The Historical Function of Synods

[JP Wallace]

There is a historical piece to this in the Covenanter (RPCNA) and Seceder (ARP) traditions. I've come across the opinion (but can't recall where) that these bodies only believe that you can have a GA if you are the established Church in your nation - until then, the highest body you can have in a synod. In other words, the Covenanter and Seceder traditions regard “General Assembly” as only properly denoting an assembly representing a whole visible national Church (or "particular churches" as used originally in the WCF - see 25.4) and therefore used “synod” in the way that we use "denomination" today (a fragment of the visible Church). So when the RPCNA and ARP constitutions, for example, today call Synod the “highest court of the church,” they're not saying they don't believe in a GA but rather that they can't have a GA because neither are the established national church and thus the synodical level is the highest they currently can have. Thus the RPCNA and ARP are in this way acknowledging that they do not constitute the entire visible Presbyterian church in the land.

In other words, in the Covenanter (RPCNA) and Seceder (ARP) traditions, there was a belief (now perhaps lost or obscured) that a body which knows itself to be only a portion of the visible church in a land should not ordinarily style its highest court a "General Assembly," because "General Assembly" properly belongs only to an assembly representing the church generally in that land, rather than merely the particular denomination. So the terminology is important - it is purposeful and precise because it reflects the Covenanter/Seceder understanding of presbyterianism as catholic and visible. The position isn't “We are one denomination among many, and that's just how Presbyterianism works” but rather more like "Christ has one visible Church and the existence of multiple competing bodies in a land is a disorder that ought ultimately to be remedied."

I'm afraid I don't have any sources at hand to share, so this is at best my recollection of a topic rarely broached (and so happy to be corrected), no doubt because of its interrelatedness to establishmentarianism - it is a moot point for US denominations like the PCA and OPC who follow the American 1788 Confession and thus they have no issue with having a GA since they do not accept the idea of an established Church. But to those still holding to the original WCF and the Form of Presbyterian Church Government, I would argue that this distinction exists for a reason and is still important.

This is what I've been meaning to introduce to this conversation but haven't had time and I think it's likely better written than I would have written it anyway!

I think there is a widespread view that Synod are geograpically driven, or size driven, but my belief is (though I haven't found documentary evidence so it must be based on conversations) that our RPCI denomination stops at Synod level because the Reformed church is so fragmented that we cannot hold a general assembly, i.e in the establishment principle conceptual framework.

So for example in our Testimony it is rather clear that we are not against the idea of a General Assembly - denoted here by etc.

"Presbyterianism is that form of Church government exercised by presbyters or elders, among whom there is no distinction of rank or order. It is of the essence of Presbyterianism to recognise the authority of ascending courts, that is, Session, Presbytery, Synod, etc. The Reformed Presbyterian Church believes that this is the form of church government outlined in Holy Scripture."

At the same time however it says this: " The supreme court in the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland is the Synod which exercises authority over the Presbyteries, the Sessions and the Congregations."

So there must be an explanation for why believing in an " etc." we don't have one and I think Andrew's explanation is the correct one.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

It seems to me rather unnecessary to have to argue the name of the ultimate court in a denomination. The specific number and levels are not jus divinum but circumstantial and natural. As Gillespie said in a totally different context, we care about the thing not the name. So the OPC's GA and the ARP's Synod are the same thing by another name. So, some churches have GAs, some synods (and some SJCs ).

 

[Northern Crofter]

It seems to me rather unnecessary to have to argue the name of the ultimate court in a denomination. The specific number and levels are not jus divinum but circumstantial and natural. As Gillespie said in a totally different context, we care about the thing not the name. So the OPC's GA and the ARP's Synod are the same thing by another name. So, some churches have GAs, some synods (and some SJCs ).

