We can only speculate as to how he [Machen] might view the de facto revisions of the PCA’s confession and catechisms due to the allowances of “good faith subscription.” One thing is for sure—despite the challenges of the day, PCA confessionalists stand on much firmer ground and have far better prospects than did Machen in the first three and half decades of the 20th century.

J. Gresham Machen was doomed from the start in the Northern church. A virus was inserted into the PCUSA’S denominational source code going back to the mid-late 19th century at least. Add to the doctrinal defects the denomination’s stranglehold on the property of local congregations and you have an inevitable outcome…unless the bad guys leave and take the hit. And how often does this happen? The inertia and self-interest of large organizations usually win, especially when the organization is lavishly funded.
The Charles Augustus Briggs case was the little yellow bird in the mainline presbyterian coal mine. Though Briggs, a minister, professor, and opponent of the verbal inspiration of scripture, was defrocked in 1893, his very presence was a warning. But Briggs* was not just a doctrinal heretic—”Inerrancy is a ghost of modern evangelicalism to frighten children.”—he was also an opponent of that bulwark against error, confessionalism.

Briggs sounded very up-to-date when he “claimed that the contemporary supporters of the Confession had actually distorted the spirit of its teaching. ‘Modern Presbyterianism,’ he charged, ‘had departed from the Westminster Standards’ and a ‘false orthodoxy had obtruded itself’ in its place. That false teaching—what he labeled ‘orthodoxism’—was coming from Princeton Seminary, principally in the defense of biblical authority championed by A. A. Hodge and B. B. Warfield.”
Briggs was ahead of the game when it comes to a sort of beautiful orthodoxy:
Orthodoxism assumes to know the truth and is unwilling to learn; it is haughty and arrogant, assuming the divine prerogatives of infallibility and inerrancy; it hates the truth that is unfamiliar to it, and prosecutes it to the uttermost. But (ed. note: beautiful?) orthodoxy loves the truth. It is ever anxious to learn, for it knows how greatly the truth of God transcends human knowledge…. It is meek, lowly, and reverent. It is full of charity and love. It does not recognize an infallible pope; it does not bow to an infallible theologian.
The above was quoted by Hart and Muether. Let us see more of what they wrote about this particular turning point in Presbyterian history. Ask yourself, O PCA presbyter, if anything sounds familiar:
Although critical of the alleged innovations from Princeton Seminary, Union Seminary’s Old School rival, Briggs did not advocate merely removing a supposed Princetonian gloss from the Westminster Confession. Presbyterians, he argued, must also acknowledge the inadequacies and errors of the Confession. Since progress was of the essence of genuine Presbyterianism, the Confession itself encouraged its adjustment “to the higher knowledge of our times and the still higher knowledge that the coming period of progress in theology will give us.” Failure to take this step would be to retreat to the errors of Rome and to abandon the very principles of the Reformation.
Briggs was tapping into a growing consensus in the church, which had begun to form no later than the reunion of 1869, that the harder Calvinistic edges of the Confession needed to be softened. In the words of Benjamin J. Lake, “Some of the time-honored rigidity in the Westminster Confession seemed obsolete to many Presbyterians.” Typically, Presbyterian rigidity was spelled p-r-e-d-e-s-t-i-n-a-t-i-o-n.
At the same time, former Old Schoolers feared the rise of “broad churchism” and anticonfessionalism. But if Briggs’s proposals outraged conservatives, the spirit and the terms of the 1869 reunion discouraged efforts to discipline him. (bolding mine)
That reunion was of the previously divided stick-in-the-mud Old Schoolers and go-go, revivalist New Schoolers. The question must be asked: Are the divides in the PCA of today just a repeat (or rhyming soundalike) of the Old School-New School contradictions?
Turning back to Machen, let us notice that “the harder Calvinistic edges of the Confession (which) needed to be softened” were in fact softened to encourage and pave the way for the PCUSA’s absorption of much of the Cumberland Presbyterian church, a sort of revivalist 4-point Calvinist mutant body. In 1903, revisions of a few sections, two added chapters, and a qualifying “declaratory statement” sucked the Calvinistic life out of the Westminster Confession—at least the Northern church’s version. Thus by 1920s, Machen and his allies were working with a confession already diluted and de-fanged. The writing was on the wall.

The PCA and OPC are working with a restored WCF, thanks largely to Machen, who “was not as favorable (as Warfield), describing the 1903 revisions as ‘compromising amendments,’ ‘highly objectionable,’ a ‘calamity,’ and ‘a very serious lowering of the flag’ (Presbyterian Guardian, Nov. 28, 1936, pp. 69-70).”
Machen died soon after penning these words, of course. We can only speculate as to how he might view the de facto revisions of the PCA’s confession and catechisms due to the allowances of “good faith subscription.” One thing is for sure—despite the challenges of the day, PCA confessionalists stand on much firmer ground and have far better prospects than did Machen in the first three and half decades of the 20th century. Let us learn…and live.
Brad Isbell is a ruling elder at Covenant Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Oak Ridge, Tenn. This article is used with permission.
*Briggs became an Episcopalian
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Once the issue of trans identities arose, an openness to traditional Christian accounts became more costly….The social costs for progressive non-Christians of simply expressing an openness to or curiosity about traditional forms of Christian belief became much higher.

