Ministry in Australia

My heart sank. This would mean that we would certainly lose the complaint. Procedure and etiquette seemed to be more important than people in the Presbyterian church.

In my speech I had said:

As the minister of the special Charge of South Illawarra, I am speaking here not on my own behalf, but on behalf of the people who have called me to be their minister É On the basis of a request by the Very Rev. Fred McKay, one of the Uniting negotiators, to state what minorities of members within the Presbytery who voted to remain Presbyterian were unable to be related in membership to a continuing congregation in the locality, Mr. Thomas gave notice of motion to do three things:
1) to make Presbytery believe that there was a continuing Congregation, namely Albion Park, within the Uniting charge of South Illawarra.
2) to declare that the whole "continuing congregation of Albion Park" cannot be related to another continuing congregation.
3) request the Property Commission to provide the congregation of Albion Park with a church and manse.

I challenged the competency of this motion because the premise was wrong: Albion Park was never seen as a separate congregation, as you can verify for yourselves in all statistics of the voting results É

Also, Presbytery actually requested property for the Continuing Church, which they have no right to do, as such can only come from Members who in 1973 voted "Yes" to question B. Thus Presbytery infringed on the rights of individual members and of Session, who were not given any opportunity to make any comments to Presbytery on a matter that deeply concerned all members.

So in actual fact, instead of simply debating a reply to Mr. McKay's letter at Presbytery, i.e. to ask Session to report to Presbytery as to whether the 8 people who voted "yes" to question B in Albion Park can be related to a continuing church, Presbytery decided to debate the motion as you have it before you É

At a congregational meeting on 3 April, after Presbytery had passed this motion, not one person who had the right to claim minority rights, was willing to exercise such rights.

In passing the motion before you, Presbytery violated the rights of the people who have called me to be their minister, and on their behalf I am asking you, Moderator, that this Assembly may judge this case, so that justice may be done to all concerned.

Max Fox also spoke on our behalf. Then during the debate the list of names we had sent erroneously came up again, but it was clear from the voting, that the issue was not judged on its merit, but rather on party line,

385