The terms "General" and "Assembly" had very specific meanings (separately and together). You will find references to a "General Synod" in old Covenanter writings. And of course the gathering precipitated by the Solemn League and Covenant was the Assembly at Westminster. When the Form of Presbyterian Church Government according to the Westminster Standards speaks of "several sorts of assemblies, which are congregational, classical, and synodical," it states not only that "It is lawful, and agreeable to the word of God, that the church be governed by several sorts of assemblies," but it goes on to state that "scripture doth hold out a presbytery in a church" (and then goes on to provide Biblical proofs) and furthermore states that "scripture doth hold out another sort of assemblies for the government of the church, beside classical and congregational, all which we call Synodical" (again followed by Biblical proofs) before concluding: "Synodical assemblies may lawfully be of several sorts, as provincial, national, and oecumenical. It is lawful, and agreeable to the word of God, that there be a subordination of congregational, classical, provincial, and national assemblies, for the government of the church." So the Westminster Assembly is positing that there are different and specific Biblical levels of assemblies, and that they are more than just "circumstantial and natural."

Yes, they may be called by different names, but there is a difference between an ARP/RPCNA synod and a PCA/OPC GA due to the underlying authority assumed at each meeting. The PCA/OPC GA assumes a national authority (the "A" in PCA, for example) whereas the ARP/RPCNA assumes a regional authority (the "NA" in RPCNA, for example). This again reveals a difference confessionally (1647 vs. 1788) with regard to establishmentarianism and related Church/State matters. They may largely function the same way, but I cannot agree that they are the same thing by another name.

 

[EvanF]

I wonder when and why the terms "Presbytery" and "General Assembly" superseded "Classis" and "Synod" as suggested by the Form of Presbyterian Church Government. Depending on the time frame, arguments that "General Assembly" is tied to an established national church meeting might seem more or less plausible. The original reference to provincial, national, and oecumenical synods does somewhat explain why that term is not so uniformly applied today in all presbyterian denominations.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

The terms "General" and "Assembly" had very specific meanings (separately and together). You will find references to a "General Synod" in old Covenanter writings. And of course the gathering precipitated by the Solemn League and Covenant was the Assembly at Westminster. When the Form of Presbyterian Church Government according to the Westminster Standards speaks of "several sorts of assemblies, which are congregational, classical, and synodical," it states not only that "It is lawful, and agreeable to the word of God, that the church be governed by several sorts of assemblies," but it goes on to state that "scripture doth hold out a presbytery in a church" (and then goes on to provide Biblical proofs) and furthermore states that "scripture doth hold out another sort of assemblies for the government of the church, beside classical and congregational, all which we call Synodical" (again followed by Biblical proofs) before concluding: "Synodical assemblies may lawfully be of several sorts, as provincial, national, and oecumenical. It is lawful, and agreeable to the word of God, that there be a subordination of congregational, classical, provincial, and national assemblies, for the government of the church." So the Westminster Assembly is positing that there are different and specific Biblical levels of assemblies, and that they are more than just "circumstantial and natural."

Yes, they may be called by different names, but there is a difference between an ARP/RPCNA synod and a PCA/OPC GA due to the underlying authority assumed at each meeting. The PCA/OPC GA assumes a national authority (the "A" in PCA, for example) whereas the ARP/RPCNA assumes a regional authority (the "NA" in RPCNA, for example). This again reveals a difference confessionally (1647 vs. 1788) with regard to establishmentarianism and related Church/State matters. They may largely function the same way, but I cannot agree that they are the same thing by another name.

Yes; presbytery is clear from the examples the divines give, for instance, in the Grand Debate. The scripture warrant is for synods (greater courts), not the specific number and levels, which are circumstantial. If the Scots went for overkill, it was to see the same exact pattern adopted in Scotland as what nature prescribed. I think that is pushing divine right. The Independents complained that the reason for synods was the same for all levels of synods. See also the English Presbyterians' Jus Divinum. For English (i.e., Scots) speakers, the terms go back to the first and second books of discipline. Pressed for time so the following is a google AI cheat (AI can make mistates):
Yes, John Knox and the Scottish Reformers drew heavily on existing continental models, secular legal systems, and ancient church history. While they systematized these concepts into what we now know as Presbyterianism, they did not invent the structural framework or the terminology out of thin air. [1, 2, 3]

