Special Hearings — Faith Community Hearings — 1997-11-17

DOUGLAS BAX: The reason why we have several Presbyterian Churches in this   country is firstly because there were missions from different countries. There   was a mission or two missions from two different churches, two different Scottish   churches, in what is now called the Eastern Cape. There was a mission from a   Swiss Church in the Northern Transvaal and there was a mission from the Paris   Evangelical in Lesotho. And then there was a breakaway fromwell let me   first of all say when the Presbyterian Church of South Africa was formed in   1897 there was an attempt to include all the congregations that did subsequently   join that church, plus all the Scottish missions, but some of the Scottish missions   - one of the Scottish missions, particularly that of the Free Church of Scotland   decided to stay out, largely to stay out, and then in 1921 or 1920 rather, some   missionaries were sent out to look at the whole issue and they made a recommendation   that it would be better if the black congregations first of all formed a church   on their own that would much later join up with the white congregation, with   the Presbyterian Church of South Africa. So in 1923 what was called the Bantu   Presbyterian Church formed, and because the Presbyterian Church of South Africa   at that stage was asked if it would release some of its black congregations   to join that church, it gave them the option to do so, which many of them did.   Some of them subsequently came back. For a long time the Assemblies of the two   churches had representatives from each other present at all their meetings and   the idea always was that eventually they would join up. There have been attempts   to unite those two churches and what is now called the Evangelical Reformed   Church which is the church in the Northern Transvaal, but these have failed.   Partly because of the making the Transkei independent which aroused quite a   feeling of nationalism amongst many people in the Transkei and made people in   the Reformed Presbyterian Churches that subsequently became a bit hesitant to   join us. Partly because I think of the experience of white paternalism in the   PCSA. We hope now that things will move ahead. We have tried in the past and   the attempts to unite have always failed.
REV.

PAKISO TONDI: In as far as the second question is concerned, I can say   that the fact that I'm here together with the two gentlemen is a sign of repentance.   There is repentance in the PCSA as far as white domination is concerned. You   can see that I don't even belong to their generation. We have just fallen short   in bringing a woman, but there has been a great change because of the Presbyterian   Black Leadership Consultation which was founded in 1985 and I'm glad to hear   that the chairperson says churches also have in the Black Anglican Forum which   will help to speed up, to make sure that there is equal representation in some   of the churches.

CHAIRPERSON: Thank you very much for all of that - making us feel so decrepit.   We hope that your children will remember when you were here. Thank you very   much. Siybulela. You may stand down. The Congregational Church.
We are not doing too badly. The Congregational Church represented by David   Wanless and John De Guchi. Thank you very much and we have to express our appreciation   that you have shown so much patience waiting for this to happen. We are grateful.
ADMINISTERS OATH.
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