Presbyterians Debate Union

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30900, 5 November 1965, Page 1

Presbyterians Debate Union

(N.Z. Press Association) DUNEDIN, Nov. 4.

Demanding to know why an important committee could be influenced by a group with no official standing in the Church, the Rev. L. Geer i n g sparked off the first of the debates on church union when the General Assembly resumed in First Church today.

Mr Geering, principal of the Theological Hall in Dunedin, was objecting to recommenda-

tions from the convener of the church union committee after discussions with representatives of the Westminster Fellowship at a function in the Presbyterian Church last night. As a result of this meeting, the convener, the Rev. D. J. Brown, of Wellington, asked the assembly not to approve his committee’s recommendations regarding the Statement of Faith of the Doctrine and Practise of Baptism of the Ministry of the Church, of an Act of Unification and of Probationary Ministry but merely to receive them with a view to referring them to presbyteries and sessions for discussion.

“Nothing will be lost in a fuller discussion of these matters,” he said.

Supporting Mr Geering, the Rev. O. Robinson, of Geraldine, said it was time to come to grips with the question of church union.

At assembly after assembly these great issues had been constantly postponed by various legal subterfuges. As a member of the Westminster Fellowship and one who was not happy or convinced by the findings of the church union committee, the Rev. C. L. Gosling, of Wellington, appealed to members to debate this important matter without bad temper or heat.

To the younger ministers, inclined to be a “rabble-rous-ing” element with feet stamping and hand clapping he said: “Even if you disagree with opinions of a minority

group behave with dignity and restraint.” Mr Brown’s move to alter the recommendations was defeated on a show of hands and he continued with his presentation of the report from the church union committee.

The committee felt he said that a point had been reached where a basis of union could be produced to other churches. The deep issues of doctrine, sacrament and ministry had been studied by 16-man working teams which found that there were no insuperable barriers to union and that they would now put forward in broad outline a way ahead.

The church union committee’s report was then reI ceived.