# Validity of a Statement on Exceptions to the Confession of Faith



## Marrow Man (Aug 11, 2011)

The following statement was posted on a public forum by a friend (and fellow minister). I certainly do not agree with the statement, since it puts the confession in the dock and assumes that "exceptionalism" (I just coined that term!) instead of confessionalism is the default position. However, I am mainly inquiring as to the validity of statement by the church history professor alluded to. If someone could provide a quote or an anecdotal account, that would be appreciated. Other discussion on chapter 23 of the WCF might also be helpful.



> Indeed, in a Presbytery exam for ordination, one should be ready to defend exceptions. I would also add that one should be ready to defend a statement of full subscription to the Standards. In the ARP Church, chapter 23 on the Civil Magistrate has been rewritten to the point of being unintelligible. A statement of subscription to that chapter will leave us wondering as to whether or not you have read it. I am told that Westminster Theological Seminary Prof. Paul Woolley in his Church History classes told young men that if they said that they fully subscribed to the Confession of Faith and Catechisms without exceptions that they hadn’t read them! I agree!


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## NaphtaliPress (Aug 11, 2011)

Sounds like the standards in the dock to me. I can't speak to the comment on the ARP revision. Maybe posting that and the PCUSA and original might help? I don't have a problem with the quotation in the context of brash wet behind the ears young men; taking that and applying it to anyone taking a no exceptions stand, particularly mature men standing for ordination, is probably way out of the original context. It is also unworkable in putting confessionalism on its head. What's a presbytery to do with someone standing for ordination taking no exceptions? Go through each paragraph asking, 'okay, do you _really _take no exceptions here?' Develop a list of common exceptions and then grill them on them? That's making the common exceptions the constitutional standard instead of the confessional documents! When Samuel Miller stood for ordination he had one scruple, but he resolved and took no exceptions to the PCUSA standards of the time.


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## py3ak (Aug 11, 2011)

Are you looking for sources for the Woolley quote? I seem to recollect having heard this before, but it's been many years ago: it may have been cited in a piece by John Frame?

I'm sure there are people who read the Confession in sort of a skimming manner, not understanding the force or implications of many of the turns of phrase. Their agreement is a general, vague, "it sounds good to me," that requires little ability to appreciate or explain the details, as opposed to the main gist, of the individual chapters, or of their coherence. It's not surprising that people without practice in precise and systematic thinking wouldn't recognize the precise and systematic character of the Standards. And in that sense, I can understand Professor Woolley's remark. 

When I began to realize that the Confession wasn't haphazardly put together, but that the sentences had actually been carefully crafted as a scientific statement where each word had meaning, I had all kinds of scruples and quibbles and a few exceptions. But Woolley's words make me very uncomfortable, because the more I've learned of the meaning of the Confession, the more those scruples and quibbles and exceptions have diminished. Obviously when you are first introduced into a far more elaborate theological world than you've known before, it takes a while for you to get your bearings and figure out where you stand amid the new profusion of details, and so there are many things from which you withhold your consent until you have opportunity to consider them and their place in relation to the whole.

It's not too hard to identify yourself with the Confession as an evangelical, instead of a sacerdotalist, document; but the Confession has far more intricacy than that simple dichotomy, and it is unreasonable to expect people just introduced to that intricacy to immediately and unhesitatingly affirm every aspect of it. Indeed, it would be somewhat worrisome if they did, because it would not seem that they are taking time to search the Scriptures to see whether these things are so. So again, in that sense, I can appreciate the remark.

But it also troubles and annoys me, because the theological intricacy of the Confession is not puerile or jejune or obviously wrong; it is deep and coherent. And in that sense, it seems to me that taking for granted that there must be disagreements with the Confession, offhanded rejections of its intricacies, may be a proof of almost as much ignorance as those who don't realize that the intricacies are even there. I can live with someone who believes the Confession ought to be modified on one point or another; but the person who thinks this is patently obvious seems to me to lack so much appreciation for what the Confession is, that I wonder if he understands what he is rejecting.


