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The church of apartheid crept toward reconciliation with its non-white sister church on Wednesday, indicating it agreed with the principles of social justice and racial equality but refusing to adopt them as doctrine.
Heading the agenda of the Dutch Reformed Church at its regular four-year synod was a merger with the Uniting Reformed Church, composed mainly of black and mixed-race members.
Delegates approved a series of measures intended to lead to a merger, and progressive church leaders hailed them. However, Dutch Reformed church members refused to adopt the Confession of Belhar, a doctrine named after the mixed-race neighborhood where it was sanctioned by non-white church members in 1986 to protest apartheid.
