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General Convention Sunday June 28

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Yesterday was such an amazing day. I am so blessed. First some back story:

This is my fourth time to be part of the deputation from MIssissippi (2006, 2009, 2012, 2015). I am so very grateful to be here and I am loving spending time with these amazing people on our MS deputation.

Before I had even left for Salt Lake City, the chair of our deputation, Canon David Johnson, asked me to take his spot on the floor for Saturday. Deputies can exchange with alternates for any legislative session. David knew Saturday was when the Presiding Bishop election would take place, yet gave that up for me. He thought his wife was arriving mid day so he wanted to be available for that. Saturday morning her flight was delayed until around 8 at night, so he could have easily served on the floor and been available when she arrived. I offered to let him retract his offer to swap with him and let me have another day, and David graciously refused. Due to the kindness of Edward O’Connor (who graciously gave up his place on the deputation) and David Johnson, and the willingness of Bishop Seage and the Executive Committee to allow me on the team, I was on the floor when we confirmed the election of the Right Reverend Michael Curry, Bishop of North Carolina, as our new Presiding Bishop. Bishop Curry is a dynamite preacher, great evangelist, wonderful teacher, excellent administrator and a man that loves Jesus and the church. If you haven’t heard him preach, google him, he is so gifted. The electricity on the floor of the House of Deputies once we heard he had won was amazing. He won on the first ballot (the House of Bishops elect the PB, they were sequestered at the Episcopal cathedral in Salt Lake City for the voting. They prayed and sang and prayed some more before casting ballots). There have only been two PBs elected on first ballot, and Bishop Curry had 47 more votes than he needed for a majority on ballot one. Slam dunk. 

By the way he is our first African American Presiding Bishop. 

This week has been unreal. After preaching on the Charleston murders Sunday, including a lot of words on racism and gun violence, coming here and continuing the work of the marriage task force as we strive for full access to the rite of Holy Matrimony for all, then the SCOTUS decision coupled with the hard-to-believe movement to remove the Confederate Battle Flag, and then today being present RIGHT THERE ON THE FLOOR of the House when history was made and the best Episcopal preacher I have ever heard was selected to lead our church, it is really almost impossible to believe.

What a week! I am so blessed to be part of all this movement of the Holy Spirit.

This morning I will join with the Bishops Against Gun Violence and many others participants of General Convention for a march here in Salt Lake City, calling for reasonable conversation on guns. Later in the moring the United Thank Offering Eucharist will be celebrated, then the business of GC kicks back into high gear in the afternoon. Our marriage resolutions have been sent by the legislative committee to the House of Bishops for deliberation. Should be an exciting next 6 days of convention.

Thanks for listening. Thanks for your prayers. Thanks be to God.

My Main Blog

General Convention June 27

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Yesterday was pretty wild around here with the early morning news of the SCOTUS ruling on marriage equality. The committee on marriage was told the news and decided to ajourn so members and visitors could have time to receive it and communicate with others.

The President of the House of Deputies, the Reverend Gay Jennings, preached a wonderful sermon at daily Eucharist. We were also led in worship by Theodicy Jazz Collective, which includes Ann Phelps of St. Andrew’s Cathedral in Jackson, MS. Ann’s voice led us beautifully and the music was stirring.

Legislative sessions today dealt with some easy resolutions and defeated a resolution to adopt the Donor’s Bill of Rights. Canon David Johnson of Mississippi was a principle speaker against the resolution with some very wise words.

Last night the marriage committee held hearings on the four marriage liturgies submitted by the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music. It was interesting to note how lightly attended the hearing was. Almost all those testifying were in favor, with one opposed and one bishop wanting to make sure they had discretion to not use these in their diocese. These rites will most likely be proposed as “trial rites” which moves them closer to prayer book revision, which could possibly take place in 2018. The rites offer four ways to “do” marriages and  / or blessing liturgies, with gender neutral language. One of them is from the 1928 prayer book! Trial use would provide feedback to the SCLM for GC in 2018.

This morning I am attending marriage committee meetings where the committee debates the resolutions after the hearings. Marriage hearings are over with so now the committee gets into the sausage making. I will be on the floor for legislative sessions today, which will include the House of Deputies receiving and concurring on the election of a new Presiding Bishop. The House of Bishops will meet at St. Mark’s Cathedral to elect the PB. Will there be purple smoke?

Some important legislation should show up today at the House of Deputies, including A037 which extends the work of the marriage task force, adds members to it, and requires more cultural and theological diversity. While I would love to continue on the task force, odds are most of the members will be new. The bishops passed A037 without dissent.

As always you can go to generalconvention.org and actually check on resolutions, and go to the media hub for live streaming of worship and other activities.

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General Convention June 26

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The legislative process continues to lumber along. The two houses (Deputies and Bishops) met twice today, but primarily for organizing themselves and welcoming visiting dignataries and the like. In the 2nd session of the day the House of Deputies (HoD) spent over an hour nitpicking new rules of order, which had been worked on these last 3 years by a committee of people who really knew what they were doing. The new rules are definitely an improvement. But taking over an hour to wordsmith the committee’s good work was exhausting to behold. Several amendments were offered, all defeated easily. After all the debate, the rules passed by over 95%! 

