LOUISVILLE, Ky. -- A small network of Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) congregations is calling for the denomination to confess and repent as the group prays for a reformation of the church and its national leadership.
Five Presbyterian ministers representing the Confessing Church Movement taped a poster-size "Call to Confession and Repentance" near the entry to the Presbyterian Center in Louisville, Ky., home to the denomination's headquarters.
The document charges that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is "decaying and dying in the belly of the beast" (Rev.: 13:1-8) and is "irretrievably apostate under current management," according to the Presbyterian News Service.
It urges Presbyterians to remain with the denomination but to refuse to support any work "antithetical to the will of God."
The Confessing Church Movement has called on the church to unequivocally profess three beliefs: that Jesus is the only way to salvation; that scripture is the inspired word of God; and that Christians are called to holiness, which precludes sexual relationships outside of marriage between a man and a woman.
It's not clear how many churches are part of the movement; more than 100 individuals signed the "Call to Confession and Repentance."
"We come in deepest humility," said one of the protestors, the Rev. Robert Kopp of Rockford, Ill. "Not because we are better than … but recognizing our own sin, recognizing the silence we've allowed to go on too long. And we are calling our brothers and sisters to a time of confession, confessing how we've not stood up for Jesus."
