Heartland Presbytery decides once in, always in

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An administrative commission established by Heartland Presbytery has rejected the requests of two Kansas congregations – one that sought to be dismissed from the Presbyterian Church (USA) to the smaller Evangelical Presbyterian Church and another that sought be dismissed to join the New Wineskins/EPC Transitional Presbytery – even though both congregations previously had voted overwhelmingly in favor of those actions.

On June 10, Hillsdale Presbyterian Church in Hillsdale voted 77-5 to request dismissal from the PCUSA in order to join the New Wineskins/EPC Transitional Presbytery. On June 24, First Presbyterian Church in Paola voted 200-81 to request dismissal with its property from the PCUSA in order to join the EPC.

What a difference from the attitude taken by a truly Christian presbytery like Beaver-Butler. The Heartland Presbytery should be ashamed but instead they are probably gloating. They should read over the Gospels and Epistles and determine who they are most like.

In response, the session of First Presbyterian Church, in a letter to the congregation signed by Clerk Pro-Tem Stacy Boan, wrote that:

"The Heartland Presbytery administrative commission met with the elders (session) of First Presbyterian Church on Sunday night, Sept. 9. We had hoped this meeting, our first face-to-face contact, would be a time to share the details of our current ministry and heart for Christ, to ask and answer questions about our mission, ministry goals and reasons for seeking dismissal to the EPC. We hoped to spend time considering the needs of all the members of the church in light of the understandable duties of the presbytery. Instead, we discovered that the administrative commission had already made up their mind - they had already reached a decision and had come to meet with us to tell us what they had decided.

There are times where I think the best thing to do would be to follow the Mexican bandit in Joe Kidd, "One day there was a fire."