PCA HISTORICAL CENTER
Archives and Manuscript Repository for the Continuing Presbyterian Church

The Historical Development of the Book of Church Order

Chapter 6 : Church Members
Paragraph 2 : Of Communing Members

6-2. Communing members are those who have made a profession of faith in Christ, have been baptized, and have been admitted by the Session to the Lord's Table. (See BCO 46-4 for associate members).

DIGEST:
This paragraph has its origin with the Proposed Book of Church Order (1973), and has no specific precedent in PCUS or PCUSA texts. The parenthetical comment regarding associate members was added in _____.

BACKGROUND & COMPARISON:
1. PCA 1973, 6-2, Adopted text, as printed in the Minutes of General Assembly, p. 130
and
2. Continuing Presbyterian Church 1973, 6-1, B, Proposed text, p. 7
Communing members are those who have made a profession of faith in Christ, have been baptized, and have been admitted by the Session to the Lord's Table.

No comparable text in these editions:
PCUS 1933, VII
PCUS 1925, VII
PCUS 1879, III
PCUS 1869 draft, III
PCUS 1867 draft, III

COMMENTARY:
F.P. Ramsay, Exposition of the Book of Church Order
(1898, pp. 42-44), on Chapter III :
[no comparable text for comment by Ramsay]

CONSTITUTIONAL INQUIRY:
[Under BCO 24-3, compare Reference #3 from 1982 and Inquiry #9 from 1984
]