The legislative committee on marriage met yesterday morning to discuss the first 4 resolutions from the previous night’s hearing. A lot of discussion around extending the work of the Task Force on Marriage took place. They added money to the budget request in order to insist on much broader consultation with Anglican Communion partners, inserted language to make sure the reconstituted Task Force is more reflective of cultural and theological diversity, and implored the Church to really use the materials (toolkit especially) produced by the Task Force already. (A caveat for those who do not know – I am currently a member of the Task Force, so a bit of pride in our work may creep into my comments. Should GC approve the continuation of the Task Force, I would love to continue to serve on it, but we all understand that will be entirely up to the Presiding Officers  – the Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies). Bishop Dorsey McConnell of Pittsburgh was particularly critical of the Task Force report and what he deems the one-sided nature of the theological arguments. He was perturbed by it enough to oppose the resolution imploring the Church to use the study materials because he disagrees with the theolgical, historical, canonical essays. Thankfully, Bishop Tom Ely of Vermont defended our work (he is also on theTask Force) and challenged McConnell’s statement. In the end the committee approved the amended resolution to continue the work, which means it now goes into the pipeline to be debated by the two houses, where it can be approved, amended, rejected, or sent back to the committee.

Last night the committee held hearings on proposed canonical changes. Our Task Force had filed one of those resolutions which changes the canon on marriage in several areas. While the majority of those speaking at the hearing (anyone is allowed to sign up to speak) were in favor of the canonical change, which changes language of “man and woman” and “husband and wife” to “two parties”, there were some passionate pleas to not mess with this. For some it was “we are not ready for this”, for others this was moving our church out of “Christendom” (someone needs to tell the speaker that Christendom is over, thanks be to God).
Bishop Shannon Johnston of Virgina (and formerly of Mississippi) gave us a peek at a core piece of the argument against the canon changes. While stating emphatically he was in full support of marriage equality, he believes strongly that changing the canon is the wrong way to go. He encouraged the committee to put forward the suggested new liturgies which are gender neutral and consider them prayer book revision (trial rites), which could allow them to be part of the prayer book in 2018 (having been approved by two consecutive General Conventions). The House of Bishops will be where the rubber meets the road on all this.
I enjoyed a late dinner with my bishop, the Rt. Rev. Brian Seage. It was really good to catch up, being a long way from my home diocese I needed to reconnect and discuss my future with him.

Off to the new day, your prayers are appreciated.

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General Convention June 25

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I spent most of the day yesterday traveling to Salt Lake City. What imagea beautiful city, I had great views of the mountains and the lake as we descended.

I was able to catch much of the Presiding Bishop candidates presentation. This was held in the House of Deputies, I think for the first time. They showed videos from each candidate, who then had a few minutes to speak, followed by Q and A. The election is Saturday. Bishop Curry from North Carolina has to be the front runner, but history tells us handicapping this race is dangerous. Never know what happens behind closed doors in the House of Bishops.

It took three forevers for my room to be ready, so I wandered the downtown SCL area a bit. It’s pretty warm here (97), but it’s a dry heat! Actually it was way more comfortable than South Florida.

The deputation from Mississippi met briefly to work on a resolution we will present to committee today. This is a great team, folks! It is a joy and privilege to work with them. More on this resolution once it is submitted and in the pipeline.

Last night I attended the first legislative hearings for the Special Committee on Marriage. They heard testimony on A037 (submitted by our Task Force on Marriage to continue and expand the work), C007, C009, and D026. The latter three have to do with changing liturgies to be inclussive for same-gender marriages. Tonight they take on A036, which we are the Task Force submitted, calling for canonical revision of the canon on marriage. More on that later.

If you go HERE, you can see the text of resolutions and track them as they are edited by the committee and eventually by the House of Deputies and House of Bishops.

After the hearings we had a wonderful reunion of our Task Force on Marriage team, almost all of us are here. We shared dinner and talked strategy and, as always, laughed a lot! They even sang Happy Birthday to me – a day early. Yep, today is my birthday!

General Convention is a marathon so I am off to the races again. Today I really look forward to seeing a bunch of old friends from around the church. I will try to check in both with the marriage committee and the social justice one, as I am interested in anti-racism resolutions. I am hoping we can put additional funds into anti-racism training and put some teeth into encouraging ALL our leaders to attend. To that end, we need more trainers trained and updates to our materials, which costs money. Money we need to spend!

Blessings to all. Comments are welcome!

Let us Pray, My Main Blog

Tuesday, June 23, 2015 and off to General Convention

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I am posting this on the main blog as well as the prayer blog…..

St. Paul’s Cycle of Prayer: Tuesday – Seekers and other Young Adults, those in our community who are unchurched, and especially Family Promise and CROS ministries

Early in the morning I leave for General Convention in Salt Lake City. This is my 4th time to be part of the Mississippi deputation and each time has been a great honor. As a member of the Task Force on Marriage, I will be very busy behind the scenes working with the legislative committee on marriage and the other task force members as well. I hope to see many old friends and make new ones!

I will be blogging on my Main Blog (what a creative name!) from GC. This morning, as I was reading Morning Prayer, I thought I would put a note on the Prayer Blog that I won’t be updating it as often because of time constraints at GC. Which led me to think I probably won’t have time to say MP or EP while gone. Which then led me to say – are you stupid? GC is so intense, there is so much to do and so much to consider and so much to take in and so many places to be and often tense conversations and weighty matters to debate and in all that madness, the worst thing I could do is shirk a spiritual discipline because I don’t have time for it while at a church gathering!

Of course we pray every day at legislative sessions, committee meetings and the like. We share Eucharist together each day, worship at GC is really wonderful. But this discipline of daily prayer, solitary daily prayer but with the understanding that I am hoping to share something from that practice on the prayer blog, is just the foundation I need each day at GC. I hope you are praying with me!

I was struck by the so familiar words this morning from the Venite:

Come, let us bow down, and bend the knee, *
and kneel before the Lord our Maker.

For he is our God,
and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. *
Oh, that today you would hearken to his voice!

I hope all of us attending GC will remember these words – and that we humble ourselves and bow down before the Lord, remembering we are the sheep of his hand and that today, each day, we will hearken to God’s voice. Will you pray that with me?

#GC78