My reflections on General Assembly can be found on pccweb.ca/presbyterianrecord. In this space I’d like to share a conversation I had on the plane with a commissioner.
The lady sitting beside me is a Mom and Grandmom from a central Ontario town. Her husband passed away some years ago and she lives in an apartment. Her sons live in near enough towns. The trip to Cape Breton was her third by plane; the others were vacations to the United States. It was obvious she was anxious about flying but she had a healthy sense of humour about herself.
This was her first time at General Assembly and she said she learned a lot. She enjoyed following the debates and the conversations but was confused by the process, though she is familiar with Robert’s Rules. The process of amendments and discussion, amendments and discussion, is not always easy to follow, particularly in a big room with hundreds of people involved. Motions can often be stacked several deep and it’s a challenge to track them up and then clear them in order. Even the pros drop a motion in the process now and then.
I asked her if she was involved in her presbytery, since, obviously she was at assembly because she was a representative elder. She said, “Yes, I go to their meetings.” When I made a joke of her use of “their” she laughed and quickly changed it to “our.” But it was a quick peak into her world view.
Before I proceed further with this story let me make it clear: I believe this lady to be a representative presbyter of our church. We often make fun of women like her; we joke about the aging of the membership. But this lady, and women like her, have spent a lifetime doing the practical work of the church: they make the sandwiches and provide a lot of the pastoral care and teach the children and do the clothing drives and other fundraisers and much, much else. They are the front line workers of local congregations, the ones we take for granted. Somebody still needs to get their hands dirty in congregational life and women like this lady have been doing that for decades.
So, needless to say, for my seatmate on the plane, presbytery is an outsider; her primary loyalty is to her congregation and the church building where it meets. She was baptized and married in that church. Her husband is buried in the adjoining graveyard where she expects to join him several decades from now. Her children (who no longer go to church) were baptized there.
This is her church; her identity as a Presbyterian (a title she wears proudly) starts with that building and that congregation. And both are vulnerable. On a good Sunday there might be a dozen in the pews; most Sundays see less than half that number. The building is paid for, of course, but it needs work and needs to be heated. There is no minister, though they do have a lay minister. My seatmate occasionally takes the pulpit. (She once overheard one of her sons brag on her sermon to a friend and she’s very proud of that!)
Lest you think this is another dead-end story; not true. This little, faithful, aging band of presbyters is involved in a labour-intensive mission which reaches the needy around the world. They also host successful community suppers, none of which has resulted in a new member.
So, let’s put this together: Hardworking but aging members, who pastor to each other, are local in their loyalty but international in their reach. They are faithful but somehow have not been able to pass the church-going habit to their children. They realize they are in love with their own history but can’t always overcome that intellectual knowledge to undo the symbols of the past (amalgamate, sell the building, etc.). They are warm and hospitable people but cannot convert that into membership.
Sound like anyone you know?
