Are PC-USA members Calvinists?

[Osage Bluestem]

Are PC-USA members still considered Calvinists? They seem to be shunned by most of the Reformed community. Someone says they are PC-USA and people think they either don't know God or lack the conviction to leave that liberal denomination.

 

[Apologetic_Warrior]

The short answer is yes. The long answer is, denominationally they are still Presbyterians, albeit compromised as a whole denomination. If we looked at PC-USA members as individuals, I would say the situation is a mixed bag. It would not surprise me if many members within PC-USA have if not a low value or low view of the doctrines or distinctions of Calvinism, have secretly if not publically given up, or compromised or merely pay lip service to doctrine they once held. On the other hand, there are still conservative Presbyterians that may or may not be members but still attend PC-USA Churches and are Calvinists in every sense of the word.

As for shunning etc. people are gonna be people no matter what denomination. Personally, I think the higher ground is attempting to "restore" a brother. Turning a blind eye, ignoring, and handling the situation without compassion or with an ungodly anger, only adds to the problem. Probably the biggest obstacle though has to be pride. How can we possibly follow the example of Christ and not love our brother? How is it we can love unregenerate ungodly heathen sinners, and not love our weaker brothers? Christ went even further and told us to bless those who curse us, to turn the other cheek, to love even our enemies. So even if liberal Christianity is an "enemy" for us conservatives, we're still commanded to love them. Sorry for kind of straying a little off topic.

 

[hedrick]

I'm a member of the PCUSA, on the liberal side. I still consider myself a Calvinist. So does my pastor, who is probably even more liberal than I am. I use the Institutes and Calvin's commentaries regularly as references. However I see the heart of Calvin's theology as being our union with Christ. His concept of atonement is unusually close to Paul's, and is based on this. However you can make a good case that the center for him was the glory of God. If you say that you have to be very clear what you mean by glory. There's an impression that God takes glee in damning people. That comes out of Calvin's statements that predestination further's God's glory. We need to take John's view of glory, where the key example of Christ's glory is the cross. Election is not the heart of Calvin's theology, although it's what he is best known for.

One of the issues with an innovative leader is whether to follow his beliefs or his methods. Imagine that we had two groups of scientists, both of whom honored Newton. One honored him by following the best scientific research, even when it comes to different conclusions. The other honored him by rejecting newer ideas such as relativity as unNewtonian. I actually agree with Calvin in many areas, probably most. But I see him as the Biblical scholar of the Reformation. His commentaries show a commitment to understanding the original context and meaning of Scripture, using our best knowledge. He is one of the few commentators who will reject an interpretation even when it supports his own ideas, because it doesn't agree with the likely intent of the authors. I don't believe we honor Calvin by sticking with his ideas in the face of better scholarship. Given his support for the new astronomy of his time, and what he says about science, it's also hard to see him supporting current conservative views on evolution.

The same issue is true of the Reformed tradition as a whole. How much are we reformed and how much are we always reforming? To me the Reformation was an exercise is reforming theology and the church based on the best Scriptural scholarship. The Reformation happened because in moving from Latin to the original languages, and in a renewed look at early Christian writers, it became clear that the Church had made mistakes. In the end we have the Reformers pitting Biblical scholarship against traditional views. It seems to me that a lot of the current debates are a rerun of the 16th Cent, with new insights in scholarship being rejected by a new equivalent of the Catholic Church that has committed itself to 16th and 17th Cent tradition. The arguments against modern critical scholarship sound exactly like the 16th Cent Catholic arguments against the Reformers. Both sides cite Calvin. But I think it's pretty clear he would not be happy with having his own views treated as a new Holy Tradition.

My take on election is somewhat ambiguous. I will admit that I'm not sure quite how far to push God's omnipotence. Are there things about the structure of the universe or meta-universe that are givens for him? Probably. But if he has anything like the kind of power that Scripture shows, then he has chosen to work in a way that does not result in everyone being saved. I think we have to assume that he is willing to accept responsibility for damnation as well as salvation. The pastoral view of election is that this is a consequence of the Biblical view that we should thank God for everything that happens to us. It is all intended to help us. Even the bad things. To take that view, we are assuming that God's will is involved in even evil, although he neither created it nor does it. He certainly doesn't force anyone to sin.

