Abstract

STRAUSS, Piet J.. The church order of the Dutch Reformed Church of 2013: Channel or stumbling block for church discipline?. Verbum Eccles. (Online) [online]. 2018, vol.39, n.1, pp.1-9. ISSN 2074-7705.  http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/ve.v39i1.1747.

There is a widely accepted stand in reformed churches not to accept detailed prescriptions in its church order for church discipline. Church assemblies tasked with church discipline need space to undertake this according to God's Word, with a pastoral approach, the well-being of the church and its members in mind, and a good deal of common sense. Despite this, the Dutch Reformed Church accepted detailed rules and regulations for discipline as a binding addendum to its church order in 1974. This addendum was scrapped in 1998. However, a new addendum was again accepted in 2011. This article asks the question whether the binding articles and regulations of this church is a proper channel or a stumpling block for discipline in its midst. Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This article is based on a philosophical-sociological distinction between the discipline of the church as a society of faith and discipline in other institutions of society. The discipline of the church implies that the church is as an institution of faith, in this case, must also act according to the natural rules of justice and justice in terms of its own calling as an institution of the Christian faith. These rules and the church order as an instrument for procedure in the church, are the grounds on which a civil court, when asked to, can rehearse a decision of an assembly of the church. This is not about the merit of the church content of the decisions, but the procedure. The article also makes extensive use of ecclesiological matter or a dogmatic church concept that must be maintained in criminal matters. The challenge: the church remains theoretically and in practice church.

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