What’s a Synodical Parliamentarian?

As Synod 2025 opened June 13, president Stephen Terpstra noted Article 1-a of the Church Order. Right at the beginning the Christian Reformed Church is “confessing, acknowledging, and desiring,” he said: confessing “complete subjection to the Word of God and the Reformed creeds … acknowledging Christ as the only head of his church,” and desiring to honor the call “‘to prepare God’s people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up’ (Eph. 4:12), and to do so ‘in a fitting and orderly way’ (1 Cor. 14:40).”

Synod is the annual general assembly of the Christian Reformed Church in North America. It is meeting June 13-19 in Ancaster, Ont.

Synod 2025 parliamentarian, Michael Winnowski, sees the Church Order as “not just a set of rules but a set of disciplines that are aimed at helping us discern the will of God,” and that’s what he’s most passionate about as a parliamentarian.

The role is relatively new, one of the changes adopted by Synod 2019—along with a time limit for floor speeches and annual orientation for delegates—to help improve the running of synod. The rules of synodical procedure say the “position could be filled by the faculty adviser for church polity.” Kathy Smith, former adjunct professor of church polity at Calvin Theological Seminary, who resigned from that position last year, served as parliamentarian for synods 2022 to 2024.

Winnowski, who sat down with The Banner Friday afternoon while most synod participants were engaged in closed advisory committee sessions, said, “I feel like Kathy Smith’s shoes are pretty big to fill.” But knowing he can’t be the same as an academic scholar professionally versed in church polity, he said, “I pray God will use who I am in this moment, and that’s all I can take responsibility for.”

He is a former synodical deputy—those appointed by synod to aid classes (regional groups of churches) in following synod’s rules; a specialized transition minister—a pastor with specialized training to assist churches in transition; and a retired pastor who’s still willing to learn—he just completed a 15-month certificate in spiritual formation from Tyndale Seminary in Toronto, Ont., where he lives, though he was born in Pittsburgh, Pa., and spent 19 years pastoring Geneva Campus Church, near the campus of the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

“If you’re a pastor, you love the church, you care about it, and this (synod) is an important aspect of the church,” Winnowski said. “One of the things I hope is that as a synod and as a denomination we can bear witness to Jesus in a way that is not reflective of the dismissive and contentious culture that surrounds us.”

The duties of the parliamentarian, as laid out in the Rules for Synodical Procedure, include “advising the president with regard to appropriate procedure related to Church Order and the Rules for Synodical Procedure, responding to procedural challenges from the floor, and serving with the officers of synod when complicated procedural processes arise.” Winnowski described it as, “Helping synod take advantage of its own precedents and procedures and do what its own Church Order says to do.”

The parliamentarian is appointed each year by the program committee (the officers of the previous year’s synod). Winnowski said last year’s synod president, Derek Buikema, who Winnowski knew from having been the synodical deputy at Buikema’s ordination exam and with whom he subsequently worked in a peer mentoring program, approached him about the role. Winnowski said he did two things in preparation after confirming in prayer a willingness to say yes: “I asked God to help me, and I immersed myself in the literature—the CRC Manual of Church Governance, Henry DeMoor’s Commentary on Church Order, and the Rules for Synodical Procedure.”

Paraphrasing a line he learned in his spiritual formation training: “pray as you can, not as you can’t,” Winnowski said, “I’m going to be the parliamentarian that I can, not that I can’t.”

While Synod 2025 is Winnowski’s first as parliamentarian, he has been a delegate and a representative from the then Interchurch Relations Committee (now Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations Committee), serving in an official capacity to about six synods.

Synod 2025, the annual general assembly of the Christian Reformed Church in North America, is meeting June 13-19 on the campus of Redeemer University in Ancaster, Ont. Find daily coverage from The Banner at TheBanner.org/synod. Visit crcna.org/synod for the agenda, advisory reports, recordings of plenary sessions, and to subscribe to the daily Synod News email.