My Experience At Covenant CRC Appleton Part 3 - My Husband And I Seek The Assistance Of Church Visitors
The elders of Covenant started claiming that they already answered my doctrinal questions, then dragged their feet on scheduling and announcing a church visitors meeting
I have begun detailing my experience at Covenant Christian Reformed Church of Appleton and the events that resulted in the exodus of 30% of the congregation. Although it is lengthy and of little importance to the vast majority of people, I believe there are a few specific groups of people for whom this story holds relevance, and once I have told the story I will explain why I feel it is important that I tell it.
Part 1 details my initial attempts to determine whether or not the elders of the church shared the concerns Pastor Mark Pluimer had raised in the New Members class I attended about the left-wing drift of certain denominational entities including the Office of Social Justice, the Office of Race Relations, and the Banner.
Part 2 details the 6 months in which the elders continued in a set pattern of not engaging in any proactive communication with me and issued confusing and contradictory statements that they refused to clarify. Additionally, they passed off their responsibility to maintain the doctrine of the church onto Covenant’s finance committee. That part ended with Joe DeHaan, president of Covenant’s Council, refusing to respond to me even when I finally explicitly asked him to clarify whether or not the elders were intentionally not speaking to me.
FEBRUARY 2024
During the time period in which I was being pointedly ignored by Joe DeHaan, I was also being ignored by Race Relations representatives.
On 02/07/2024 I emailed Viviana Cornejo and Idella Winfield the representatives of the Race Relations division of Thrive as well as Zachary King, the General Secretary of the CRCNA and asked them about some of the concerning doctrinal issues I saw. I sent a follow-up email to Ms. Cornejo and Ms. Winfield on 02/26/2024. They never responded to either of my emails.
On 02/29/2024, Reverend King did respond to me. His response was, in my opinion, entirely inadequate, but in his email he stated, “I encourage you to talk with your elders and pastor about your concerns.” (See Substack Post On This Matter)
Additionally, unrelated to any of my concerns although it would become relevant later, at the February council meeting, the council discussed preparations for the arrival of Pastor Roger Sparks, the church’s new specialized transitional minister. The elders indicated they intended to speak to him about female office bearers saying, “Council discussed elder & deacon candidates. Elders will talk with Pastor Roger about how to address the topic of potential women office bearers.” (See Attachment V)
MARCH 2024
On 03/04/2024 Pastor Roger Sparks arrived.
On 03/19/2024 my husband and I met with him and talked about our experience with the council over the previous 12 months. We discussed the possibility of filing an appeal with Classis. He recommended that we try to meet with church visitors first.
I called Jason Ruis, the stated clerk of Classis Wisconsin and sent him an email the next day asking if we could set up a meeting with the church visitors. He got back to me on 03/21/2024 and provided a helpful quote from the Church Order Commentary on how the matter should be handled and then said he would forward my email to the church visitors “so that they are aware of your concerns and hopefully take action accordingly.” (See Attachment W)
On 03/24/2024 Joe DeHaan finally responded to the email that I had initially sent him back on February 8 asking when the council would be taking up the discussion about doctrinal issues at the denominational level again; however, his email was confusing and did not answer my question about the timeline. He also talked about things that had not been included in my initial email to him. He said, “Some of the content linked to denominational offices websites appears to be at odds with the stated doctrinal stances of the CRC. Please be careful in differentiating between stated doctrinal stances and others material on our linked to denominational offices websites. The denominational offices do not set the doctrinal standards of the CRC. All office bearers are required to sign and adhere to the covenant of office bearers which includes the doctrinal standards of the CRC. Doctrinal standards are set by synod. Synod assigns committees to investigate doctrinal standards to make sure they align with Scripture if any questions arise (Roger, please correct me if my understanding is wrong).”
I sent him an email asking for clarification on what he was saying because I had been under the impression that removing Ministry Shares from the budget was a stop gap measure to give the council more time to delve into the doctrinal concerns. (Indeed, Joe himself had stated during the January congregational meeting that the council was “committed to making sure that our denomination stays in line with the Bible.”) Now, however, it sounded like the council was not planning to look into the matter or clarify what they believed on anything. I told him, “based on what you’ve written, it sounds like the elders have already determined that various entities are indeed promoting beliefs that are not in line with the CRC’s confessions. In that case, it would seem that your oath as elders would require you to (1) clearly warn the congregation about what is going on at the denominational level and (2) no longer allow Covenant to serve as a middle man in the transfer of money from congregants to the erring entities in question.”
