Sesquicentennial Reflections

1857 - 2007: From CRC to ACRC?
Arie C. Leder

Since 1880 we have been known as the Christian Reformed Church, even though the adjective “Holland” was still attached at that time. It wasn’t our first name, however. From April 8, 1857, the birth date of the CRC, to 1880, the following names described us: Holland Reformed, True Dutch Reformed, the Christian Seceded Church, the True Holland Reformed Church. The latter name was in use from 1864. Churches were given the freedom not to use “true.” Our first local option decision.

The first hundred years
The variety of names discloses the nascent community’s struggle to define itself in the new world, not only in terms of its experiences in the Netherlands, but also the more recent attempts to distinguish itself from the Dutch Reformed Church (now the RCA) from whom our ancestors seceded in 1857. It was about being true to the Reformed traditions as they understood them.

On April 8, 1907 the CRC celebrated its 50th anniversary at the Auditorium on South Ionia Street in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The gathering, as it was called, consisted of opening and closing prayers, congregational and choral singing in English and Dutch, a poem of welcome, and several short speeches. Rev. Henry Beets delivered the first speech in English: “The Christian Reformed Church in its Origin and Period of Struggle.” The others, delivered in Dutch, were: “The Character of Our People, the Dark and the Light Side (“Het Karakter van ons Volk, naar Schaduw- en Lichtzijde.”) by Rev. I. Van Dellen; “Our Dangers” (Onze Gevaren”) by Rev. H. Van Hoogen (Read by Rev. J. W. Brink because Van Hoogen had died.); “The Christian Reformed Pulpit in America” (De Christelijk Gereformeerde Kansel in Amerika”) by Rev. K. Van Goor; and, “Our Calling and Ideals for the Future” (Onze Roeping en Idealen voor de Toekomst”) by Rev. J. Groen. These and other full length addresses may be found in J. Noordewier, et. al., Gedenkboek van het Vijftigjarig Jubileum der Christelijke Gereformeerde Kerk A.D. 1857-1907 (Grand Rapids: J. B. Hulst and B. Sevensma, 1907.).

By 1907 the CRC was on the way to becoming an American church. The founders of the church had passed on; a younger generation was in charge. The youthful vigor and immaturity of the CRC formed the basis for Van Hoogen’s reflection. He warned the CRC of the potential for recklessness; of the challenges of its diversity–at that time the variety of Dutch backgrounds that made it difficult to work together; and the questioning of the crucial difference between the world and the church so much a part of becoming more American. The CRC must remain, so Van Hoogen, counter-cultural.

Fifty years later Dr. John H. Kromminga reflected on the CRC’s one hundred years in his In The Mirror. An Appraisal of the Christian Reformed Church (Hamilton: Guardian, 1957). By this time post World War 2 immigration to Canada had begun to shape the CRC experience, the Dutch language had disappeared from almost all pulpits in the US and by the 1960s was heard from few pulpits in Canada. Our confessional roots were valued, church life began receiving a neo-Kuyperian sheen, mostly in Canada. But being a church in the world was still a challenge. Kromminga acknowledges that Americanization was a problem for the CRC, but that it also presented new opportunities. The isolation of language had been mostly overcome, but other forms of isolation remained: dependence on the Netherlands, the Reformed distinctiveness as expressed through separate institutions, and the lack of cooperation with other denominations. None of these enable true evangelism. “Isolationism,” he writes, “ fosters a diminished view of the needs of the world . . . has either no conception if the needs of the world or no concern with them” (53). But, “the perils of contact are essentially the perils of conformity.” One of the perils of greater contact in America is losing theological distinctiveness: “One student of American culture has spoken of a recent period in American history when ‘religion prospered while theology slowly went bankrupt.’ The fact is that American religion is theologically illiterate because that which was different was, by silent common consent, not to be mentioned in our democracy” (55).

