Fourth Presbyterian Church, a prominent congregation in the Washington, D.C., area, has voted to pull out of the 3.1 million-member Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) (PCUSA). The congregation plans to join the 23,700-member Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPC).
From 1958 to 1981, Richard C. Halverson, now chaplain to the U.S. Senate, pastored Fourth Presbyterian. The church’s current pastor, Robert Norris, said his congregation voted 1,070 to 14 to leave the PCUSA. A decision is expected this month from the PCUSA to dismiss the Bethesda, Maryland, congregation, allowing it to retain its church property.
Norris cited three major areas where his congregation differs with the PCUSA: doctrinal differences over the inerrancy of Scripture; denominational efforts to control the life of the church; and disagreements over issues such as abortion and homosexuality. The congregation chose to join the EPC because of its commitment to the inerrancy of Scripture, said Norris. At the same time, he said, the small denomination offers “flexibility of debate on matters on which there is no clear theological and biblical mandate,” such as the ordination of women. With a congregation approaching 2,000 members, Fourth Presbyterian will rank among the top half-dozen largest churches in the denomination.
Not all evangelically oriented congregations want to leave the PCUSA, however. Theologically conservative Presbyterians have banded together in denominationally approved special-interest groups called Chapter Nine organizations. Matthew McGowan, executive director of one such group, the Covenant Fellowship of Presbyterians, said Fourth Presbyterian Church’s decision to leave the PCUSA represents “a big loss to the denomination. We are grieving that they’ve elected to leave us, because we need their strength.”
McGowan visits PCUSA congregations that are considering pulling out, and he offers them reasons to stay. “I sense a genuine evangelical renewal taking place at the grassroots,” he said. His organization receives four to six requests each week from PCUSA congregations that want to host lay renewal weekends. And in PCUSA seminaries, McGowan said he sees “a new hunger for spiritual formation, Bible study, and student-led prayer groups.”