---

Local Level: The "Session"​

Before the First Book of Discipline (1560), the term "session" was not widely used for a church court, but the underlying structure and language were heavily borrowed. [1, 4]

• The Genevan Model: John Knox spent years exiled in Geneva, calling it "the most perfect school of Christ". John Calvin had already established the Consistory (Consistoire), a weekly court made up of pastors and lay elders tasked with church discipline. [2, 5, 6, 7]
• Etymology: The word "session" comes from the Latin sessio, meaning "a sitting" or an official assembly. [8, 9]
• Secular and Legal Roots: In Scotland and France, the word was already heavily used in secular law. Scotland’s highest civil court was the Court of Session (established in 1532). The Reformers simply borrowed a trusted legal term for a "sitting" of local judges and applied it to the local meeting of elders. [8, 10]

---

Regional Level: "Presbytery" and "Synod"​

The regional tiers of the church took longer to develop and were formalized primarily in Andrew Melville’s Second Book of Discipline (1578/1581), but the precedents were already firmly established. [4, 11, 12]

• Presbytery: The term comes from the Greek presbyteros (elder). Rather than a brand-new invention, Knox's early church used a system called the Exercise or "prophesying". This was modeled directly after Zurich's Prophezey (under Huldrych Zwingli) and Calvin's Congrégations—weekly regional meetings where local ministers gathered to debate scripture and examine doctrine. Over time, these theological meetings took on administrative power and were renamed "presbyteries."
• Synods: The term "synod" (from the Greek synodos, meaning "assembly" or "meeting") deeply predates the Reformation. Provincial and ecumenical synods were the standard governing tool of the ancient and medieval Catholic Church for over a millennium. The Scots adopted the term but stripped it of its episcopal (bishop-led) structure, turning it into a regional gathering of equal pastors and elders.

---

National Level: "General Assembly"​

The concept of a supreme national council was an expansion of both biblical precedents and contemporary European political structures.

• The Stranger's Church of London: In the 1550s, Polish Reformer John à Lasco ran a government-approved "Stranger’s Church" in London for Protestant refugees. His church featured a multi-tiered council system that Knox observed firsthand and utilized as a blueprint.
• The French Reformed Model: The closest institutional match for the General Assembly was the National Synod of the French Protestant Church (the Huguenots), which held its first national meeting in 1559—just one year before Scotland's first General Assembly.
• Political Context: The term "Assembly" also mirrored the Scottish Convention of Estates or Parliament. Because the early Scottish Kirk (church) was fighting for independence from a Catholic monarch (Mary, Queen of Scots), they deliberately formed a national "Assembly" that functioned as an independent spiritual parliament.

---

Summary Table of Institutional Lineage​

Presbyterian Court	Scottish Term Origin	Prior Direct Model
Kirk Session	Latin legal term for an official sitting tribunal.	John Calvin's Genevan Consistory.
Presbytery	Greek for "elder"; evolved from the Scottish "Exercise."	Zurich's Prophezey and Geneva's Congrégations theological meetings.
Synod	Ancient Greek/Catholic term for regional council.	Medieval Catholic Provincial Councils (reformed to eliminate bishops).
General Assembly	Parliamentary vocabulary adapted for church independence.	The French Huguenot National Synod (1559) and John à Lasco’s London model.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org
[2] https://www.thirdwell.org
[3] https://www.logos.com
[4] https://www.biblicalcyclopedia.com
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org
[6] https://billmuehlenberg.com
[7] https://www.quora.com
[8] https://opc.org
[9] https://www.scottishindexes.com
[10] https://victorianweb.org
[11] https://pcv.org.au
[12] https://www.youtube.com


