Further Change in the Free Church
A few months ago, the Kirk Session of the Bon Accord Free Church in Aberdeen issued a “strategy document”, giving as a reason that “every organisation – including a local congregation like Bon Accord – needs a strategy that outlines its objectives and provides direction as to how those objectives are to be met”. The document is partly in response to a Presbytery visitation in 2015 which detected “a feeling among many that [Bon Accord] was going through the motions” and that “there was little evidence of meaningful interaction (on the part of the leadership) with the congregation on matters of vision and strategy”; and partly because the congregation has recently completed an expensive refurbishment of its building. Among the “objectives” of the congregation, the strategy document lists preaching and teaching, proclaiming the good news of the gospel, and being a prophetic voice in society.
For corporate worship, the primary purpose is “to gather believers for the worship of God allowing us to praise, pray, and be instructed, equipped, and enthused for service,” with an important secondary purpose being “to provide opportunity for unbelievers to participate in our worship services and so hear the gospel message and witness gospel life”. The document identifies one needed change, which is “to make our worship services more accessible while maintaining our commitment to Biblical worship”. The people who may find the present corporate worship unduly inaccessible are “outsiders (visitors from other church traditions and those who make no Christian profession)”.
Let us consider then an “outsider” from a conservative Presbyterian “church tradition” (which until recently would have described the Free Church) who happens to enter Bon Accord on the Sabbath. He wears the ordinary formal dress of his day – a suit and tie – but he notices that hardly anyone else regards the occasion as formal enough for such clothing. His wife and daughters are in hats, in obedience to the timeless injunction of 1 Corinthians 11, but they are virtually the only women so dressed. He hears musical instruments playing, which makes him uncomfortable when he remembers the opposition to such things in the Scottish Church from the Reformation onwards, the silence of the New Testament, and the ordination vows taken by most Free Church office-bearers. Though familiar with the 1650 Psalter (authorised by the General Assembly, which discharged the use of any other Psalter), he does not recognise the version of the few psalms that are sung, and he does not feel able to join in with the numerous hymns. Following the biblical practice, he stands for prayer (which is in the unfamiliar “you” form, popularised in the later twentieth century) but finds that he alone is on his feet. The version of the Bible jars on him, as the work of someone with no ear for the English language, and betraying signs of a faulty textual base.
The visiting preacher refers, perhaps, to the Pope as “a Christian brother”, or speaks of the suffering of the Father in the death of His Son. At this point, it may be, our visitor, shocked by the false doctrine, the blasphemy, and the unfaithfulness to ordination vows, walks out; wondering to what extent he and some of these people are of the same religion. There was perhaps not one thing in the service that was unchanged from 30 years ago.
Many aspects of the “strategy document” are commendable – whatever the wisdom of producing such a document may be – but the Aberdeen Free Church Kirk Session should consider the offence that they are giving to conservative Christians, even of their own denomination, by their modernising and schismatic practices. The biblical strategy would be for them to put the helm hard over and return to “the old paths and the good way” (Jer 6:16).
DWBS
Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill
In January the Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill had a second reading in the House of Lords. Introduced last year by Baroness O’Loan, it seeks to protect the conscience rights of all medical practitioners – and to ensure that they are not discriminated against over their objections to “end of life practices”. It specifically highlights abortion, withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment, and actions under the provisions of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act (1990).
Nuala O’Loan has had her moments of controversy in Northern Ireland’s politics but her commitment to the pro-life cause seems without question. In 2014 – shortly after being appointed – she resigned, on conscientious grounds, from a prominent medical ethics committee of the British Medical Association – on discovering that one of its aims was to extend the British Abortion Act of 1967 to Northern Ireland. She said, “I felt immediately that I had to step down . . . there is no space for a dissenting decision”.
She believes that the basic nature of human life from conception is “something which is fundamental to my whole set of belief values, so I could not go ahead to subscribe to any response . . . which is the extension of the Abortion Act in all its terms to Northern Ireland”. She said she will continue to “express [her] views on abortion in the House of Lords and I have already done so”. The current Bill is the result.
Her contention is that many medical professionals are being pressurised into compromising their beliefs. Some young doctors, she said, believe that they simply cannot take up employment in, for instance, obstetrics and gynaecology, because they feel they will be thwarted in their career prospects if they refuse to participate in arranging or performing abortions. She adds, A “lack of conscience rights is putting people off joining some areas of the medical profession . . . so there is a pressing need for statutory rights which actually protect those who need protection”.
The 1967 Abortion Act allows for conscientious objection, specifying: “No person shall be under any duty, whether by contract or by any statutory or other legal requirement, to participate in any treatment authorised by this Act to which he has a conscientious objection: provided that in any legal proceedings the burden of proof of conscientious objection shall rest on the person claiming to rely on it” (Abortion Act 1967; Section 4 (1) (The Conscience Clause)). But, in practice, some doctors and nurses do face discrimination when they refuse to become involved, even indirectly, in procedures that end in a termination.
In 2014, the Supreme Court overturned a ruling by the Court of Session, which had decided in favour of two Scots midwives who conscientiously refused to supervise staff who were working under them while performing an abortion. The Supreme Court disregarded the midwives’ rights, and overturned the Court of Session’s decision, concluding that the conscience provision in the Abortion Act 1967 did not cover this aspect of their employment. Sadly it appears inevitable, in the current moral climate, that the rights of health care workers will be violated in other areas also. Doctors and nurses report facing discrimination in their professional lives when they conscientiously object to the withdrawal of food and fluid from a dying patient in end-of-life care. Pharmacists also were recently threatened with guidelines that would force them to provide drugs that bring about an abortion.
Dr Mary Neal, a leading conscientious objection expert and lecturer at Strathclyde University, lends her support to the Bill, saying, “There is a pressing need for statutory conscience rights which actually protect those who need protection. The current law fails to do this; so this Bill is a necessary and timely step.”
Thirteen peers spoke in support of Baroness O’Loan’s Bill, but ten spoke against it. It is telling that several of those who opposed the Bill said that they had been briefed by the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), and Dignity in Dying. One opponent was Baroness Barker, spokeswoman for the Liberal Democrats, who said it was “thoroughly disingenuous” and another, Baroness Thornton, said it “flies in the face of Labour Party policies”.
The Government spokeswoman in the House of Lords, Baroness Chisholm, confirmed that in all matters of conscience, the Government took a neutral position. The Bill will now proceed to the Committee stage for further discussion. Certainly the current law is woefully inadequate to protect medical workers – and clearly certain areas of specialist healthcare, such as obstetrics and gynaecology, are becoming extremely difficult to work in with a clear conscience.
Of course the fundamental matter is that God requires “all lawful endeavours to preserve our own life, and the life of others” – from conception to old age. Woe to those nations which have such blood on their hands, implementing practices to end life which are diametrically opposed to God’s holy law. They are then putting pressure on those who question such actions to conform to their secular values. We should pray for God’s Holy Spirit to give us tender consciences in seeking to follow Him and pray that laws will be enacted to protect life – not to take it away. Those who hold Christian values in the medical sphere need our support to be allowed to act according to their informed consciences. We hope and pray that this Bill will eventually become law.
KHM