Testing time for Church over PMS
THE Presbyterian Church in Ireland holds its General Assembly this week against a backdrop of widespread anxiety and apprehension at pew level caused by the financial plight of the Presbyterian Mutual Society.
The dire effects of the global economic recession resulted in the once-flourishing Mutual Society going into administration, with the 314m belonging to 9,500 investors frozen and devalued.
Assembly deliberations, particularly at Tuesday afternoon's scheduled debate on the PMS, will undoubtedly be conducted with great intensity.
It is important, however, that participating ministers and elders bear in mind that whatever divisions there may be on how the Mutual Society issue was handled at a senior Presbyterian level, the dignity and standing of the Church at large must be upheld.
Congregations and individual members have good reason to feel aggrieved over a situation where the significant amounts of money which they invested in good faith are currently out of reach, due to lack of liquid funds to reimburse those seeking withdrawals.
Incoming Moderator the Rev Dr Stafford Carson, whose own First Portadown Church congregation has 1m invested in the PMS, will be in the eye of the storm as he presides over the Assembly debates.
He knows that where theology and ecclesiastical matters led to sharp Church differences in the past, the PMS issue has pushed Irish Presbyterianism into difficult uncharted waters, with Dr Carson conceding "there are no easy answers".
The Moderator-designate understands that many Presbyterians are "feeling wounded and betrayed by the Church", but he rightly stresses affairs have to be conducted in a decent and orderly manner.
Our senior politicians have tried to obtain a meaningful rescue package for the PMS, through protracted lobbying with both the Prime Minister Gordon Brown's office and the Treasury.
Another meeting is planned with "Son of the Manse" Mr Brown, who yesterday, when dealing with the MPs' expenses scandal which has engulfed Westminster, talked about how this debacle had offended his "Presbyterian conscience".
The Government has bailed out major UK financial institutions with billions of taxpayers' money, at least one in Gordon Brown's Fife constituency in Scotland, and he must now extend this "Presbyterian conscience" and generosity to kinsfolk in Northern Ireland who are cash-strapped by the PMS crisis.
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Thursday 24 May 2012
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