On my circumstance law of nature point AI says,
Yes, you have hit on a foundational concept in historical Presbyterian and Reformed church government.
While Reformed theologians argue that the principle of regional church courts (synods) is directly proven by divine right (jus divinum) in Acts 15, they freely admit that the exact number, sizing, geographical levels, and meeting frequencies of these courts are matters of human prudence, circumstances, and the "light of nature".
The classical distinction breaks down across specific categories:

1. What is Proven by Acts 15 (Divine Right)​

Classical Presbyterians argue that Acts 15 provides a permanent biblical pattern for church courts. It explicitly establishes three major principles: [1, 2, 3]

• The principle of appeal: Local church disputes (like the one in Antioch) can be referred to a wider, external body of elders.
• The principle of regional authority: A broader council has the scriptural right to make decisions that bind multiple local congregations.
• The principle of unity: Equal elders from different regions meet together to deliberate and vote on doctrine and peace.

2. What is Determined by Circumstance and Natural Law​

The exact structure of modern denominations—such as having local Sessions, regional Presbyteries, broader Synods, and a single national General Assembly—is not mapped out line-by-line in Scripture. [4]
Instead, historical documents like the Westminster Confession of Faith (Chapter 1, Paragraph 6) explain that:

• There are "some circumstances concerning the worship of God, and government of the Church, common to human actions and societies, which are to be ordered by the light of nature and Christian prudence, according to the general rules of the Word."

Why the "Law of Nature" Applies Here​

Because God created humans as social creatures, the light of nature teaches us basic organizational logic. For example:

• Geography: It is logistically impossible for every elder in the world to meet every single month. Therefore, geography dictates that we create local, regional, and national tiers based purely on travel and size.
• Scale: If a church grows to millions of members, it naturally needs more intermediate "levels" of courts than a small church in a single city.

The Bible provides the theological blueprint (wider courts have governing authority over local ones), but leaves the logistical implementation up to holy wisdom, natural necessity, and orderly management.


[1] https://www.reformedclassicalist.com
[2] https://www.facebook.com
[3] https://cfc.sebts.edu
[4] https://mary.org

 

[CGS]

For information on the early history of the ARP, I recommend the book History of the Associate Reformed synod of the South by Robert Lathan. It's probably in your church library or you can find it on Archive.org or Google Books.

Yes, I have all of those red history of the ARP books, including the one you referenced, but I've never taken the time to read them.

 

[Jake]

Yes, I have all of those red history of the ARP books, including the one you referenced, but I've never taken the time to read them.

The Lathan book (1782-1882) is by far the best of them. Informative, well-written, and engaging. Covers an important period of history too.

 

[cthorn14]

The Lathan book (1782-1882) is by far the best of them. Informative, well-written, and engaging. Covers an important period of history too.

I agree, very engaging prose. In reality he goes back much further than 1782.

 

[DanM]

I recently learnt that the Presbyterian Church in Australia has separate 'General Assemblies' over each state and then the General Assembly of Australia as the highest court of the church. Would these state general assemblies be equivalent to the historical function of Synods?

 

[darrellmaurina]

In the for-whatever-it's-worth category, despite its relatively small size, the Canadian and American Reformed Churches do have particular synods as well as a general synod. The particular/regional synods make an annual general synod unnecessary, or at least less necessary.

Current practice (our Canadian Reformed brothers can correct me if I'm out of date on this) is for the general synod to meet every three years while the particular synods meet annually.

Everybody who knows me knows I'm not a big fan of government by broader assemblies, and as @NaphtaliPress correctly points out, the PCA has bigger fish to fry, but I wonder if a number of the complaints in the PCA that the denomination no longer has a deliberative general assembly could be addressed if, at such time as the PCA develops a common consensus on what the denomination's mission and vision should be, it went to a model of the GA meeting less than annually with regional synods meeting annually and handling much of the work that is now done by the SJC, and doing it deliberately.

Some things are going to get appealed to the GA no matter what, even in a well-functioning and unified denomination. Furthermore, right now, there are major problems in multiple presbyteries, or being raised by conservative presbyteries about national issues with the denomination's leaders, that simply MUST be addressed at GA. Implementing regional synods would be viewed as a "delaying tactic" to make it harder to get problems addressed by GA.

