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The Church Atlas
Reformed Confessional Bodies
16 sections · 31 cards in its deck · 0 field files · as of 2026-10-05
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16 sections, below.
IVitals
The council that defines the family
NAPARC, the North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council, first met in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, in the autumn of 1975. Membership requires a full commitment to the Bible as inerrant and to the classical Reformed confessions.
Wikipedia: North American Presbyterian and Reformed Council · read 2026-10-05 · the quote was REMOVED on 2026-10-07: quote_check.py did not find it in the source, so the point stands as a summary only. secondary source; check against naparc.org
Size of the family
The eleven NAPARC member churches report about 619,000 members in about 3,700 congregations, with figures dated 2015 to 2025. The PCA alone is about two-thirds of that.
Wikipedia: NAPARC (member table) · read 2026-10-05 · the figures in the table come from different years
The largest body: the PCA
The Presbyterian Church in America reports 405,634 members and 1,959 congregations at the end of 2025. It was founded in 1973 by conservative churches that left the southern Presbyterian mainline, and it has been growing by about 1.5–2% a year.
adding 1.5% to 2% to their membership rolls each year
Religion Unplugged: A deep dive into the PCA (2 Aug 2025) · read 2026-10-05 · quote found word-for-word in the source by quote_check.py, 2026-10-07. the 405,634 figure is from the Wikipedia NAPARC table, end of 2025
The smaller bodies
Other member churches include the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (33,566 members, 2024), the United Reformed Churches in North America (25,004, 2023), the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (25,692, 2023) and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America (6,990, 2023).
Wikipedia: NAPARC (member table) · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
Sourced draft · 4 points · awaiting the house's review
IIOrigins
Genesis vector
Continuous confessional lineage; present American shape set by twentieth-century splits from mainline Presbyterianism and by continuing-church formations after 1973.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
IIIWhat They Hold
Ideological base
Confessional Calvinism under Presbyterian or Reformed polity — doctrine bounded by the Westminster Standards or the Three Forms, and enforced through church courts rather than personality.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
IVHow They Are Governed
Hierarchy & roles
Presbytery and general assembly as courts; teaching and ruling elders; seminaries as the formation gate; congregations as members rather than audience.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
VThe Sword & The State
The 1788 American revision
In 1788 American Presbyterians meeting in Philadelphia revised the 1646 Westminster Confession. The largest change was to chapter 23, on the civil magistrate: the magistrate was no longer to suppress heresy or call synods, but to protect every church without preferring any denomination.
without giving the preference to any denomination of Christians above the rest
Themelios: A Tale of Two Texts · read 2026-10-05 · quote found word-for-word in the source by quote_check.py, 2026-10-07.
Protection reaches unbelievers too
The revised text binds the magistrate to protect all citizens, believers or not, from abuse made in the name of religion.
no person be suffered, either upon pretense of religion or of infidelity, to offer any indignity, violence, abuse, or injury
TGC: 'Of the Civil Magistrate' · read 2026-10-05 · quote found word-for-word in the source by quote_check.py, 2026-10-07.
The question has reopened
In May and June 2025 the confessional press ran a public exchange on whether the 1646 or the 1788 text of chapter 23 is the faithful one. It is a live fault line in the family, tied to the wider Christian-nationalism debate.
American Reformer: The Civil Magistrate and the WCF (June 2025) · read 2026-10-05 · existence and date of the exchange only; its arguments are not yet summarised here
Sourced draft · 3 points · awaiting the house's review
VIInside the Doors
Memetic payload
Catechesis over time rather than a shareable unit — formation is the product, and it is deliberately slow.
Compression format
The catechism question; the confession chapter; the exegetical sermon; the presbytery overture.
Platform substrate
The congregation and presbytery, denominational publishing, seminary lecture media
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
VIIWhere They Stand Now
Structural position
Bounded and low-interface by design, but the source population for Ring 1 #9's media layer — which is the distinction this ring exists to make. The bodies ordain; the media guild broadcasts.
Node centrality
Low by design, high in proportion to its size in the online theology layer downstream.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
VIIITwo Hundred Years Out
For the house to write. This section is the house's own judgment, not something a source can answer. It waits for the house.
