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Joel said it right. I highly doubt that overtures 20-22 will be taken up. The current wording in the BCO is "failed to act" ie. they are unwilling to take a man to trial or examine his views. While many do not like the action of the PNW, It seems hard to suggest that they has failed to act.
Joel said it right. I highly doubt that overtures 20-22 will be taken up. The current wording in the BCO is "failed to act" ie. they are unwilling to take a man to trial or examine his views. While many do not like the action of the PNW, It seems hard to suggest that they has failed to act.
OK so the PNW "acted",so is this the end?
I've heard it from enough men that I know for that to be my read of the situation. Look, you can't even bring in evidence like Leithart's books into the SJC hearing to make the ruling. If the prosecution and the complainant are not up to snuff then it's not the SJC's job to do the "work" of overturning a Presbytery decision.
Earl, it may help you to think of it as somewhat similar to an appeals process in our state and national courts. If a man is put on trial and found "not guilty," he doesn't get subjected to the higher court putting him on trial all over again—calling new witnesses and examining further evidence. The appeals court can only rule regarding the evidence and processes at the original trial. This protects people from abusive prosecution and "double jeopardy." It's the sort of safeguard that's generally good to have in place. We don't want to go around saying, "Yeah, but we think this guy is clearly a bad dude, so in his case we need to break the rules." The rules are there for good reason.
And, as Rich pointed out, when a case is upheld at this level, it doesn't necessarily mean that the court is making a statement on the merits of the case or the guilt or innocence of the one on trial. It's wrong to read into the SJC decision that the PCA was ruling on Federal Vision thinking. That wasn't that committee's job.
Yes I can see where this can be a good thing if the PNW judges did a good job. I just reread Rich's post here and am almost afraid to read Lane's and Horton's entire testimony for I may burst a blood vessel knowing the defense swam to Rome from which I was delivered from.
I assume you meant the prosecution. Look, there are some really solid men on the SJC. They have, in the past, found when a Presbytery is presented with sufficient grounds to convict and ruled that they had failed to act so it's not as if the Presbytery is autonomous. Nevertheless, it appears that if the Prosecution blows it (as it appeared to have done in this case) then it's review of the proceedings isn't to re-try the case when they're reviewing it based upon a complaint. I don't know if one of the arguments that might be made for them to assume original jurisdiction is the idea that the prosecution can arguably be seen as incompetent to present the case (despite his protestations of competence to the contrary). After all, it seems odd to me that a man is on the one hand arguing in favor of WCF orthodoxy while he's in the process of apostasizing. Furthermore, his arguments about why he left makes me wonder how well he ever understood the system of doctrine he was supposed to uphold given how many strawmen he now erects against the system he claimed competence for.