However, it seems to me that a significant amount of what now comes to the SJC and the GA has less to do theological conflict, but rather involves poor decisions by presbyteries or "normal" appeals in messy local church cases that, if appealed to a regional synod, could get fixed without taking up huge amounts of time at the national level.

Let's say the PCA had a half-dozen regional synods, which seems reasonable given its size and number of presbyteries. There would probably have to be a nongeographical synod for the Korean presbyteries as well.

If the regional synods met annually, and each of them had two or three or four major appeals from presbytery decisions, there would be time to deal with them on the floor without delegating most work to a synodical version of the GA's SJC.

There is no way for a denomination the size of the PCA to deal with twenty or thirty major appeals from presbytery decisions on floor of GA.

Cut that number down to one-fifth or one-sixth, and have the appeals handled by regional synods, and three things will happen.

First, the presbytery decisions which are clearly based on errors of fact or process can be remanded back to the presbytery and not take up any time at GA.

Second, people who believe they haven't been heard at the presbytery level due to some sort of animus against them, or just plain mistakes, will have a second look at their case. In our secular court system, a lot of decisions made at the trial court level get appealed once but don't ever get appealed beyond that, either because the appellant got what he wanted or because he said, "I struck out once, I struck out twice, maybe it's not worth it to keep fighting."

Third, if the general assembly sees a case in which the presbytery and synod both said the same thing, it will be inclined to give detailed consideration only to appeals where there were MANY dissenting votes at the presbytery and synod, or cases where the facts are so egregious that action is unavoidable because of a widespread belief that both the trial court and appellate court erred.

Now given the history of the PCA, this may be impossible or impractical, and possibly unwise and imprudent even if it could be implemented.

But what I've just outlined is the historic way that the four-court rather than three-court system worked in practice, and why it was viewed as helpful.

For what it's worth, the four-level system isn't unique to either the Dutch Reformed or Presbyterian church systems. Historically, Congregationalists had the local church, the regional association of churches, a state conference (or sometimes a regional conference if there weren't enough churches to have a state conference), and after the 1860s, a national council. There was also the German General Conference, a non-geographical conference for German-speaking Congregational churches. The UCC, after the E&R-Congregational merger, abolished the German General Conference but inherited from the E&R a Hungarian nongeographical synod of Hungarian Reformed churches, divided into several classes, which came to function as a non-geographical conference comparable to the old German General Conference.

 

[darrellmaurina]

There was some synodical overlap between the pre-merger constituent denominations and there were some segregated Black synods in the northern church

Yikes!

@WithinThePale : Just a note here on context. Today, segregation of minorities is widely viewed as a bad thing unless necessary due to language, or if, as in the case of the Koreans today in the PCA, CRC, and PC(USA), all of which have ethnic Korean presbyteries/classes, the minorities themselves want it.

However, in the 1800s, having a segregated presbytery or synod was an opportunity for minorities to develop and promote qualified men to leadership roles beyond the local church which they could not realistically have had as black elders or black pastors of a black church in a white presbytery.

Because people Google, I need to explain a bit more. My record on racial issues is crystal clear. I am absolutely not a kinist, or anything close to one, and am absolutely **NOT** defending segregation. I have an interracial marriage. I have served two churches in which I was one of only a few white people in the church. What I am saying that we need to recognize that the way we think of these issues today is not the way they were thought of in the 1800s, and unlike the secular context of Jim Crow where minorities were forced against their will into substandard schools and housing, in church life, it was often the minorities themselves who wanted the opportunity to have their own churches and their own leadership structures beyond the local church.

As I've said in my post above, ethnic-based churches and even groups of churches were once common, and not just for black people. The Christian Reformed Church had what was once a German-speaking Classis Ostfriesland, along with a German college and seminary. It still today has Korean classes and a Native American classis. The PCA today has its Korean presbyteries. Other examples could be cited in the Reformed world of broader assemblies/church courts for people of a different racial, ethnic, or linguistic group, including, way back in the Puritan era itself, the "English Synod" in the old Dutch de facto state church for English-speaking congregations in the Netherlands, and four different ethnic churches in London for Spanish, Italian, French, and Dutch Protestants.