Calvin has an excellent defense of compatibilism, which I think successfully protects human responsibility even if you take a very strong view of election. But whether this is the right view is less clear. Whether God chooses specifically who will be saved, from the foundation of the universe, depends upon just how detailed his control is. There are some Biblical problems with the view that God creates some people specifically to be damned, although there are certainly passages in John and possibly Paul that could support it. I will admit to some sympathy with suggestions that God has specifically chosen to operate in a way that avoids complete determination. It's tempting for me, as a former physics grad student, to see quantum mechanics as showing that there is a genuine indeterminacy to the world.

 

[Elderone]

I am a reformed Presbyterian elder, a Calvinist, now, because of a move, serving as an elder in a small PCUSA congregation. There aren't any reformed churches within a reasonable traveling distance of our home and after more than a two year search my wife and I were drawn to this church.

To answer the OP question as to whether PCUSA members are considered Calvinists, my answer, for this congregation, is a resounding NO. When we started attending I seriously doubt they had even heard of Calvinism or Calvinists. They hadn't had a pastor for about 15 years; a college professor was giving the Sunday message which were, mostly, Christ centered but he suffered from the same aberrant beliefs as the members and attendees’. Those beliefs were, and still are for the most part, dispensational, premillennial, antinomian, free willism, one person who believes Christ was crucified and buried on Wednesday, and I may have forgotten some. The usual pap picked up from the “so-called” Bible teachers on TV. This amounted to no scriptural guidance. A congregation, or denomination, will have the same thing happen to it as a ship without a rudder, they WILL flounder, "flail helplessly", and eventually founder, "sink".

The PCUSA has for at least four or five decades been going liberal and it is to the point now that many congregations have had enough and are leaving the denomination. The sessions and congregations of the past knowingly or unknowlingly paved the way for this sorry condition by not adhering to Jude 1:10-16, especially verse 13.

 

[hedrick]

To answer the OP question as to whether PCUSA members are considered Calvinists, my answer, for this congregation, is a resounding NO. When we started attending I seriously doubt they had even heard of Calvinism or Calvinists. They hadn't had a pastor for about 15 years; a college professor was giving the Sunday message which were, mostly, Christ centered but he suffered from the same aberrant beliefs as the members and attendees’. Those beliefs were, and still are for the most part, dispensational, premillennial, antinomian, free willism, one person who believes Christ was crucified and buried on Wednesday, and I may have forgotten some. The usual pap picked up from the “so-called” Bible teachers on TV.

That probably reflects more conditions in your congregation than PCUSA theology. I don't think you'll find much interest in dispensationalism in the church as a whole. If there is "free willism" I think it's generally closer to mine: a concern about accepting complete determinism, but still an appreciation for our need for and reliance on grace. I've not run into PCUSA churches with the typical Arminian emphasis on God waiting for our decision.

One problem that a lot of denominations have is that members don't consider denominational identity as much as they did in the 19th or early 20th Cent. Both of us are committed to belonging to Reformed churches. But this is not the case for most of our members, including our elders. We try to provide education for members and specifically leaders. But we simply aren't going to be like a 19th Cent Presbyterian church, where everyone grew up as Presbyterians and were subjected to repeated diatribes against Arminianism.

It sounds to me like your church gets its theology more from pop culture than from the PCUSA. I have to wonder about the wisdom of your Presbytery in allowing a situation like this. What is *supposed* to happen is that when you have a lay leader they go through a fairly careful training curriculum, and get support from the Presbytery. I conjecture that this isn't happening in your church. Our church (which is an 800-member church in the Northeast with several pastors) would be significantly closer to mainstream PCUSA theology.

 

[GQ Chris]

anything tainted by liberalism spoils everything. Reformed circles are right to reject PC-USA.

 

[Radagast]

I'm a member of the PCUSA, on the liberal side. I still consider myself a Calvinist. So does my pastor, who is probably even more liberal than I am. I use the Institutes and Calvin's commentaries regularly as references...

When people say "Calvinism," they usually mean not so much the theology of Calvin, but the "Five Points."

 

[Elderone]

That probably reflects more conditions in your congregation than PCUSA theology

On its best day I have a very low opinion of the PCUSA's official understanding of the Bible and their theology.