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## ChristianTrader (Aug 11, 2011)

But isn't exceptionalism, the default position?


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## raekwon (Aug 11, 2011)

What's wrong with putting the Standards in the dock, if what we're cross-examining them by is the Word of God?


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## Andres (Aug 11, 2011)

raekwon said:


> What's wrong with putting the Standards in the dock, if what we're cross-examining them by is the Word of God?



Because the Word of God has all myriads of interpretations,understandings, etc. The confession which the denomination subscribes to is their summary of what the Word of God says, therefore it's only logical to expect men who desire to minister within said denomination to subscribe as well.


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## Marrow Man (Aug 11, 2011)

py3ak said:


> Are you looking for sources for the Woolley quote?



Yes.


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## Marrow Man (Aug 11, 2011)

raekwon said:


> What's wrong with putting the Standards in the dock, if what we're cross-examining them by is the Word of God?



Because that is not the job of a presbyter or a seminary professor, in my opinion. That is to turn confessionalism on its head, as Chris says above. And anti-confessionalism is the death of denominations. I am fine for a minister having scruples as long as he is examined on those scruples and it is acceptable with his presbytery, but I do not believe he should be allowed to teach contrary to the standards from his teaching ministry position, either in sermon or lecture or written word.


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## raekwon (Aug 11, 2011)

Andres said:


> raekwon said:
> 
> 
> > What's wrong with putting the Standards in the dock, if what we're cross-examining them by is the Word of God?
> ...



Of course, but since we're to be ever-reforming according to the Word, it'd seem to me that it's not only "okay," but our duty as office-holders to look at any subordinate standard as something that can either be 1) potentially improved upon or 2) be understood better -- admittedly, most of the time it will be the latter.

I'm not saying that we take the position some do of constantly looking at the Standards with a suspicious eye. By no means. Just that we maintain an awareness that they are indeed subordinate to Scripture. Of course, we can say that all day and all night, but I've seen at least hints of not really believing that here and there.


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## Marrow Man (Aug 11, 2011)

raekwon said:


> Of course, but since we're to be ever-reforming according to the Word, it'd seem to me that it's not only "okay," but our duty as office-holders to look at any subordinate standard as something that can either be 1) potentially improved upon or 2) be understood better -- admittedly, most of the time it will be the latter.
> 
> I'm not saying that we take the position some do of constantly looking at the Standards with a suspicious eye. By no means. Just that we maintain an awareness that they are indeed subordinate to Scripture. Of course, we can say that all day and all night, but I've seen at least hints of not really believing that here and there.



I don't recall anyone ever saying or suggesting that the standards aren't subordinate to the word of God. To suggest otherwise seems to be a strawman. If you have evidence of this, however, please present it.

There are procedures for handling revisions and amendments to the standards. They are handled by the church courts and with due procedure, and I've no problem with that. For instance, when the ARP church decided (for better or worse) to allow hymns to be sung in churches, the process went through the church courts and was approved at the Synod level. That is a far far different thing that for a minister to take a personal scruple and to teach his congregation a position contrary to the WCF because of it. It is an abuse of the teaching office of the church.

Let me use an example: suppose a minister is examined his presbytery, with his only two scruples being exceptions to the Larger Catechism's teaching prohibiting images of Christ, and a view of the days of creation that allows for theistic evolution. After much debate, the presbytery approves him. He has been honest and has given full disclosure. So, he is ordained and installed in his new church, and about a month later he begins a teaching series on Genesis that promotes theistic evolution (and he clearly teaches that the WCF is wrong in the process). He collects the sermons in a book and publishes them for more to read. Then he decides that worship will be more meaningful for the congregation if a life-sized "Jesus" statue is brought into the sanctuary. In both cases, it is the minister's own personal preferences and personal interpretations of Scripture which have taken precedence over the accepted standards of his denomination. And that is a big problem. It certainly doesn't sound Presbyterian.


