Posted on 05/18/2015 5:50:38 PM PDT by ReformationFan
Presbyterians Collapsing, or “Settling Into The New Thing God is Creating”?
The 2014 numbers reveal the PCUSA's largest statistical decline to date.
A slimmed-down Presbyterian Church (USA) is apparently getting ready for beach season after shedding unwanted excess members, according to a cheery report by the denomination’s top official.
“The PC(USA) is a church made up of vibrant congregations doing their best to live out the gospel of Jesus Christ in their communities and in the world,” an apparently unfazed Gradye Parsons, Stated Clerk of the General Assembly of the PCUSA, soothed. “Membership declines continue, but on a whole the denomination is settling into the new thing God is creating.”
In case Presbyterians are wondering what the “new thing” looks like, the PCUSA’s Office of the General Assembly revealed today a loss of 92,433 members (down 5.54 percent) to a total membership of 1,667,767 in 2014. The Presbyterian Layman has a thorough write-upon the increasingly negative trajectory that the liberalizing denomination finds itself locked into. (Incidentally, the Layman’s Carmen Fowler LaBerge notes a count of former PCUSA churches that joined the Evangelical Presbyterian Church or Evangelical Covenant Order of Presbyterians (ECO) in 2014. It exceeds the 101 churches officially listed as dismissed from the PCUSA in 2014, making us wonder if the congregation losses are in fact underreported).
The 2014 numbers reveal the church’s largest statistical decline to date. Last year, Parsons offered equally silly commentary on the losses.
“Yes, the numbers reflect a decrease in active members in the denomination,” Parsons acknowledged of the 2013 figures. “But the numbers also illustrate fewer losses than the previous year. The membership declined by 89,296 in 2013, compared to 102,791 in 2012.”
Now that the number of persons departing the denomination has increased from 89,296 to 92,433, and the statistical rate of decline has bumped from 4.83 percent to 5.54 percent, Parsons can no longer soothe fellow church bureaucrats in Louisville that decline is somehow slowing – it isn’t. For those keeping track, the PCUSA has lost a staggering 645,895 members since 2005, 28 percent of the denomination’s members having vanished. The PCUSA and its two predecessor bodies have been in decline since 1965.
The PCUSA’s rate of decline is now exceeding all of its Oldline Protestant peers. As IRD’s Alex Griswold wrote last August in the Federalist, every major American church that has taken steps towards liberalization of sexual issues has seen a steep decline in membership.
The Presbys have “The Ten Suggestions” like the Episcos, right?
“Shedding unwanted members.”
Yea,like the few there that actually believed the Gospel.
What’s left is a seething mass of homos and their enablers.
>>The Presbys have “The Ten Suggestions” like the Episcos, right?
Just the PCUSA “Presbys”. The orthodox Presbyterians of the PCA, EPC, and OPC are doing just fine with the Commandments.
PCUSA denies the Word of God, and is in denial of its own demise.
why would anyone waste their time belonging to a ‘church’ that is so clearly off the rails of Christian faith
especially when there are dozens of other churches available, both in and outside the Calvinist tradition, that still try to preach a genuinely Christian message
It’s like the Catholic church that my mother attends - you get the feeling that everyone is welcome except Catholics.
The place has a nice county club atmosphere,and no one ever says anything that will make you uncomfortable.They can settle right in and be comfortable with their sin.
In other news the Titanic has shed many unwanted decks, and the new swimming facilities are far more extensive. Also it’s sinking more slowly than it was earlier this evening.
Yup you got it. And it seems pcusa is embracing as many sins ( instead of sinners) as it can. A real loser of a church and one Calvin would have condemned outright.
To paraphrase Shakespeare, the fewer the members, the greater the glory each will share.
this reminds me of the old joke about the angry Episcopalian bishop that denounced Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ” for being blatantly pro-Christian.
;)
Is Parsons auditioning for Press Secretary at the State Department.
PCUSA. Gentle octogenarians in sweaters and polyester pants, who have never uttered or heard the words doctrine, wrath or propitiation.
Did this guy work for the Iraqi misinformation ministry some years back?
“Membership declines continue, but on a whole the denomination is settling into the new thing God is creating.”
Yeah right.. It is not something God is creating but something man is creating.
Remember, marriage on earth is to reflect our understanding of God’s marriage to the Church. God is the groom and, His bride, is the Church.
The Kingdom of God, only occurs with both, God and the Church.
It doesn’t occur, one, without the other.
Two men coming together in a ‘marriage’ suggests that God will be with Himself and doesn’t need the church.
Two women coming together in a ‘marriage’ implies that the church only needs the church and doesn’t need God.
Since marriage is such a powerful symbol from heaven, it is no wonder that Satan works so hard to distort this symbol on earth.
Not once in Scripture, does the man symbolize the church, nor does the woman ever symbolize God.
Does "vibrant" ever mean anything other than "full of leftist idiots"?
I bet there aren't even a third that many in the pews on Sunday.
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