A KIRK committee, which was expected to be wound up in the autumn, has been granted an unexpected reprieve.
In a three-way battle over its future, which involved a former moderator and the convener of the ill-fated Assembly Council, the committee was saved in an eleventh-hour move by Mrs Helen MacLeod, a council member and Forfar elder.
In what he believed would be his final address as council convener, the Rev Angus Stewart opened with a hard-hitting attack on Kirk administrators, which he claimed reflected presbytery concerns.
''The council has listened to the voice of the pew across the country and has found real and deep concern.
''For example, assembly boards are setting the Church's agenda, rather than serving the congregations. The Church is not mission led, but finance driven.''
He also expressed reservations about the central administration of the Church, outlining five areas of concern, including the ongoing unrest within the board of communication, staffing disputes in World Mission, and a shift in power to the board of practice and procedure.
Mr Stewart called on the assembly to wind up the council, but establish a commission examining the possibility of a think-tank to replace it.
However, it was a move by Mrs MacLeod to allow the Assembly Council to continue in a different form, which won favour.
She claimed she had been one of three who dissented with the 32-strong Assembly Council's motion and claimed the council would have achieved the aims set down by a report in 1996 on its future if it had been tackled in a positive fashion.
''We seem to have become involved in one negative spiral, focussing always on difficulties and problems,'' she said.
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