Statement of Church Differences (2)¹

Four Churches – the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, the Free Church of Scotland, the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing), and the Associated Presbyterian Churches – all claim to be the rightful heir of the Disruption Free Church.

The Present Free Church of Scotland

4.2 The present Free Church of Scotland. The body presently called the Free Church of Scotland came into separate existence in 1900 at the union between the majority in the old Free Church of Scotland and the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Had there been no union, there would have been no body taking up the position of the present Free Church. This was conceded by Mr Salvesen (afterwards Lord Salvesen), one of the Free Church counsel, in answer to questions put to him by the Appeal Judges while the 1904 case was being heard in the House of Lords. Mr Salvesen said: “I think they (that is, the United Free Church) would have to rescind the union, because our view is that the union necessarily involves the abandonment of the principles of the Free Church; but if they rescinded the union and came back to the Church, of course they would be entitled to participate with the pursuers”.²

In other words, the Free Church counsel admitted in so many words that according to the case presented by the Free Church to the Law Lords, if it had not been for the union, no claim could be made for the property, and that the majority with the minority would have remained in possession of the property and been recognised as the legal Free Church of Scotland. There is, therefore, the greatest difference between the constitutional standing of the two Churches – Free Presbyterian and Free. The former came into separate existence in response to the passing of the Declaratory Act; the latter owes its being, as presently constituted, only to the 1900 union.

The 1900 Free Church of Scotland began its existence with the 1892 Declaratory Act on its statute books, and it hesitated to rescind that Act for several years lest, by so doing, it might invalidate its claim to the Church property. The “Constitutionalists” who had opposed the Declaratory Act prior to 1892 but who continued in the old Free Church, and who subsequently formed the new Free Church in 1900, argued that the Declaratory Act was ultra vires [beyond (its) powers], and that the Assembly had no power to pass such legislation. They therefore regarded the Act as “inoperative”.

The Declaratory Act undoubtedly was ultra vires, but it was certainly not inoperative, as was witnessed by the Assembly’s order that the protests against the Act that the Presbyteries of Inverness and Dornoch had engrossed in their records were to be deleted. As far as the admitting of unsound men to the ministry was concerned, the Act was in full operation in the old Free Church from 1892 onwards. Furthermore, the Declaratory Act had been sent down to the Presbyteries under the Barrier Act of 1697, and had been approved by the majority of them, and had therefore become a “binding rule and constitution” of the Church. Other Constitutionalists argued that the Questions and Formula used at the ordination and induction of office-bearers were unchanged. But the Declaratory Act, while it may not have changed the words of the Questions and Formula, changed the sense, which is the vital point. When a modernist probationer or minister signed the Formula after 1892, he did so with the liberty conferred upon him by the Declaratory Act, and this was understood to be the case by all concerned.

Office-bearers in the present Free Church profess unqualified subscription to The Westminster Confession of Faith, but some of the teaching of the Westminster Confession – for example, that the Papacy is the Man of Sin, that God is impassible [cannot suffer], and that the earth was created in six days – is openly denied and opposed in the Church. In 2010 the Free Church allowed the use of hymns and musical instruments in her public worship, notwithstanding the fact that all her ministers to that date had solemnly affirmed that they owned “the purity of worship presently authorised and practised in this Church” and would to the utmost of their power “assert, maintain, and defend” it – and that “present practice” had been explicitly defined in 1932 as being “to avoid the use in public worship of uninspired materials of praise as also of instrumental music”.

The Free Church of Scotland (Continuing)

1. The Free Church of Scotland (Continuing). This Church came into separate existence in 2000 as a result of a case of discipline in the Free Church of Scotland. A minority regarded the majority as acting unconstitutionally over the matter, and when they themselves were disciplined for maintaining this position, they separated and reconstituted themselves as the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing). Their constitution is that of the Free Church of Scotland at their separation in 2000, and is therefore subject to the various criticisms already levelled. In addition, in 2013, the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) adopted a “Right of Continued Protest” which allows parties to defy decisions of the supreme court indefinitely and without danger of discipline, if they consider those decisions to be unlawful.

The document defining this right is not part of the constitution of the Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) but is, nevertheless, used in the examining of students for the ministry. Among other things, it contains the erroneous statement that Rev. Donald Macfarlane’s “separation from the [Free] Church did not become effective until his signing of a formal Deed of Separation on 14 August 1893”. Mr Macfarlane’s view was that he separated when he protested on 25 May 1893, and his subsequent conduct bore this out. The 2013 document’s claim that a “Right of Continued Protest” has been the historic position of Scottish Presbyterianism was not sustained by the Scottish courts during legal cases between the Free Church and the Free Church (Continuing) in 2007 and 2008.

The Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland

1. The Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland came into separate existence in 1893, owing to the passing of the 1892 Declaratory Act by the Disruption Free Church of Scotland. In her Deed of Separation, the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland asserts:

That by passing the Declaratory Act of 1892 the present subsisting Church, calling herself the Free Church of Scotland, through her Assemblies, has, in so far as the said Church is concerned, destroyed the integrity of the Confession of Faith as understood and accepted by the Disruption Fathers and their predecessors, and instead of the Westminster Confession of Faith as the recognised Standard of orthodoxy in the Church, in all its heads and articles, has substituted what is called “the substance of the Reformed Faith therein set forth”.

