05/13/2007

The Biased Committee

Since there seems to be some revisionist history going on over at the Warfield list by Richard Phillips and Andy Webb, I thought it would probably be appropriate to just lay it all out on the table about the bias that the federal vision study committee members entered the debate with from the get-go. So, below, I'll just go ahead and take each Teaching Elder (Pastor) on the committee in order and talk about their evident, public, pre-appointment-to-the-committee bias. I leave aside discussion of the ruling elders because I have zero data on any of them and it would still be sufficient to sustain the case for the bias of the committee even if all the TE's were anti- and all the RE's were pro from the get go.

A disclaimer - I'm not saying that there should have been four blank slates looking at these issues. It's great that men who have thought about these issues prior to appointment were put on the committee. The problem comes in, however, in noting the similarity of viewpoint shared by all the pastors on the committee. The evidence below should demonstrate that there is every justification in the world for the FV guys to view the committee as composed of men who would assure a possibly predetermined outcome.

Another disclaimer - All of the men below are good folks, and dredging up this history is an unpleasant task. But I think this material needs to be in the public record so that the kind of revision of history that is occuring will at least find a response here if anyone cares to google. A few of the documents below are HTML and if they are available only here, I've put a "noarchive" tag in them so that Google won't assimilate them into their archive forever. If there are any statements below that are untrue, feel free to correct me. Send corrections to jbarlow at gmail dot com so that my work box won't fill up. Ok, here goes:

Ligon Duncan

First, Duncan's church website has, for several years now, listed the Federal Vision in its apologetics section under "Modern unbiblical Challenges to Traditional Reformed Covenant Theology" (source, screenshot). What are the chances that someone who views the Federal Vision as an "unbiblical challenge" to "traditional Reformed Covenant Theology" is going to be able to look at the FV anew in an objective way? One even wonders what "traditional Reformed Covenant Theology" really means anyway. If you graduate from RTS Jackson, it means a meritorious covenant of works. If you graduate from Covenant Seminary - the PCA's official denominational seminary - it means that the covenant of works was between God and Adam on the basis of grace and love without reference to some (arguably crass) idea of merit.

Secondly, Duncan shepherded two books through the publication process from Guy Waters on the New Perspectives on Paul and the Federal Vision. How do I know this? Because I personally contacted P&R way prior to the release of Waters's Federal Vision book and essentially said that given the negative scholarly reviews of Waters's first book (on the NPP), mostly due to its bias, I was offering to help them find some readers for the FV manuscript that would help them work out the bias ahead of time. P&R didn't reject my offer, they simply referred me to Ligon Duncan who, they said, was spearheading the peer review and found all the reviewers for the book. Needless to say, I didn't contact Duncan, but I did urge the FV guys to contact Waters and offer to help with the peer review. He declined every request and the book's manuscript was sealed with more security than the script for the season finale of ABC's "LOST". The Federal Vision book from Guy Waters came out in 2006 and lest any think I am lying about contacting P&R, then believe Waters's own words where he, in effect, lists the pre-readers of the book on page xv and includes Duncan.

To save space I will leave aside the issue of the New Perspective on Paul not because I think Wright's views are treated with any more care than the FV guys by the committee report, but because it would lengthen this post beyond acceptable limits. But in summary, Duncan's criticism of Wright goes all the way back to the first pcanews.com debates on the issue and to the Mississippi Valley Presbytery's report on the FV and NPP (and Norman Shepherd).

Now, on the Mississippi Valley Presbytery report, Duncan was on the committee, and a timeline of the committee's activities can be read here. If there are inaccuracies in the timeline, someone can feel free to correct me - just send proof and I'll change it. The timeline paints a disturbing picture in and of itself, but it also demonstrates where Duncan's conclusions lay prior to his appointment to the PCA FV committee.