He concludes his reflection on conformity thus:

“Contact with such [an American] environment must mean one of two things. It will mean conformity or it will mean friction. For theological distinctiveness is diametrically opposed to it. The Christian Reformed Church is lost if it conforms. No one can say in advance whether it can survive the friction which will result it retains its distinctiveness while establishing contact. And yet, in the face of all this, the church cannot rest satisfied with the isolated way.”

“Thus it would be sheer folly to act as if the situation of the Christian Reformed Church were secure and her future established. The realities of life are cruel and disturbing. The only possible course of action seems to be to retain and develop such an isolation as will produce distinctiveness–genuine distinctiveness; and then to proceed with that distinctiveness into aggressive contact. This, at the cost of the ease and tranquility of the denomination, would be a potential source of good, not only to the denomination itself, but to the other churches round about” (58).

From our CRC to ACRC: Ecclesiastical Syntax
We don’t yet know what the 2007 anniversary book of reflections will say about us. This much is true: The CRC of 1957 was not that of 1907, nor is the CRC of 2007 that of 1957. Kromminga’s challenge to make contact with churches outside of the CRC has been successful; it is doubtful that we have retained the theological distinctiveness he charged us to keep. We have had dialogue with the Roman Catholic Church about Lord’s Day 80; we participate in WARC, but NAPARC cancelled our affiliation. Preaching from the Heidelberg Catechism is not what it’s supposed to be. The psalms we sing today are the so-called seven-eleven choruses: snatches of praise phrases sung multiple times. Psalms to “regular” hymn tunes, never mind those in the Genevan tradition, do not characterize CRC congregational singing in the 21st century. We also have a sizable bureaucracy in Grand Rapids which, for better or worse, tries to steer the denomination from one vantage point; classical renewal began without synodical approval but with agency support; and local church councils are more deeply rooted in entrepreneurial management styles and views of the church than the confessions and traditional Reformed church polity envisions. The CRC is also more diversified, beyond the Dutch provinces. On a given Sunday services are conducted in English, Korean, Spanish, Chinese, Hmong, Laotian, and Vietnamese. Few church leaders, however, can speak more than one language. Our orthodoxy is shifting. In 2007 you will more likely get into trouble for political incorrectness than confessional heterodoxy. South of the border we are American, east-coast or west-coast American, West-Michigan or Iowa-American; those who call us Dutch don’t know us at all. We’re not what we were even fifty years ago. Nor are we agreed about which changes are for the better and which are not.

So, maybe a name change is needed. After all since 1880 we’ve had the same name, and many CRC congregations no longer use the denominational name. Apparently the Board of Trustees is also considering a new name (Has Synod asked them to do so?) Why not give ourselves a new name to reflect our post-modern identity in our 150th year? Sam Hamstra suggests we become the ACRC (Association of Christian Reformed Churches, in his “Modest Proposal,” [The Banner, March 2007.]), a proposal that shows how far conformity to the American religious scene–a danger Van Hoogen in 1907 and Kromminga in 1957 warned us against–has taken us. This move is on display in the ecclesiastical syntax. Let me explain.

The pronoun “our” appears 13 times in the 1907 anniversary speech titles: our church, our people, our mission, our publications, our dangers, our calling. “We” had an identity. The future was about us and our ideals. A deep sense of the youthful vigor of “our” community was encourages, then evaluated and judged. Kromminga’s 1957 appraisal is definite: the heritage, the isolation, the dangers of conformity. He reflects an intimate knowledge of a community striving to keep its identity while moving beyond its isolation.

Van Hoogen gave us “our” CRC; Kromminga “the” CRC; Hamstra gives us A-CRC. In 150 years we’ve moved from “our” self-understanding, to a challenge to break our isolation without undermining our theological distinctiveness, to an indefinite sense of our ecclesiastical identity and an openness to change that will not endure the friction, as Kromminga called it, of being true to our theological confession.

Synod’s first local option, in 1864, gave churches the right not to use the word “true” as part of the church’s name; Hamstra’s local option argues for the right of local churches to separate themselves from our church political identity. No more “our” CRC, no more “the” CRC; only an association of local churches doing their own thing. Happy 150th birthday