[Vision2020] Letter to Idaho Statesman about Wilson

[Nick Gier]

Greetings:

Below you will find a letter that I have sent to the Idaho Statesman 
objecting to the title that they gave to my column, which I had entitled 
"The Cultural Wars Come to Moscow, Idaho."  This is the full version.  Now 
I have to cut it to 200 words.  Wish me luck!

I object to the title given to my “Reader’s View” of August 12.  At no 
point in my piece did I say that Douglas Wilson was an Aryan Christian.  I 
am quite prepared to document his association with neo-Confederates, but 
there is no evidence to link him with neo-Nazis.
I accept Wilson’s disavowal of racism, but his statement that the 
antebellum South was a harmonious multiracial society would give great 
comfort to many racists.
Wilson also refuses to distance himself from Steve Wilkins, his co-author 
on the slavery booklet, who was a founding director of the neo-Confederate 
League of the South.
         Wilson claims that he not a neo-Confederate, but I offer the 
following:
·       Robert E. Lee’s portrait is proudly displayed in Wilson’s Logos 
School and the Confederate flag is displayed at social functions.
·       A conservative Presbyterian minister has testified that he saw a 
Confederate flag in Wilson's office, along with other Civil War memorabilia.
·       Wilson wrote an editorial supporting the right of states to succeed 
from the Union. Isn’t this an act of rebellion that Wilson’s religion forbids?
·       Wilson has spoken at neo-Confederate Southern Heritage conferences 
and has written for the neo-Confederate journal Chronicles.
·       Moscow Chamber of Commerce executive Paul Kimmell, a member of 
Wilson’s church, featured Lee in a leadership conference. In his PowerPoint 
presentation he had projected the Confederate flag and Old Glory side by 
side as if they should be given equal value.
Wilson’s claim to be a Presbyterian is also problematic.  For example, the 
Mississippi branch of the conservative Presbyterian Church of America (PCA) 
has stated that Wilson’s views “are confused and confusing, are unbiblical, 
are contra-confessional, and are (as Jonathan Edwards put it) ‘of a 
pernicious and fatal tendency.' As such, we are ready to declare some of 
these distinctive teachings to be outside the bounds of acceptable 
diversity in this presbytery, and we trust also, in the PCA.”
On June 22, 2002, the Reformed Presbyterian Church of the United States 
(RPCUS) declared that Wilson’s and Wilkins’ teaching “has the effect of 
destroying the Reformed Faith through the introduction of false hermeneutic 
principles; the infusion of sacerdotalism; and the redefinition of the 
doctrines of the church, the sacraments, election, effectual calling, 
perseverance, regeneration, justification, union with Christ, and the 
nature and instrumentality of faith. . . . We therefore resolve that these 
teachings are heretical.”
Since Wilson is not a member of the PCA or the RPCUS, he cannot be 
disciplined by these Presbyterians.  Strictly speaking, Wilson’s own 
Confederation of Reformed Evangelicals is not a recognized presbytery; 
rather, it is a loose confederation of independent churches that will never 
hold Wilson to account for his actions or his eclectic theology.
Nick Gier, Moscow

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