Ethnic segregation in the church can be bad, and when forced, it almost always is bad. There are times, however, when the ethnic minorities want it that way.

Trust me on this. I know a thing or two about what it's like to be the one white face visiting a church and get singled out for special treatment. If for some reason I ever move to Korea on a permanent basis, which I don't expect would ever happen, the only viable opportunity for me would be find a church with a separate worship service for "neorang-mori" (i.e., white people), or start one in a sympathetic conservative Korean church that believed all the "outreaches to white foreigners" by other Korean churches in their area were watering down the Reformed faith.

It gets interesting to have a Korean tell me that "we can't expect those people to appreciate Reformed worship and the Five Points" and realize "those people" means white evangelicals who are in Korea for business, military service, or travel. Got it. The "tyranny of low expectations" is real, and more than one ethnic group can be harmed by the idea that "we can't expect as much of them." My usual response is to look those Koreans straight in the eye and say, "Do my short stature and black hair make me look Asian enough to 'pass,' or that maybe my mother was an Asian who married my father when he was in the military? You seem to have forgotten that I am Migukseram (American). I'm also Italyseram (Italian) and we're known for being rude, so let me ask you bluntly -- where did the missionaries come from who brought you the gospel?"

The usual response is to apologize and say, "That's not what we meant, you're not like other Americans." Great. So in their mind, most Americans are lazy broad evangelicals who don't think, don't value education, have low morals, have poor work ethics, and certainly can't be expected to learn something difficult like the Five Points of Calvinism. But I'm okay because, for whatever reason, my Korean wife with a doctoral degree decided to put up with me. Go figure.

(A side point here: No American would think I look Asian, but because I am Italian, a fair number of Asians do get confused and think I'm mixed race because I'm not tall and I have Southern European, not Northern European, features. I've had multiple people ask if I'm partly Japanese or partly Filipino or some other Asian ethnic group.)

Discrimination looks different when the shoe is on the other foot, but it's not pretty no matter who the target is.

 

[Edward]

, or if, as in the case of the Koreans today in the PCA, CRC, and PC(USA), all of which have ethnic Korean presbyteries/classes, the minorities themselves want it.

So, minorities can segregate but whites can't? What about areas (most major cities in the US) where whites are a minority?

 

[darrellmaurina]

So, minorities can segregate but whites can't? What about areas (most major cities in the US) where whites are a minority?

Actually, that's not my view. You're a lawyer and you know the US Constitution guarantees freedom of association. But given the history of the civil rights movement's legal victories to overcome Jim Crow -- a form of forced segregation which I absolutely **DO NOT** defend -- there are subjects that white men are the wrong people to discuss in our current political environment.

Promoting and encouraging Korean and Hispanic churches and church assemblies in the Reformed world is one "politically correct" way that I can point out that yes, culture DOES count. The Reformed faith is NOT tied to one ethnic group, but historically speaking it has radically transformed several ethnic groups. "Tighter than a Hollander" and "Strict Scotsman" are stereotypes that were generated, not by being Scottish or by being Dutch, but by being Reformed.

I want people to become Reformed no matter what their skin color or ethnic background or language. I also want them to evangelize their families, teach the covenant, and bring a Reformed view of family life and work ethics, as well as of soteriology, to their cultures.

That project depends on conversion, not culture, and on religion, not race, and it requires a constant emphasis on personal conversion of each generation. When churches fall apart, the culture falls apart. Very few people on the Puritan Board would view modern Amsterdam as a good place to live or raise a family, except as missionaries to a culture of godless apostasy.

Now as for areas in major cities where whites are a minority, I've lived in several of them where I was one of the very few non-black (Michigan) or non-Hispanic (New Mexico) residents.