I expressed dissatisfaction with the way the council had responded to my concerns over the last year and told him, “The lack of clear communication by the elders over the last year has caused a great deal of personal distress for myself and my husband and I suspect to other families in the congregation as well.” I requested that the church council seek the assistance of church visitors to help resolve these ongoing issues and laid out the reasons why I believe their assistance was necessary. (See Attachment U2)
After the service at church on 03/24/2024 I approached Joe and asked him in person if it was possible to bring in the church visitors to help resolve this situation. He had not read the email that I had sent him the afternoon before. I told him that it was almost a year since I had first contacted them about this and I was very close to filing an appeal with Classis Wisconsin. My husband joined the conversation, Joe grabbed fellow elder Jim Niemier, my husband and I grabbed Pastor Sparks, and we sat down in a private room to discuss things.
During that discussion, it became very clear to me that some kind of outside mediator was needed to resolve both the ongoing doctrinal concerns as well as the bad feelings that exist between the parties. Joe and Jim seemed to believe that the elders had answered our questions. I do not understand why they would think that because they had not even talked to us for the last year except extremely grudgingly and only when I had pushed hard for it.
Jim seemed to dislike my husband for reasons I don’t entirely understand other than their personalities clash and Jim finds my husband abrasive. During this meeting, Jim also seemed needlessly hostile toward me. Jim seemed to be angry that I had raised these questions and continued following up and pushing for answers for the last year. He told me that the council had talked about it endlessly and it had “sucked all the air out of the room.” He wanted to focus on other things such as acts of service. He was not interested in dealing with doctrine. Jim seemed to suggest that the denomination was in charge of doctrine and that doctrine wasn’t the responsibility of elders.
During this meeting, I was told that I could take up my concerns with the denomination. I said that I had contacted the Office of Race Relations and they had not responded. Jim told me that if I still had problems, I could write an overture to Synod; however, I could not actually do that because I was not a member. Additionally, that advice flew in the face of what Reverend King told me which was that I should talk about this matter with the elders of my church.
I received conflicting feedback from Joe and Jim on what the council thought about the doctrinal issues coming from denominational entities. Joe seemed to acknowledge that there were some concerning things there, but he also said it was unfortunate that Pastor Mark had shared his “personal opinions” in the New Members class. Jim, on the other hand, didn’t seem to think there was anything wrong with the teachings being promoted on the denominational website and said that he had reviewed the entire Office Of Race Relations website and found nothing of concern there. I asked if the elders had no problem with Christianity being blamed for the creation of racism as was stated in the White Work webinar. Joe got a look on his face that seemed to suggest he thought that was wrong, but Jim didn’t seem to be concerned.
During this conversation, I reiterated that it had been a year and the council hadn’t communicated with me and I still had no idea what the church believed. Joe and Jim insisted that they had answered me. I told them that the only person who had responded to me was Pastor Ben and I asked them if they were saying that Ben’s responses to me were representative of what the council believed? Again, Joe got a look on his face and started to walk that back.
Jim seemed angry about the entire situation and seemed to think that they had given me a whole bunch of time and attention for which I was not grateful. He said that they had even let me attend an elders meeting and talk to them which was highly irregular. In a demanding tone he asked, “What do you want?”
During this meeting I also expressed to Jim my concern about the way he had responded to my question during the September elders meeting about what Covenant would have done had the denomination accepted same-sex marriage as valid. I do not remember how I phrased my thoughts, but I said it in a way that made it fairly clear I was concerned that Jim personally was supportive of same sex marriage. Rather than saying something unambiguous like, “I don’t support same sex marriage,” he said something very precise and legalistic along the lines of “All office bearers sign the oath of office.” It struck me as the sort of response a person gives when they want you to draw an inference that isn’t really there. Leading up to Synod 2024, there were plenty of examples of people in the CRCNA who signed the oath of office and were office bearers but who clearly did not adhere to the beliefs of the CRCNA as laid out in the confessions. Synod 2024 was specifically focused on dealing with this issue.