IXTheir Take on the Machine
A study committee on AI
The PCA's 53rd General Assembly (Louisville, 22–25 June 2026) set up an ad interim committee on artificial intelligence. It must report by the 55th Assembly (2028) on Scripture and the Westminster Standards, with reference to anthropology and the church, and on limits for AI in the church.
byFaith: AI Study Committee Members Announced · read 2026-10-05 · the quote was REMOVED on 2026-10-07: quote_check.py did not find it in the source, so the point stands as a summary only. Assembly date confirmed from the 53rd GA docket (pcaga.org) and byFaith's guide to the 53rd GA
Who sits on it
The committee has seven members, chaired by Mel Duncan, moderator of the 53rd Assembly. The other members are teaching elders Nathan Barczi, Scott Cook, Adam Parker and Ben Ratliff, and ruling elders Frank Cohee, Dan Lohrmann and Joshua Torrey.
byFaith: AI Study Committee Members Announced · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
What it will rule on
The overture behind the committee names five areas: AI in preaching and pastoral care, in church administration, as evidence in church discipline cases, in work and diaconal ministry, and in Christian education. Their first question is whether AI may be used at all, not what it is.
PCA GA: Overture 2025-49, Pacific Northwest Presbytery · read 2026-10-05 · the areas come from a search summary of the overture; read the PDF directly before relying on them
Sourced draft · 3 points · awaiting the house's review
XAbove · Around · Below
Edge weight
Dense TALENT flow to Ring 1 #9; theological adjacency to #35 and #37 across a real polemical boundary; competition with #38 for the confessionally-inclined.
Intertextuality
Deliberately delayed. Cultural events are answered doctrinally, weeks later, if at all.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
XITheir Case
The first answer
The family's own catechism opens with the purpose of a human life, and it puts God, not the self, at the centre.
Man's chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.
OPC: Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q.1 · read 2026-10-05 · the quote could not be checked automatically (access not completed: HTTP Error 404: Not Found); check it by hand. quote read directly in the source
God, defined
Their case rests on a God who does not change. The catechism defines him in fixed terms, so doctrine is received, not developed.
God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable
OPC: Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q.4 · read 2026-10-05 · the quote could not be checked automatically (access not completed: HTTP Error 404: Not Found); check it by hand. quote read directly in the source
Sourced draft · 2 points · awaiting the house's review
XIIThe Ledger
Economic model
Congregational tithe with presbytery assessment; denominational seminaries; small relative to the evangelical bodies and deliberately unentrepreneurial.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
XIIIStrengths & Fault-Lines
Internal factions
Confessionalist vs broadly-evangelical wings; a recurring dispute over the strictness of subscription; ongoing contention over the boundaries of ordination and of cultural engagement.
Context-collapse vulnerability
Low. The vocabulary is old and its unfamiliarity reads as archaic rather than coded.
Velocity & mutation
Very low, and treated as a virtue — mutation is nameable as error and adjudicable in a court.
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
XIVRules of Engagement
For the house to write. This section is the house's own judgment, not something a source can answer. It waits for the house.
XVWho to Know · What to Read
J. Ligon Duncan III
Chancellor and CEO of Reformed Theological Seminary, the largest seminary that trains PCA ministers, and the most senior institutional figure in the family.
RTS: Dr. J. Ligon Duncan III · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
Kevin DeYoung
Senior pastor of Christ Covenant Church (PCA) in Matthews, North Carolina, and a professor at RTS Charlotte. The family's most-read popular writer.
Wikipedia: Kevin DeYoung · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
Fred Greco
Stated Clerk of the PCA, its chief administrative officer, elected at the 53rd General Assembly in June 2026.
byFaith: General Assembly Full Recap · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
What to read
Start with the Westminster Shorter Catechism, which is short and is the family's own summary. Then read chapter 23 of the Confession in both texts, 1646 and 1788, side by side.
OPC: Westminster Shorter Catechism · read 2026-10-05 · a summary of the source; no direct quote
Sourced draft · 4 points · awaiting the house's review
XVILexicon
Vernacular & shibboleths
Presbytery, session, the Standards, subscription, good faith exception, means of grace, regulative principle, federal headship, courts of the church
From Ring III #40 · compiled, not founder-reviewed
In the Rings
The Guild Atlas's Third Ring bodies housed in this dossier.