The regional bodies of the Presbyterian Church (USA), known as presbyteries, are sending less money to their headquarters.
According to the Presbyterian News Service, Christopher Nicholas, the financial officer for the Office of the General Assembly, told the committee overseeing that office that uncollectible per-capita payments for 2005 will exceed $400,000 for the first time in 10 years.
As of his report on Oct. 12, the amount in the arrears was $430,000 or 3.4 percent of the total $12.6 million presbyteries were asked to remit, the Presbyterian Layman said Tuesday. The apportionment to the presbyteries is based on a fixed amount for each member of a Presbyterian congregation as established by the General Assembly. The per-capita rate in 2005 was $5.46.
Somewhere between 25 and 35 of the 173 presbyteries are falling short because congregations are withholding payment because of opposition to actions of the General Assembly or denominational leadership.
The report to the Committee on the Office of the General Assembly included two "top-10" offenders: The 10 that owed the most money and the 10 that had the highest percentage lapse. An analysis of those two lists shows that the bulk of the shortfall came from presbyteries where there is strong opposition to many of the denomination's liberal policies, including the move by the 2006 General Assembly to allow the ordination of practicing homosexuals and adulterers.
3 comments:
Locally, about 12% of the churches in the Beaver-Butler Presbytery are withholding their per-capita from the General Assembly as a protest against liberal policies adopted by the PC(USA).
Another good article on this issue is at http://www.layman.org.
I appluad anyone who is willing to take a stand in such a way. Submit to authority untill that authority goes against the word of God.
Based on my experience in the PCUSA I would suggest that most of the shortfall is likely due to financial problems in churches.
Post a Comment