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## py3ak (Aug 11, 2011)

Just to add to Tim's good points - of course you put the Standards in the dock when you open them and your Scriptures and ask yourself if you believe that they contain the system of doctrine contained in Scripture. But when you have once said that this is, in fact, what you do; and when you have joined and indeed become an office-bearer in a church that puts this out as their public statement of what the Scriptures teach -- then when evaluating whether someone lines up with the constitutional profession of faith of the church or not, you are not putting the Standards on trial all over again. 

The reason the Standards shouldn't be on trial in an ordination exam is that everyone there should already have evaluated them, and those evaluating the ordinand should be committed to them as an appropriate and adequate expression of their faith.


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## Semper Fidelis (Aug 11, 2011)

> Indeed, in a Presbytery exam for ordination, one should be ready to defend exceptions. I would also add that one should be ready to defend a statement of full subscription to the Standards. In the ARP Church, chapter 23 on the Civil Magistrate has been rewritten to the point of being unintelligible. A statement of subscription to that chapter will leave us wondering as to whether or not you have read it. I am told that Westminster Theological Seminary Prof. Paul Woolley in his Church History classes told young men that if they said that they fully subscribed to the Confession of Faith and Catechisms without exceptions that they hadn’t read them! I agree!


I find it more often the case that the Confessions are shown to be faulty when they are misrepresented. In other words, the Confessions assume a hermeneutic that is not practiced by the person challenging the Standards and so they are shown to contradict themselves. I think it is generally accepted that the Confessions are full of facile contradictions because so many prominent Seminary profs are wont to cast them in the worst possible light when proposing their own alternative to a clause in the Standards.


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## Marrow Man (Aug 11, 2011)

py3ak said:


> The reason the Standards shouldn't be on trial in an ordination exam is that everyone there should already have evaluated them, and those evaluating the ordinand should be committed to them as an appropriate and adequate expression of their faith.



Excellent point.


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## Scott1 (Aug 11, 2011)

raekwon said:


> By no means. Just that we maintain an awareness that they are indeed subordinate to Scripture. Of course, we can say that all day and all night, but I've seen at least hints of not really believing that here and there.



Actually, the Westminster Standards are received as a faithful _summary_ of what the Scripture says, by oath.

It's not really a matter of them existing independently, they are summaries, and they are what the church confesses, and the basis of its peace and purity, its doctrine.

If someone is not in good conscience willing to receive that confession, that basis of unity, they need to find another place they can.

Time tested, all.


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## MW (Aug 11, 2011)

Marrow Man said:


> I am told that Westminster Theological Seminary Prof. Paul Woolley in his Church History classes told young men that if they said that they fully subscribed to the Confession of Faith and Catechisms without exceptions that they hadn’t read them!



When I first read this I reacted with the thought that it is a disgraceful statement to make, if the representation is true and accurate. But then I remembered the context. We are dealing with a school that was born out of a particular struggle, and that struggle was fundamentally over the credibility of propositional truth. I imagine that if "propositional truth" was the exclusive focus of the statement then it could well be true. The problem with an exclusive view of truth as propositional is its dependence upon falsehood to demonstrate it. Propositional truth is born out of a context of theological debate. Falsehood rises and the truth is stated in contrasting terms. Given that mechanism, and given the fact that theological contexts change at different times and in different places, it is not surprising to learn that mid 20th century subscribers of the confession likely had numerous exceptions. That would be expected, of course, only insofar as the propositional nature of truth was divorced from its historical concerns. With the revival of contextual interest in truth claims the likelihood is that most subscribers to the confession can properly evaluate its claims and accept the propositional context of time and place along with the propositional content of its statements. It is now realised perhaps better than ever that truth claims require truth systems to evaluate them. In fact, that was the great contribution of another Westminster Professor in the mid twentieth century. With that vantage point most subscribers today can appreciate the Confession as part of a rich heritage of which they are beneficiaries. They can see the Confession in historical perspective and themselves in historical continuity with it. Its truth claims are not seen as requiring exception, but exposition. The statement of truth in historical context is understood to be the best defence against error.


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