangelical Presbyterianism in the South? Did it have to do with how long the PCA stayed in the PCUS as opposed to the earlier split between the OPC and PCUSA? 

3. If Princeton was the bastion of Northern Confessional Presbyterianism (before modernism), was there any similar Southern institution?

4. What trends do you see today in the American South regarding Presbyterianism and Confessionalism?

I understand I am asking a broad and possibly complex question, but I'd appreciate someone helping me see the big picture (as both a Southerner and Presbyterian I have a dog in this fight).


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## Pilgrim (Jun 12, 2014)

You can go back to the days of Dabney, Thornwell, Girardeau and Palmer for a more confessional Southern Presbyterianism. They had all been in the united Old School church before it split in 1861. Hence they were the first generation of PCUS leaders. There were representative seminaries (Columbia and one in Richmond?) but I don't think they were quite equivalent to Princeton. 

With regard to the PCA, I've known men and have seen testimonies online from other men (If I recall correctly including some threads on here from years ago) whose recollections corroborate that given in the two links you posted above. It seems that many TE's (much less RE's) did not get the memo that the PCA was supposed to be TR and strict subscriptionist, or else misunderstood or disregarded it. If I recall correctly an early PCA or RTS leader wrote an article in the 70's denouncing TR's. I've heard one of the founding fathers use the sinner's prayer at the end of the sermon and ask any in the congregation to pray it with him to be saved. And the first GA of the PCA was held at the church he pastored. Many Baptists and other evangelicals who are not even Calvinistic (including some Wesleyans) don't do that kind of thing anymore. 

And those linked articles leave out the racial (anti-Civil Rights) motivation which was a significant factor for some in leaving the PCUS. (Morton Smith defends segregation in his "How the Gold Has Become Dim" and apparently still defends it, if the reports I've seen regarding a recent case somewhere in the Carolinas is any indication.) You don't have to support everything the Civil Rights movement has ever stood for to realize that keeping blacks out of the churches was and is sinful.


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## hammondjones (Jun 12, 2014)

Here is my unqualified and biased answer...

My ancestors were Scots-Irish Presbyterians (Associate) that settled in NC/SC in the mid-1700s, and it is my impression from their records and the research that I have done on that time period, that that time-frame might best fit the concept of "heyday". Often, entire congregations and their pastors came over together. As for TR, that might depend on your definitions, but I do know that they quit attending their church because of the introduction of singing "human compositions" in worship. (It is now a PCUSA church.)

Abbeville, SC was a locus for early Colonial Presbyterianism, and it is not far from Due West. I'm sure someone more qualified can fill in the details of how Erskine Seminary got started. The other important location I might suggest would be Charlotte (Mecklenburg County).


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## Philip (Jun 12, 2014)

Pilgrim said:


> . There were representative seminaries (Columbia and one in Richmond?)



This was Union Seminary, originally founded in 1812 on the campus of Hampden-Sydney College. Dabney was there after the Civil War, but it didn't move to Richmond until 1898.


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## Edward (Jun 12, 2014)

Pilgrim said:


> And those linked articles leave out the racial (anti-Civil Rights) motivation which was a significant factor for some in leaving the PCUS.



One of the expressed reasons for James Kennedy's holding out on joining the PCA was that he wanted to make sure they carried through on promises that it would NOT be a segregated, southern church. 

Sure, there were segs who were in at the founding, but race was not a significant factor in the split - certainly ranking well behind theology and property as motivation. 

And, for the flip side of the coin, see how the PCA's growth stalled out when MNA shifted its focus to ethnic outreach from the suburban growth model.


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