Judge Greer, Terri Schiavo, and Church Discipline
World Magazine, as usual, looks for the unusual take on a news story. What do you suppose has happened to the church membership of Judge Greer, the judge who ordered Terri Schiavo to be killed?
Tensions between the judge and his church arose in 2003 after the Florida Baptist Witness published editorials critical of him. Calvary wraps its own newspaper inside the Witness, the Southern Baptist state newspaper, so it is circulated widely among Calvary’s members. By all accounts, Judge Greer stopped attending services as a result and halted his contributions. He expressed displeasure with how the church publication treated him, but he has declined all requests for news interviews. New pastor William Rice arrived on the job last fall. He said he offered to meet with the judge to discuss their differences, but no meeting took place. The Witness meanwhile continued its criticism, and Rev. Rice publicly commended the editors for doing so. Finally, on March 10, he wrote a letter to Judge Greer that became public when he sent a copy to the courthouse. The letter said: “If you have chosen to leave Calvary, distance yourself from her, and criticize her publicly, then why have you not formally transferred your membership elsewhere? I am not asking you to do this, but since your connection with Calvary continues to be a point of concern, it would seem the logical and, I would say, biblical course.” The judge’s reply came in the form of a letter announcing his resignation from the church. Rev. Rice told reporters he regretted the letter was made public, but he insisted Judge Greer’s withdrawal from Calvary was “completely voluntary.” He said the judge would always be welcome at the church, adding: “We will continue to pray for [him].” He also emphasized that Calvary “has long been committed to the sanctity of life.”
The court decision in the long Terri Schiavo feeding-tube case divided many Christians–including Florida county judge George Greer and his pastor and fellow members at 2,000-member Calvary Baptist Church in St. Petersburg. Judge Greer ruled that by law Michael Schiavo as Terri’s husband had the right to make decisions on her behalf. Opponents had wanted him to cede custody to Mrs. Schiavo’s parents, who wanted to keep her feeding tube in place. The judge, a former Republican county commissioner described by fellow church members as pro- life, said he was nevertheless sworn to uphold the law.
We have to give credit to the new pastor for doing *something* about the open sin of a member of his church. I hope that he addressd the issue from the pulpit. This behavior by a church member was public in the broadest sense. Everybody in the congregation knew about it, and would have looked to the pastor for leadership. Thus, to preach on it would not have been gossip in any way.
It’s curious that the pastor was afraid to criticize Judge Greer in his letter, or, mildly, to criticize him for behavior unrelated to the Schiavo case. The biblical course is emphatically *not* to tell a church member to resign because he has criticized the church leadership. It is perhaps biblical to tell someone to resign because they never attend church, but I bet the pastor hasn’t sent letters to other non-attenders– and I have to include the “perhaps”, because it isn’t clear that a person’s poor attendance is enough reason to ask them to leave the Church. Rather, it should be an occasion to ask them to *come* to church.
Nor is the connection to Calvary just a “point of concern”. On Judge Greer’s side, it might be his only chance of salvation. On the church’s side, it is a declaration that the church does not consider Judge Greer’s behavior to be bad enough to warrant expelling him.
I don’t know the full situation, which includes Baptist rules and the internal politics of that particular congregation. Pastors should not engage in church discipline apologetically, however, or talk as if it is a matter of indifference whether an erring member resigns or stays.