Baptistic Ethos in America: Another Gem from Douglas Wilson

In his dialogue with greenbaggins, Doug Wilson has produced another noteworthy (but lamentable) observation about American Presbyterian sacramentalism of an Evangelical stripe:

"In conservative American Presbyterianism, the governing doctrine is not the Westminster Confession, but is rather the agreed-upon-consensus of what the Westminster Confession must have meant. And whatever it must have meant, it cannot stray too far from the baptistic ethos of American evangelicalism."

For more, see read the full text here.

I think he is on to something. In 1986, the Presbyterian Church in America's general assembly asked a study committee to examine the issue of valid baptism. The basic question was this, "What do we do about the baptism of Roman Catholics who want to join our churches?" The majority report at the next year's GA declared the Roman Catholic baptism to be "invalid" (it didn't "work"?) and thus suggested (without commanding) that these folks be baptized (again?). In this ruling, the committee followed the 1845 general assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States. But who else?

This is the precise point of departure for the dissenting minority report. This report makes clear that this decision has no precedence in the Reformed tradition, whether that be in its faith or practice. Calvin and Bucer didn't "rebaptize" Roman Catholics who came into their churches....nor did they have themselves "rebaptized." Their churches did not do this either, which means that the presupposition of the Reformed confessions is actually against what was decided in 1845 and reaffirmed in 1987. So who else? The answer is no one else. No one else in the Reformed tradition said what the 1845 and 1987 general assemblies said....not even the confessions themselves, thereby rewriting history through the lens of the said "baptistic ethos of American evangelicalism."