Throughout this conversation, Pastor Sparks tried to be a peacekeeper. He suggested that the elders needed to work somewhat on their communication. Like Jim, my husband had also been angry during this discussion, and Pastor Sparks somewhat humorously commented on the vein showing on his neck which calmed things down somewhat.
Pastor Sparks also told Joe and Jim that this was the sort of situation in which church visitors could assist. At some point during this discussion, it was stated that Covenant was due for its annual visit from the church visitors. It had been put off until Pastor Sparks arrived, but now they needed to schedule that. We talked about the logistics of having congregants talk to the visitors; Pastor Sparks said such conversations were not outside the norm and that often churches would announce a church visitor visit a couple weeks ahead of time and provide time an hour before the meeting for congregants with concerns to talk with the visitors. I left the meeting believing that this is what would happen.
After I left the room, Rob remained and tried to patch things up with Jim Niemeier. He told Jim, “I’m sorry.” To which Jim responded, “For what?” My husband answered, “For being an asshole.” Jim then did not accept his apology but instead told him, “Then stop being one.” So, this meeting ended with an elder at Covenant Christian Reformed Church of Appleton essentially calling a fellow Christian an asshole to his face and refusing to accept that fellow Christian’s attempt to make peace. Jim has gone on to hand out communion without taking any steps to apologize and rectify things between him and Rob.
APRIL AND MAY 2024
My husband and I waited for the minutes of the most recent council meeting to be released which we assumed would include information about the church visitor visit. We also kept an eye on the weekly church emails which we also assumed would include information of some sort.
Finally, on 04/28/2024 after a month had passed and no information had been provided, I checked in with Joe after the service, and he told me the visit was tentatively scheduled for 05/09/2024 only 11 days from then. The two-week notice period that Pastor Sparks had recommended had already passed, and, even though Joe clearly knew that I was interested in meeting with the visitors, he had not given me a heads up when the meeting was tentatively scheduled so that I could keep that evening free. As a result, my family had to cancel plans in order to make it to the meeting. It was also a struggle to get the contact information for the church visitors so that I could provide them some background material ahead of meeting with them in person.
Additionally, my husband was concerned about the lack of a timely notice being provided to the congregants at Covenant as well as the potential that the elders would not be transparent to the congregants about the purpose of the meeting. He told Joe via email, “the Church Visiting guide also states: ‘Both the Council and the congregation must be notified in advance about the when and the why of the visit.’ I believe that if you intend to bill this visit as a ‘regularly scheduled visit’ that would be a half-truth as Jessica and I also requested this meeting not as a routine visit but in order to work through the ongoing issues with the leadership of this church including the Council's lack of transparency and communication and its unwillingness to explain the basic doctrinal stances of the church. I would request that you tell that to the congregation when you provide them notice of the meeting.”
As late as 05/02/2024 the elders had still not confirmed the date and time of the meeting or sent out any sort of communication, so I emailed Joe and asked him to confirm if the meeting was going to happen. He emailed me back on 05/02/2024 and confirmed the meeting was going to happen 05/09/2024 and stated he would announce it on Sunday 05/05/2024 and put an announcement in the church email. (See Attachment X1 and Church Visitor Guidance Document)
On 05/05/2024 during the service when Joe gave the announcements, he did not mention anything about the visit by the church visitors or the reason why the visit was taking place. He mentioned coffee hour, the spring cleanup day, and the special offering for GEMS. He also gave an extended announcement about the fact that the next week they would be holding communion, enjoining congregants, “As we prepare to celebrate Holy Communion, let us remember that Scripture calls us to examine ourselves before God. We're taught that eating and drinking unworthily brings judgment upon ourselves. Let us therefore ask God for the proper spirit in which to celebrate the sacrament. Where forgiveness is needed, seek forgiveness. Where restoration is needed, seek restoration. Where repentance is needed, seek repentance. Fall at the feet of God's mercy seat and trust and the cleansing blood of His Son that washes away all of our sins.” (See YouTube Video)
Although Joe had stated unequivocally to me via email only 3 days prior that he would announce the church visit on that Sunday, he did not do so.
