Good Faith Subscription

What the PCA Actually Confesses

In recent days, I have seen renewed discussion about how the Presbyterian Church in America understands confessional subscription. Many have described the PCA as a “system subscription” denomination. That language is absolutely insufficient and misleading for how the PCA views subscription to the Westminster Standards.

The PCA does not begin with a vague appeal to a “system of doctrine.” It actually begins with full subscription, which is far more concrete and demanding than some would like to admit.

The Baseline: A Church Without Stated Differences

The PCA, as a denomination, has adopted the Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms as its doctrinal standards. Importantly, it has done so without stating any differences from them. The church does not confess a generalized “Westminsterian system” in the abstract. It confesses these Standards, in their entirety, as containing the system of doctrine taught in Holy Scripture. ¹

That matters.

It means that, at the level of the church’s confession, there is no built-in elasticity, denominational footnotes, or formal exceptions. The Standards are received in the whole, not selectively or representatively.

Good Faith Subscription: Not a Loosening, but a Guardrail

This is where the PCA’s doctrine of “good faith subscription” must be rightly understood. When constituionalized in the early 2000’s, almost immediately and now too often, it is assumed that good faith subscription introduced flexibility into a “system of doctrine” that it allows officers to subscribe to the “system” while quietly diverging at particular points. But that is precisely what good faith subscription was designed to prevent.

Good faith subscription does not lower the bar of confessional subscription. The PCA’s constitutional standards require that any candidate for office must declare any differences with the Westminster Standards. ² Those differences are then examined and judged by the presbytery. They are categorized, weighed, and either allowed or disallowed. ³ Meaning, there is no unstated exceptions to the Standards.

A man may not privately redefine the Standards, or appeal to a personal understanding of the “system” while bypassing particular doctrines. If he differs, he must say so, and if he says so, the church must judge.

This leads to an important—and often overlooked—conclusion:

In the PCA, full subscription is the baseline, and stated differences are the exception.

If a man declares no differences, he is not merely subscribing to a general theological framework. He is affirming the Standards in full. Every chapter, every doctrine, every formulation is received as part of the church’s confession. This is what gives good faith subscription its real weight.

Good Faith Subscription is not a system designed to create latitude. It is a system designed to expose, examine, and regulate any departure from full confessional agreement.

And even when differences are allowed, they are not autonomous. They exist only under the judgment and oversight of the church for that particular officer.

Why “System Subscription” Falls Short

This is why describing the PCA simply as a “system subscription” denomination fails to capture its actual practice.

In many contexts, “system subscription” has functioned as a kind of theological minimalism. It has been an appeal to broad doctrinal agreement while allowing quiet divergence on particulars. It can, at times, shift the point of authority from the church to the individual.

But the PCA’s approach resists that move. The “system” is not self-defined or privately interpreted. It is confessed corporately, in the concrete form of the Westminster Standards, and guarded through the courts of the church.

To say that the PCA practices “system subscription” without any further qualification risks obscuring this reality.

If we must use categories, it is more accurate to say that the PCA holds to full confessional subscription as its baseline, and practices good faith subscription as the ecclesiastical mechanism by which any exceptions are declared and judged.

That preserves the comprehensiveness of the church’s confession and the accountability of the officer’s subscription

The Peace and Purity of the Church

At its best, this framework serves both the peace and purity of the church. It guards purity by refusing to allow silent deviations from the Standards, guards peace by allowing carefully examined differences that do not strike at the vitals of religion, and upholds historically Presbyterian practices. Good Faith Subscription, again, at its best, places the responsibility of confessional subscription where Presbyterianism has always placed it, in the courts of the church and under the authority of Christ.

1. Book of Church Order (PCA), 26-1: “The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in America… consists of the Westminster Confession of Faith, together with the Larger and Shorter Catechisms…”BCO 21-4(c); 24-6(b): Candidates must state any differences with the Confession and Catechisms as part of their ordination vows and examination.

2. BCO 21-4: “…in examining a candidate for ordination, the Presbytery shall inquire not only into the candidate’s knowledge and views in the areas specified above, but also shall require the candidate to state the specific instances in which he may differ with the Confession of Faith and Catechisms in any of their statements and/or propositions.”

3. BCO 21-4: “It is the right and responsibility of the Presbytery to determine if the candidate is out of accord with any of the fundamentals of these doctrinal standards and, as a consequence, may not be able in good faith sincerely to receive and adopt the Confession of Faith and Catechism of this Church as containing the system of doctrine taught in the Holy Scriptures”