Assembly Turns Away Effort to Study Historic Continental Reformed Standards

The Assembly turned back an effort that would have raised the possibility of having the PCA study the historic standards of the Dutch Reformed world, called the Three Forms of Unity.
The Interchurch Relations Committee (IRC) had, without authorization from the Assembly and apart from presbytery overture, erected a special sub-committee comprised of two PCA and one Orthodox Presbyterian elders, to study the compatability of the Heidelberg Catechism, Belgic Confession, and Canons of the Synod of Dordt with the Westminster Standards, the historic confession of Presbyterianism. With an eye to those in the Dutch Reformed tradition who might want to join the PCA, the IRC was recommending that the church, in her lower courts, study these documents so that the PCA could appreciate the common Reformed theology contained therein.
But TE David Coffin objected that this might lead to a situation of the denomination having a multitude of confessions, with practical allegiance to none. His substitute motion, which called on elders and churches which presently hold to the Three Forms of Unity to study the Westminster Standards, carried.