When I first started writing online in the early 2010s, most of what you might term the evangelistic openness I saw in media culture was coming from the political or cultural center-left.
A columnist at the New York Times came to faith.
A religion writer from Vox did as well.
Additionally, there were editors at both Vox and the New Yorker who were part of PCA or ACNA congregations. A number of other prominent writers in elite media seemed open to faith.
I remember hearing one such figure, now at the Times with quite a large platform, interview all three of Rod Dreher, Michael Brendan Dougherty, and Patrick Deneen within about a 12 month stretch in the late 2010s. Hearing some of his questions, particularly in his conversation with Dougherty, had me genuinely wondering if he was close to conversion.
This was also, of course, the tail end of Tim Keller’s ministry at Redeemer. Given Keller’s success as a church planter and ecosystem builder in New York and given New York’s significance culturally, much of this era may well be tied up in Keller’s presence and Redeemer’s ministry.
Yet if you look around today, something has shifted: To my eyes there is very little evangelistic openness in the center-left world. There are still plenty of Christians to be found, but virtually all of them that come to mind for me are not adult converts and came from Christian backgrounds.
But if you look at the right or the reactionary ends of the political horseshoe where right and left begin to converge, the picture is quite different: Jordan Peterson’s wife is now Catholic. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a one-time new atheist who did events with Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins, is a Christian. So is Paul Kingsnorth and Martin Shaw.
Meanwhile, figures like Tom Holland and Douglas Murray and Bari Weiss all seem, to varying degrees, interested in Christian faith in a way that goes beyond mere intellectual curiosity.
Moreover, as younger Americans politically polarize by gender, with men tending toward the right and women toward the left, those trends seem to also align with young men going to church in growing numbers even as young women continue to dechurch.
It would be a mistake to suggest this is happening because Christianity itself is “right wing.” In the first place, defining “right wing” is itself a fraught project—is it the “right wing” politics of Dwight Eisenhower or Mussolini? The politics of Reagan or George W. Bush or the politics of Orban or Meloni? Or should we range further afield—what about the “right wing” of D’Annunzio or Disraeli? “Right wing” conceals as much as it reveals in such conversations.
In the second place, one can easily think of any number of political positions one could plausibly assign to the right that do not align at all with historic Christianity. (Matthew Rose’s A World After Liberalism is the essential book to read on this.)
So what accounts for this shift and how should Christians respond?
The answer to the first question might be surprisingly simple: The shift dates back to the growing awareness, acceptance, and promotion of transgender sexual identities in mainstream American culture. This shift, dating to the mid 2010s and probably peaking in the early 2020s, did two things that fundamentally changed the evangelistic landscape for Christians in America. (I know some will argue that the real shift has to do with “wokeness” more than it does trans issues specifically. I don’t find this altogether persuasive both because I think one can disambiguate the different parts of the “woke” package and because I think issues of sexuality strike at the vitals of Christian belief and practice in uniquely complicated and challenging ways.)
The Mid 2010s Evangelistic Shift
First, as acceptance of transgender identities became a litmus test for the American left, the conflict between left wing political ideology and Christianity was redefined and intensified. A left wing media figure in 2015 might be able to signal friendliness to conservative post-liberals, for example, both as a sign of sincere desire to understand the appeal of Donald Trump and as an openness to alternative theories of American social collapse. Social breakdown was, after all, a long-standing concern of many on the American left dating back decades and certainly well-established by the early 2000s when works like Nickel and Dimed and Bowling Alone hit American bookstores.
But once the issue of trans identities arose, an openness to traditional Christian accounts became more costly: Christianity was no longer seen as a plausible conversation partner with left-wing political concerns around public justice. Instead, it became regarded as a threat to the lives of transgender individuals that made it impossible for trans people to publicly exist as their authentic selves. The social costs for progressive non-Christians of simply expressing an openness to or curiosity about traditional forms of Christian belief became much higher, in other words.
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In presbytery meetings if someone was needed to finish populating an ordination commission or take a seat on a committee, Scotty was often willing to help. He always had a word of encouragement for other ministers and provided wise assistance to many pastors during his numerous years of ministry. He was a kind and patient man.

When we met I was told that everyone called him Scotty because of his homeland. He looked the part with his thick white hair, matching bushy moustache, glint in his eyes, and ever-present smile. If he had been Irish, I would say he had a leprechaun-like quality about him. During a conversation I made the mistake of calling him Scotch which elicited a polite but emphatic response, “Scotch is a drink; people from Scotland are Scots.” I purposed not ever to make that mistake again. His wife Ruth was always cordial as she showed guests needlework and trinkets from her homeland Sweden scattered throughout their home. I never asked them how a Swede and a Scot managed to get together, but they were a loving couple that were hospitable to all and faithful in ministry together.
One time my wife and I were dinner guests of Scotty and Ruth. As we waited for the meal, I was seated in the living room chatting with Scotty when I viewed his study through a pair of glass doors, so I asked if he would show it to me. Setting in front of his desk was a nice wood book case with glass doors where he shelved his prized antiquarian titles. It was a nicely done piece and it was obviously made by hand. The touch of handicraft was observed in a few smidgens of misalignment and some saw kerfs that had passed their stop marks, but it had a wonderful patina with its surfaces colored by time and touch. Scotty informed me that his father had built the case many years ago in Scotland. When Scotty was a lad and the family finished eating dinner, the table was cleared so his father could turn it into a joiner’s bench for sawing, planing, chiseling, and fitting panels and joints to create furniture for the house, extended family, and selling to others.
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