The CRC's Clashing Confessionalisms

For those of you who don’t know, the Christian Reformed Church (CRC) is in the midst of a conflict over how to practice confessional subscription. At Synod 2024, it is quite possible that the conservatives will reassert the CRC’s official policy of requiring its ministers, elders, and deacons to unreservedly affirm all the doctrines contained in the church’s confessions, including the doctrine that homosexual sex constitutes unchastity. If they do, then it may very well mean a significant departure of predominantly ‘liberal’ or ‘progressive’ churches from the denomination. Of course, if Synod 2024 doesn’t do that, then the CRC is likely to see a significant departure of conservative churches. In short, there is no way out of Synod 2024 without someone walking toward the door.

Part of the challenge facing the CRC as it strives to have this conversation is that the CRC has not been of one mind about confessional subscription for quite some time. I agree with Harry Boer's observation in 1983 that there have been at least three approaches in the CRC toward confessional subscription since at least WWII. First, there is what we might call the 'old school' approach to subscription. This is the approach favored by many conservatives. It is the view that all the doctrines contained in the confessions fully agree with the Word of God and, therefore, are worthy of our faith, our promotion, and our defense. This view is the official ‘on paper’ view of the denomination.

A second approach to subscription is what we might call the ‘traditionalist’ approach to subscription. For those who prefer this approach, a minister’s subscribing to the confessions does not mean that that person agrees with every doctrine contained in the confessions. Instead, by subscribing, one is going through something of an initiation ritual. The minister is committing himself/herself to a community and to being in ‘dialogue’ with that community’s theological tradition. In the history of the CRC, George Stob, Harry Boer, Bob De Moor, and Nicholas Wolterstorff appear to have adopted and encouraged something like this approach.

The dangers associated with both the ‘old school’ and the ‘traditionalist’ approaches are well known. When it comes to the ‘old school,’ the danger is that the theological tradition will ossify; the community will not do the hard work of learning how to faithfully confess its faith in new contexts. Issues will be ignored. Questions will be suppressed. Challenges will go unmet. This danger is well-known, even to theological conservatives (such as myself).

The danger associated with the ‘traditionalist’ approach is also well known. All one has to do is look to the theological chaos that characterizes all of the Mainstream Protestant denominations (e.g., the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Episcopal Church, the Reformed Church in America). If the danger with the old school approach is that the tradition will ossify, the danger with the traditionalist approach is that the tradition will dissolve into an inchoate gob of goo.

Seeing the dangers of both the ‘old school’ and the ‘traditionalist’ approaches, a third approach developed in the CRC. And we might call this the “conformist” approach to confessional subscription. On this approach, those who have or come to have difficulties (of whatever sort) with the confessions are allowed to serve or allowed to continue to serve provided that they don’t raise a fuss. For officebearers this means conforming their writing, speaking, and living to the confessional teachings or, at least, not flagrantly going against them. Yes, technically you’re not allowed to serve, but, provided you don’t cause trouble, we will look the other way.

The danger that the conformists have discovered with their position over the last couple of years is that - without a formal church order mechanism to limit what doctrines a church may grant exceptions to - their approach can lead to the same danger that the traditionalist faces. What is good for the goose is good for the gander. If a conservative CRC looks the other way when a person doesn’t agree with the confessional teaching on infant baptism, or limited atonement, or reprobation, then on what grounds do they stop a liberal CRC from looking the other way when an officebearer doesn’t agree with the confessional teaching on unchastity or penal substitutionary atonement or whatever else?

The conservative conformists waking up to this problem is bad enough for liberal-leaning conformists and traditionalist as they head into Synod 2024. But what is making it all the worse is that some LGBT-affirming churches have made it very clear to both the old schoolers and the conservative conformists that they will not conform to community standards when it comes to same-sex marriage and ordination. The result is that the old schoolers and the more conservative conformists have found themselves pulled more and more into an informal alliance. And, if the vote tallies of the last two synods are any indication, that informal alliance is representative of somewhere between 60% and 70% of CRC officebearers.

What does all this mean for what will happen at Synod 2024? I don’t know for sure. But if my religion allowed me to gamble, I would put my money on things not going in favor of the liberal-leaning conformists and the traditionalists.