Fans of the late, great Frankie Howerd will remember his catchphrase, honed while playing various Roman slaves with names like `Lurkio' drawn almost straight from Plautine comedies: `Nay, nay, thrice nay!'

Well, as John Muether, the OPC Historian, has just brought to my attention, the OPC actually voted itself out of existence three times, not twice as I noted in my review of D G Hart's new book.   here is what john says:

"I read with interest your review of DGH's BTT on Ref 21. Permit me to clarify one small matter regarding the OPC's ecumenical record. The first occasion when the "OPC voted itself out of existence" was in the 1975 union vote with the RPCES (see p. 231). The second, of course, was the 1981 J&R.  If one counts, as you did, the 1986 vote which failed for want of a sufficient super-majority, then OPC voted three times to unite with another Presbyterian body, which confirms your point all the more."

So, despite its reputation for aloofness, in the OPC it was `Yea, yea, thrice yea!' when it came to uniting with other like-minded bodies.  That is a record which must be virtually unprecedented in confessional Presbyterian history.