Those who formed the Free Presbyterian Church believed that it was not scriptural to remain in ecclesiastical communion any longer with men who were denying central tenets of the Christian faith (which they had previously affirmed under oath), and who could not be subjected to Church discipline for this. The Free Presbyterians regarded the 1892 Declaratory Act as changing the real constitution of the Free Church. The Formula and Questions remained the same, but the meaning of the vows taken by office-bearers was different, in that the Declaratory Act released those taking the vows from committing themselves to the whole doctrine of The Westminster Confession of Faith. Furthermore, there were leading men in the old Free Church who were openly denying not only Calvinistic doctrines but even the inspiration of the Word of God itself; and events had abundantly proved that these men were beyond the reach of Church discipline. To remain in communion with them, therefore, was to partake of their sins, to mar the witness to truth of the Christian Church, to render Church discipline inoperable even at the congregational level (as the higher Church courts would not sustain that discipline), and to jeopardise the raising up of faithful ministers for the future (with young men being sent to study under heretical professors).

The separation of 1893 was a scriptural duty, and the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, therefore, is to be regarded not only as the rightful heir of the Disruption Free Church of Scotland, but also, through the Free Church of Scotland, as the rightful heir of the Church of Scotland from the days of the First and Second Reforms.

The Free Church Constitutionalists regarded the step taken by the Free Presbyterians in 1893 as a blunder, and those who had taken it as schismatics. When the 1900 Free Church moved to rescind the Declaratory Act in 1905 she inserted in the preamble the words, “This Church adheres as she has always adhered to her subordinate standards in terms of the Act 1846 anent Questions and Formula”, implicitly condemning the Free Presbyterian position. This condemnation is enshrined as a binding law and constitution in the Class I legislation of both the Free Church and the Free Church (Continuing) and constitutes an insuperable barrier to union as long as it remains. The Free Church at first sent several unsuccessful overtures of union to the Free Presbyterian Church, but of recent years she has diverged so far from the position of the Free Presbyterian Church that she has lost interest in these attempts.

Associated Presbyterian Churches (APC)

1. Associated Presbyterian Churches (APC). The APC came into existence in 1989 following a separation from the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. The immediate cause of this was the disciplining of an elder for attending a Roman Catholic funeral mass, whereas those forming the APC believed that the elder should not have been disciplined. The APC maintains that the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland has departed from the teaching of The Westminster Confession of Faith in the 20th chapter (on Liberty of Conscience) and the 26th chapter (on Communion of Saints). The Free Presbyterian Church maintains, on the contrary, that her practice accords with the historic position of the Reformed Church in Scotland while it is the APC that has adopted novel and erroneous positions which follow the prevailing religious fashions.

The APC claims to have the constitution of the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, but to this she has added a Deed of Separation of 1989 which qualifies her relation to her constitutional documents: “insofar as each and every one of these documents is consistent with the Holy Scriptures”. This Deed of Separation functions virtually as a Declaratory Act in rendering uncertain her commitment to these constitutional documents. Thus Liberty of Conscience is supposed to extend to things such as attendance at the Roman mass (which the Confession characterises as gross idolatry), while the Communion of Saints is supposed to require ecclesiastical communion with other Scottish denominations (even though this is inconsistent with lawful separation from defection and error).

The Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster

1. The Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster. The Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster was founded by Rev. Ian Paisley and others in 1951. The subordinate standards of the Church are the Westminster Confession and the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster “Articles of Faith”. The denomination takes no formal position on baptism, and in the absence of covenantal teaching on the subject, the position tends to default into that of adult baptism. At present there are a few congregations in Scotland.

The International Presbyterian Church

1. The International Presbyterian Church. The International Presbyterian Church was founded by Francis Schaeffer and has been active in England since 1969. There are also congregations in mainland Europe and Korea. In Britain, ministers and elders are required to subscribe the Westminster Confession and Catechisms (though they may list the doctrines that they do not hold, with the Presbytery then judging whether the listed omissions are acceptable), and on the Continent subscription is to the “Three Forms of Unity” (The Belgic Confession, The Canons of Dort, and The Heidelberg Catechism). Since 2012, several former Church of Scotland congregations have joined the International Presbyterian Church. For such congregations, this denomination represents a disregarding of the whole of Scottish Church history and a jettisoning of many of the attainments of the First and Second Reforms.

¹This is a further section of a document whose full title is: “Synod Statement of Differences Between the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland and the Other Presbyterian Churches in Scotland, Brought Up to Date (2019)”. The first section dealt with constitutional differences between the Free Presbyterian Church and the Church of Scotland, the Reformed, Presbyterian Church of Scotland, the United Free Church of Scotland and explained the position of the Disruption Free Church of Scotland.
²R L Orr, The Free Church of Scotland Appeals, Edinburgh, 1904, p 315.