By a slight majority, delegates at today’s business session (July 5) voted to return an amendment on divorce and remarriage, with delegate recommendations, to the Church Manual Committee for further revision. Barring a reversal in Thursday’s session, the document won’t be voted on until the 2005 General Conference Session in St. Louis, Missouri.
“By default we voted to depreciate the authority of the Church Manual,” said Laurie Evans, president of the South Pacific Division. “People might be frustrated and take this into their own hands, which would hurt the unity of the Church.”
Prior to the decision, several delegates appealed that the body not return the amendment without voting on it. “It’s imperfect, but less imperfect than the current document,” said Pastor Dave Gemmell of the North American Division. “I don’t want to live with this another five years.”
Yesterday, under Chairperson Robert Kloosterhuis, delegates had begun altering the eight-page document with the intent of voting on it. But this morning Chairperson Alfred C. McClure didn’t allow alterations because he (and apparently the delegation) thought that a motion had been passed banning further alterations. Session minutes, however, showed that no such motion had passed, but had only been suggested at the start of the session.
Throughout the three-hour meeting, delegates expressed frustration at being able to debate the document, but not alter it. One delegate accused McClure of opposing the document. “I certainly was not opposed to it,” McClure said later. “I was simply trying to follow the procedure.”
Just before the lunch break, a motion to rescind the (mythical) alteration-barring motion was narrowly defeated.
Following a backstage huddle of church administrators, the afternoon business meeting was chaired (as scheduled) by Calvin B. Rock. “We need to confess that there are some problems with procedure,” he began. “We don’t know how to solve this–to make it go away.”
“Either we proceed with the discussion,” he said, “understanding that we’re not amending but referring suggestions to the Church Manual Committee. Or we proceed allowing amendments to be made, which means we go back to section two [of five] and then process through the whole document. Then the vote taken will be on a finished church document.” Rock predicted that, by making amendments, the delegation would not finish the agenda by Friday, the close of business.
After several defeated motions, the delegates instead voted, by a narrow margin, to return the document for revision.
The proposed Divorce and Remarriage Amendment is the product of the Church Manual Committee’s revision of a report from the Divorce and Remarriage Commission, a multinational group appointed following the Church’s 1995 gathering.
While the document more clearly defines causes for divorce, such as “abandonment by an unbelieving spouse” and physical abuse, it doesn’t substantially alter the Church’s previous position on divorce and remarriage. As before, the only allowance for remarriage is adultery/fornication (whose definition now includes “incest and child sexual abuse,” as well as homosexual practices).
“[The revision] is simply a change of language and a change of attitude–a more Christian attitude,” said Mario Veloso, General Conference associate secretary. “As far as reasons for remarriage, the document does not have any new element. The Bible is much more open to divorce than to remarriage.”
But several delegates, particularly from the Africa-Indian Ocean Division, spoke against “abandonment by an unbelieving spouse” (see 1 Cor. 7:10-15) as a legitimate cause for divorce.
“This text did get a lot of discussion,” explained Lowell C. Cooper, General Conference vice president and chair of the Church Manual Committee,“ but it survived the scrutiny of the Church’s theologians.”
Asked what was meant by “unbelieving spouse,” Cooper said whether the spouse was Adventist or not.
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If/Then: Breaking Down the Divorce/Remarriage Proposal
If your spouse commits adultery/fornication (which includes incest, chid sexual abuse, and homosexual practices), you may divorce and remarry.
If your unbelieving spouse abandons you, you may divorce but not remarry until your spouse commits adultery/fornication.
If your believing spouse abandons you, you may not divorce.
If your spouse beats you, you can separate from/divorce your spouse, but you can’t remarry until your spouse commits adultery/fornication. |