Not captured by the camera was the fact that at some point during the service, prior to the sermon, Pastor Roger Sparks walked over to Joe and spoke with him.
When Pastor Sparks got up to preach the sermon, he gave the following announcement: “One thing I'll mention, kind of as an announcement, is that I think this Thursday evening, church visitors from our Classis will be coming to Appleton to visit with Council. Also, there are a few members that want some advice and help from the church visitors and they'll have a time to visit with them too. So, we can be in prayer for that too, that God will bless those conversations with representatives from Classis Wisconsin as they come to visit this Thursday evening.” (See YouTube Video)
After the service, my husband confirmed with Pastor Sparks that Joe was supposed to have announced the visit by the Church Visitors but had not done so which is why Pastor Sparks had given the announcement instead.
My husband emailed Joe and expressed his concern that the meeting was only 4 days away and the congregation almost had not been informed that it was happening. This flew in the face of the 2-week notice that Pastor Sparks had indicated was normal for such meetings. He also asked that the reason for the meeting be made clear in the email announcement that was still to be sent out and reiterated that the Church Visiting guide stated, "Both the Council and the congregation must be notified in advance about the when and the why of the visit."
Joe emailed back stating:
“Final arrangements for the meeting weren't confirmed until late last week, the day I reached out to you and Jessica. On the subject of the visit, it's the annual visit of the church visitors. It's not meant for a specific topic. You may discuss whatever you'd like with the church visitors while they're here.
“Your dissatisfaction with the elder's response on the church's doctrinal stances does not constitute a lack of response. I'm sorry to hear that you continue to be dissatisfied with your conversations with the elders.” (See Attachment X2)
MAY 2024 – THE CHURCH VISITORS MEETING
Because our meeting with the church visitors was limited to only 45 minutes, I sent them an email on 05/05/2024 outlining my concerns.
I explained to them that my concerns fell into three broad categories : (1) doctrinal issues, (2) administrative/organizational issues, and (3) interpersonal issues.
DOCTRINAL – I was concerned that denominational entities were promoting beliefs that seemed at odds with the CRCNA’s confessions. The ideas about race seemed to conflict with core aspects of Christianity such as the nature of sin, salvation, and sanctification. Additionally, there were instances of acceptance and, at times, outright promotion of LGBTQ sexualities and causes. These beliefs flew in the face of how the church was presented to me by Pastor Mark in the new members class; however, a year after I had asked the elders to confirm if they also recognized these things as unChristian, they had not provided me with an answer and continued to facilitate the transfer of funds from Covenant’s congregants to the entities promoting these unChristian beliefs. Additionally, Joe DeHaan had described Pastor Mark’s concerns as “personal opinions” and Jim Niemier had told me he reviewed the entire Race Relations website and found nothing concerning.
ADMINISTRATIVE/ORGANIZATIONAL – There seemed to be a lack of clarity as to what the responsibilities of elders were as well as a lack of knowledge about Church Order and Synodical decisions. The Council also seemed to have inappropriately transferred some of its doctrinal oversight responsibilities to the Finance Committee. Beyond that, although it had not been a driving concern of mine, the church had a reasonable number of members who did not believe in infant baptism as well as some congregants who were privately in favor of same sex marriage. Both of those stances were disqualifying for an office bearer; however, there did not seem to have been any steps taken to make sure that office bearers maintained the beliefs necessary to be elders and deacons.
PERSONAL ISSUES – Over the last year, the elders had several times made public pronouncements that they were going to maintain frequent and transparent communication; however, outside of a cursory email from Dominic Decoux and one longer phone call with him back in 2023, I did not receive any sort of proactive personal communication from the elders during 2023. Despite the copious amounts of communication and persistent follow-up I sent to the elders, I was still in March 0f 2024 angrily asked by Jim Niemeier “What do you want?”