Ethnic neighborhoods aren't new and they used to be widely understood in America.

It was only two generations ago when "Little Italys" and other white ethnic neighborhoods were all over our major cities. For a non-conservative but quite realistic take on the ethnic neighborhoods of an older Chicago, go read Mike Royko's "Boss." Written in 1971, I was handed the book by my father a few years later and told, "Read and learn." As a Republican politician who understood "old school" ward politics from the inside, having left the Democrats to become a Republican due to the anti-military and anti-patriotic (and bluntly, anti-American) turn of the Democratic party, he brought the Democratic model of ward organizing to the Republicans and eventually became head of the Republican Party in Grand Rapids.

We still have one of those ethnic neighborhoods in St. Louis -- "The Hill" -- which periodically gets bashed by people who know its history and WHY it retained its ethnic character when most of St. Louis' ethnic neighborhoods collapsed and turned into crime-ridden nightmares. Let's just say Italians may not call 911 to deal with a crime problem. There's an area of metro Kansas City which is less identified as ethnic because it doesn't promote itself for tourism, but the "we take care of our own problems" attitude is similar.

If people want to live together, I'm fine with that.

If people want to say, "You can't live here, you're the wrong race," that's a problem.

 

[EvanF]

So, minorities can segregate but whites can't? What about areas (most major cities in the US) where whites are a minority?

Looking at our churches, it seems pretty obvious that whites do segregate just like other ethno-cultural groups, and even subgroups within the "white" category segregate. That doesn't necessarily mean exclusion of others, but others aren't necessarily excluded from Korean or Hispanic churches either.

 

[darrellmaurina]

Looking at our churches, it seems pretty obvious that whites do segregate just like other ethno-cultural groups, and even subgroups within the "white" category segregate. That doesn't necessarily mean exclusion of others, but others aren't necessarily excluded from Korean or Hispanic churches either.

@EvanF is right, and when that association is voluntary, it's fine. It may be helpful in convincing people from a traditionally non-Reformed culture that, "Yes, you can be Hispanic and Reformed," or even essential, as in reaching an immigrant ethnic group where the language and culture make separate churches a missionary imperative.

The key is not EXCLUDING people from a church based on race.

The Apostle Paul had a few things to say about that which were inspired. Literally.

You mentioned exclusion of others from Korean and Hispanic churches. While some of that DOES happen, mostly it's a byproduct of culture and language, barriers which can be and sometimes are overcome by marriage by or learning the language, and are not deliberate exclusion. I've had people feed me the hottest and spiciest thing on the table at a Korean post-worship meal (most Korean churches serve meals after worship) and were shocked when I could eat it and actually liked it. "Are you sure you aren't at least partly Korean?" one woman said to me. "Yes, halmonim (grandmother)," I said. "I'm not Korean, but we Italians eat many of the same foods, and make them spicy too, we just use different recipes." For me, it was a funny joke to see if I could eat VERY spicy Korean food. There are people who would consider it deliberately offensive and saying, "You don't belong here if you can't eat our food."

A little bit of patience goes a long way. I'm not going yell "microaggression!" at an elderly Korean woman who thought she was playing a funny joke on me, and then was shocked I actually could not only eat the food but liked it.

However, there's a problem when I am told -- and yes it has happened, and happened repeatedly, "You can't be Reformed. You're not Dutch!" I don't mean the Dutch were saying that I shouldn't be in their churches (though that also happened). I mean non-Reformed people in the broader West Michigan community, people who lived in a community where the religious identity was so closely tied to racial and ethnic identity in the public mind that they simply couldn't understand that somebody could be theologically Reformed but not Dutch.

As I periodically had to say, in Dutch, "Ware Gereformeerden, nein Hollandse" (truly Reformed, not Dutch).

That's a problem. Not just a Dutch problem. Go ask how many Italians are not Roman Catholic, and then ask how many of the non-Catholics are attenders of ANY church.