Concerning the Federal Vision, Duncan gave a lecture on the subject at the Woodruff Road Presbyterian Church in March of 2005. You can listen to the audio here: 1. Lecture, 2. Q+A. These lectures contain a lot of "shop talk" about the PCA and how Duncan sees the situation with the Auburn Avenue theology and he offers a genealogy of the theology of the FV. Along the way he alleges that the Federal Vision is causing strife in particular congregations. The upshot of the lectures seems to me to be that Duncan has their number and it is just a matter of time before people sympathetic to the Federal Vision are out of the PCA.

More could be said, Duncan published on the Federal Vision in the Confessional Presbyterian journal, etc.

Grover Gunn

Gunn's position on these matters becomes clear by reading some of his study papers. First, check out his response to the work of Joel Garver on the efficacy of baptism. Gunn follows this up with a response on the Lord's Supper. Gunn also responds to Norman Shepherd in another article. Gunn addresses the corporate vs. individual election issue in a paper here where he makes reference, without specific link, to Federal Vision authors and their treatment of apostasy and perseverance.

Sean Lucas

Lucas composed a satirical poem about the New Perspective on Paul during the pcanews.com debate on the subject, he calls Peter Leithart a "postmodern tractarian" in a negative review of Leithart's book "Against Christianity" (read Leithart's response here) and he also composed a negative review of Douglas Wilson's "'Reformed' is not Enough" (read Wilson's response here and here). Phillips comments that Lucas is the dean of faculty at the denominational seminary and so that should carry some weight. I do agree, but considering that with regards to the issues addressed by the Federal Vision, the professors who actually teach those theology courses do not teach a meritorious covenant of works, do embrace Richard Gaffin's revision of the ordo salutis in terms of union with Christ, and generally speak highly of many aspects of Wright's exegesis of particular texts, I think Lucas is less representative of the Covenant Seminary approach to theology than one might assume. In addition, when many of the professors of the denominational seminary participated in the drafting of the Missouri Presbytery report on these same matters, the resulting report looked much different than the PCA denominational committee report. Lucas also served on that committee, but it was much more diverse and included many covenant professors as well as Jeffrey Meyers, author of the recent "30 reasons" document.

UPDATE (5/14/2007): Lucas has responded in a most winsome and humble manner concerning these writings (pdf).

UPDATE (5/15/2007): After corresponding with Dr. Lucas, I have agreed to remove the links to his old essays. He asked me to remove them because of the shrill tone he employed and for which he has apologized. He wrote these several years ago and since then regrets the tone of these reviews and essays. Dr. Lucas, however, told me that his substantive position against the writings of the Federal Vision men, though harshly stated in these earlier works, has not changed, and that's the main point I intended to establish by linking them here anyway.

Paul Fowler

Fowler, the final Teaching Elder on the committee has no paper trail on these issues. He did present a lecture at the Augusta conference last year on the NPP with Sean Lucas and the lecture was not billed as a debate of the issues, so I would think it logical to presume he agrees with Lucas at least on the NPP (source). Further, Fowler is the Vice Chairman of the Standing Judicial Commission (a class of 2009 appointee), and the SJC is presently investigating Steve Wilkins about the very issues at debate in the study report.

The One Who Appointed the Committee: Dominic Aquila

If what has gone before is true, either Dominic Aquila was ignorant of the perspective of the men appointed to the committee or he intended to appoint men of this stripe. It is also fascinating that Aquila's presbytery drafted the resolution to call for a committee, he presided over the discussion and passage of the resolution, and then he appointed the committee members to study the issue. He is also chairman of the Standing Judicial Commission who selected the special committee that would investigate Steve Wilkins in his judicial case. Further, Aquila is in charge of the online component of the PCA News (pcanews.com) and he is the gatekeeper for the weekly PCA newsletter emailing in which he has completely shut out announcements from Athanasius Press (of Auburn Avenue PCA Church).

Now, lest this sound like conspiracy theory and I begin placing Dominic Aquila on the grassy knoll, I will end this exercise hopefully still in the realm of clear facts and reasonable inference. :)