Ecumenicity begins at home, among brothers of the same household. No doubt the greatest obstacles often appear there too, and that brings with it the temptation to look for closer relations with more distant relatives. But that does not make it right.
In 1972 Synod ceased any kind of official contact with the Canadian Reformed Churches and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and the same Synod initiated closer contact with the Reformed Church in America. Synod 1973 continued this course of action. It is not my intention now to discuss the rightness or wrongness of this action. I only want to raise a point in connection with the Canadian Reformed Churches.
Here, as with many other things, an ounce of prevention would have been worth a ton of cure. Once ecclesiastical walls are built up, it is exceedingly difficult to break them down again. I submit that in the case at hand the Christian Reformed Church could have done much to prevent the wall from forming in the first place.
Let me explain. I have just finished reading the latest book by author Rudolf Van Reest, a vrijgemaakte [liberated] brother in Holland. In this book, entitled Terugzien Na Viifentwintig Jaren, the author describes his second trip to Canada and the U.S., twenty-five years after the first trip. Tn the book he deals chiefly with church life in our two countries, and in the course of the book he also incorporates a good deal of interesting church history. In outlining the history of the Canadian Reformed Churches, he refers to the following announcement which appeared in The Banner of August 8, 1947:
COSISTORIES, ATIENTION!
Reliable sources of information state that Prof. Dr. K. Schilder and Rev. D. Van Dyk expect to arrive in our country some time in the month of August to engage in preaching and in speaking engagements to provide information as to the schism which occurred in the “Gereformeerde Kerken of The Netherlands” and led to the organization of a new denomination known as the “Gereformeerde Kerken maintaining Article 31.” We beg to inform our consistories and churches that we do not maintain church correspondence with the denomination to which Prof. Dr. K. Schilder and Rev. D. Van Dyk are affiliated, and therefore do not recognize this new denomination as one of our sister churches, and consequently cannot invite their ministers to speak or preach in our pulpits.
By order of the Synodical Committee,
R. J. Danhof, Sec’y.
In this way, says Van Reest, the church doors which were still wide open in 1939 had now suddenly been slammed shut, and he describes this action of our church as having a hierarchical character to it.
I am inclined to agree with him completely! Not only was it hierarchical, it was no less than scandalous, and unbrotherly to the extreme, the more so in the light of what Synod said a few years later about this matter. In reply to a letter received from some brothers in Neerlandia, requesting Synod to investigate the rupture which had taken place in the Gereformeerde Kerken in Holland, Synod said, “It is not in our province to sit in judgment over these churches” (Acts 1950, p. 68). In actual fact, however, Synod had already judged the case and taken the side of the so-called “synodale” [synodical] churches. While pretending to be neutral, Synod actually condemned the Schilder group. And it is this action which precipitated the formation of the Canadian Reformed Churches. Had Synod in fact been neutral, quite possibly there would today be no Canadian Reformed Churches.
True enough, one can say that this action in itself was not sufficient reason to start a separate church. But anyone who knows a little about the strong feelings generated by the schism in Holland will be able to understand the action of these brethren.
How unecumenical the Gereformeerde Kerken were at that time! Today, however, a false ecumenicity is opening the doors wide on all sides. Are we following their example? It would seem to me that the Christian Reformed Church could take a genuine ecumenical step today by admitting guilt here, and rescinding these wrong decisions. An official act of repentance even at this late date would be wholly in order.
In 1972 Synod ceased any kind of official contact with the Canadian Reformed Churches and the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, and the same Synod initiated closer contact with the Reformed Church in America. Synod 1973 continued this course of action. It is not my intention now to discuss the rightness or wrongness of this action. I only want to raise a point in connection with the Canadian Reformed Churches.
Here, as with many other things, an ounce of prevention would have been worth a ton of cure. Once ecclesiastical walls are built up, it is exceedingly difficult to break them down again. I submit that in the case at hand the Christian Reformed Church could have done much to prevent the wall from forming in the first place.
Let me explain. I have just finished reading the latest book by author Rudolf Van Reest, a vrijgemaakte [liberated] brother in Holland. In this book, entitled Terugzien Na Viifentwintig Jaren, the author describes his second trip to Canada and the U.S., twenty-five years after the first trip. Tn the book he deals chiefly with church life in our two countries, and in the course of the book he also incorporates a good deal of interesting church history. In outlining the history of the Canadian Reformed Churches, he refers to the following announcement which appeared in The Banner of August 8, 1947:
COSISTORIES, ATIENTION!
Reliable sources of information state that Prof. Dr. K. Schilder and Rev. D. Van Dyk expect to arrive in our country some time in the month of August to engage in preaching and in speaking engagements to provide information as to the schism which occurred in the “Gereformeerde Kerken of The Netherlands” and led to the organization of a new denomination known as the “Gereformeerde Kerken maintaining Article 31.” We beg to inform our consistories and churches that we do not maintain church correspondence with the denomination to which Prof. Dr. K. Schilder and Rev. D. Van Dyk are affiliated, and therefore do not recognize this new denomination as one of our sister churches, and consequently cannot invite their ministers to speak or preach in our pulpits.
By order of the Synodical Committee,
R. J. Danhof, Sec’y.
In this way, says Van Reest, the church doors which were still wide open in 1939 had now suddenly been slammed shut, and he describes this action of our church as having a hierarchical character to it.
I am inclined to agree with him completely! Not only was it hierarchical, it was no less than scandalous, and unbrotherly to the extreme, the more so in the light of what Synod said a few years later about this matter. In reply to a letter received from some brothers in Neerlandia, requesting Synod to investigate the rupture which had taken place in the Gereformeerde Kerken in Holland, Synod said, “It is not in our province to sit in judgment over these churches” (Acts 1950, p. 68). In actual fact, however, Synod had already judged the case and taken the side of the so-called “synodale” [synodical] churches. While pretending to be neutral, Synod actually condemned the Schilder group. And it is this action which precipitated the formation of the Canadian Reformed Churches. Had Synod in fact been neutral, quite possibly there would today be no Canadian Reformed Churches.
True enough, one can say that this action in itself was not sufficient reason to start a separate church. But anyone who knows a little about the strong feelings generated by the schism in Holland will be able to understand the action of these brethren.
How unecumenical the Gereformeerde Kerken were at that time! Today, however, a false ecumenicity is opening the doors wide on all sides. Are we following their example? It would seem to me that the Christian Reformed Church could take a genuine ecumenical step today by admitting guilt here, and rescinding these wrong decisions. An official act of repentance even at this late date would be wholly in order.