I also believed the two listening sessions were handled badly and in a way that opened me up publicly to accusations by others at Covenant that I held unloving and divisive views on these matters even though my views did not seem to stray from the CRCNA’s stated beliefs and were in line with that of multiple other churches with the CRCNA. (See Attachment X3)
Along with that email I also included a supplemental attachment that basically outlined the same information that I have presented in Part 1 and Part 2 of this series of Substack posts. I concluded my message as follows:
“In summation, these doctrinal concerns that I have asked the elders about did not originate with me but came from Pastor Mark in the new members class. It has been over a year since (at their own request) I provided the elders documentation of some of the concerning things I saw being promoted by denominational entities. It has been over a year since I asked them whether Covenant agreed with them. I have still not received any answerers. During this process, although I came to the elders privately, the elders chose to make these issues public which increased their contentiousness; however, although it was their choice to make it public, they now seem to resent me for the way things have played out. Throughout this entire process the elders have communicated with me in a very nominal and insufficient manner in which they failed to clearly lay out to me when and how they intend to answer my questions, and now they seem to resent me for continuing to follow up and ask them for answers.
“At this point, I no longer believe that the elders have been acting in good faith, and I do not trust them to appropriately explain the doctrines and beliefs of the church without receiving outside assistance and oversight either from Pastor Sparks or from Pastor Sparks and a representative of Classis Wisconsin.”
I included a list of recommendations, which are as follows:
That the church visitors provide clarification as to what the responsibilities of elders are in terms of maintaining church doctrine and defending the faith.
That the elders of Covenant explain what they see as “the deeper issues with CRC” as mentioned in the November council minutes.
That the elders of Covenant explain what steps they are taking to inform and protect the congregation from these issues.
That the elders clarify what Covenant believes about race and race relations. I would specifically like them to review “The Statement About The Deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor” (including the resources it links to) as well as the “White Work” and “White Work 2.0” webinars and explain whether or not they believe these resources are aligned with the Bible and the CRCNA’s confessional documents.
That the elders of Covenant clarify whether or not they as a body and as individuals believe marriage is only between a male and a female and hold to the confessional understanding that homosexual sex is a form of unchastity.
That the elders explain if they as a body or as individuals believe that there is some sort of inherent moral deficiency with a church or denomination that is comprised mainly of people of the same race.
That the elders of Covenant explain whether the concern that was expressed by Pastor Mark in the new members class in spring of 2021 regarding progressive doctrinal drift at the denominational level is something that they as elders also share.
I ended by saying:
“I believe this should be done with the guidance and oversight of Pastor Sparks (and possibly also a Classis Wisconsin representative) and completed in no more than 1 month. Figuring out where the church stands on these core doctrinal issues seems to be in line with what the church is supposed to be doing during this period of transition, and my understanding was that one of the purposes of a transitional minister at Covenant was to help the church figure out its course before calling a new pastor.
“I also believe that my husband, myself, and others deserve a public apology from the elders for the way they, through the listening sessions, engineered a situation in which we were opened up to false accusations of being divisive and unloving.
“I also believe the elders should publicly acknowledge it is not wrong, divisive, or unloving for a prospective member to seek clarification from elders regarding a church’s beliefs and doctrinal stances.”
On 05/09/2024 my husband and I met with Pastors Ritsema and Van Engen who were the church visitors. My impression of the visit was that they did not think our concerns or desires were unreasonable, nor did they suggest we were acting inappropriately. After meeting with us, the church visitors met with Covenant’s council.
After the meeting, no one on the council reached out to my husband or me or conducted any sort of follow-up. When the minutes for the meeting were sent out to the congregation on 06/05/2024 they referenced our concerns thusly: “The Church Visitors met with a Covenant family prior to the Council meeting. The Church Visitors listened & offered counsel, then brought the matter before Council. Council agrees with the doctrinal positions of Synod 2023. The congregation can agree on the same principles, but may disagree on what actions to take, as with Ministry Shares.” (See Attachment Y)
The council did not address any of my questions regarding Covenant’s beliefs concerning the responsibilities of elders, what the council saw as “the deeper issues with CRC,” the church’s beliefs regarding race and race relations, and whether or not the council shared Pastor Mark’s concerns voiced during the new members class I attended about progressive drift in the denomination.