It's far easier to be an unbelieving Italian than a believing Italian Protestant. To leave the Roman Catholic Church and become an evangelical of any type, for many Italians, is to leave their entire culture and extended family, and maybe even close family members.

As for Calvinist Italians? The total number in Italy is probably at best a few tens of thousands in a population of 59 million, and that includes people who most of us on the Puritan Board would not consider confessionally Reformed or even evangelical.

The land of Vermigli, Turretin and Zanchius is not going to be reached by people who don't look, act, and speak Italian. Culture counts.

That's why I support ethnic churches, classes, presbyteries and associations.

 

[Edward]

go read Mike Royko's "Boss."

Required reading in on of my Journalism classes.

 

[andrewnrice]

Everybody who knows me knows I'm not a big fan of government by broader assemblies, and as @NaphtaliPress correctly points out, the PCA has bigger fish to fry, but I wonder if a number of the complaints in the PCA that the denomination no longer has a deliberative general assembly could be addressed if, at such time as the PCA develops a common consensus on what the denomination's mission and vision should be, it went to a model of the GA meeting less than annually with regional synods meeting annually and handling much of the work that is now done by the SJC, and doing it deliberately.

Some things are going to get appealed to the GA no matter what, even in a well-functioning and unified denomination. Furthermore, right now, there are major problems in multiple presbyteries, or being raised by conservative presbyteries about national issues with the denomination's leaders, that simply MUST be addressed at GA. Implementing regional synods would be viewed as a "delaying tactic" to make it harder to get problems addressed by GA.

Now given the history of the PCA, this may be impossible or impractical, and possibly unwise and imprudent even if it could be implemented.

I think having synods would be a great thing for the PCA, because at this point, the General Assembly is very large and is going to get bigger. Dr. Morton Smith identified this issue nearly twenty years ago. In my opinion, having synods would relieve that pressure. However, now is not the time for this drastic change, especially since it would have to be adapted somehow to how we operate, which might take a long time, and there are bigger fish to fry as Mr. Coldwell already pointed out. I can understand the apprehension about the idea of synods in the PCA, but the major errors that Dr. Smith identified that led to the decline of the PCUS were started through Ernest Trice Thompson training men to reject Biblical inerrancy and installing a rotational elder system. Moreover, if I remember correctly, he even said that a delegated assembly was not what led to the liberalism in the PCUS. My concern would be that synods could foster greater disunity in the PCA at this time, but that's just my opinion. I also think it would be better for the PCA to revert to a Committee on Judicial Business (or some other name, but serving the same function as it used to before 1989), although I am not as opposed to a Standing Judicial Commission as Mr. Coldwell is.

 

[NaphtaliPress]

I think having synods would be a great thing for the PCA, because at this point, the General Assembly is very large and is going to get bigger. Dr. Morton Smith identified this issue nearly twenty years ago. In my opinion, having synods would relieve that pressure. However, now is not the time for this drastic change, especially since it would have to be adapted somehow to how we operate, which might take a long time, and there are bigger fish to fry as Mr. Coldwell already pointed out. I can understand the apprehension about the idea of synods in the PCA, but the major errors that Dr. Smith identified that led to the decline of the PCUS were started through Ernest Trice Thompson training men to reject Biblical inerrancy and installing a rotational elder system. Moreover, if I remember correctly, he even said that a delegated assembly was not what led to the liberalism in the PCUS. My concern would be that synods could foster greater disunity in the PCA at this time, but that's just my opinion. I also think it would be better for the PCA to revert to a Committee on Judicial Business (or some other name, but serving the same function as it used to before 1989), although I am not as opposed to a Standing Judicial Commission as Mr. Coldwell is.

Synods may be useful but this won't solve problems but will just add layers of unworkability. To streamline costs, reobtain true court function, cut down on using overtures to solve issues, it is already the hardest working committee each year, and become Presbyterian again, go to a delegated assembly. If folks insist on a convention, hold that once every five or ten years, but it is not a biblical function and the amount of money is criminal that it takes to do that annually.