*Adopted the “Five Marks of Mission”. Various bodies and instruments of the Anglican Communion have affirmed these as strategic priorities: 1. To proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom; 2. To teach, baptise, and nurture new believers; 3. To respond to human need by loving service; 4. To seek to transform unjust structures of society; 5. To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth.

*Consented to the election of the bishop of the Diocese of Ecuador Central. This was a heartbreaking process. The Diocese of Ecuador Central, by all accounts, has struggled since the 1970s to maintain central administrative functions. For example, the diocese has not had a functioning standing committee since at least 1973. Racial and cultural strife has been a factor, along with remnants of colonialism and other challenges. Members of the deputation spoke passionately for and against the consent. It ultimately passed; for the sake of that diocese, I hope the wisdom of the Spirit was working in the House of Bishops when they elected the bishop-elect.

*Health care coverage advocacy. The Diocese of East Tennessee has been working on a curriculum that might able to be used in all congregations to train church members to be advocates for universal health care. The testimony I heard in the committee hearing makes it sound like East Tennessee may soon have something really wonderful to share with the wider church. It focuses on education about the issues and training for those who would be voices among the various governmental bodies for healthcare coverage, reform, etc.

*MDGs. The draft budget prepared by Executive Council did not include the 0.7% line item for the Millenium Development Goals. The version of the budget current under consideration in both houses has the line item restored.

*Ecumenism. Agreed to further conversations with the Presyterian Church USA, and the United Methodist Church, the latter to include more outreach to and inclusion of conversations with historically African American denominations arising from the Episcopal/Methodist experience, such as the AME and the CME. I know that the propoasal for full commuion with the Moravian Church (the American iteration, only) is out there; I cannot remember if we voted on it yet or not! If we haven’t I don’t know why it won’t pass when we do.

*Anglican Covenant. Adopted a resolution commending further study. No substantive position on the current draft (or really, the concept itself) was promulgated.

*Earth Charter. Voted to endorse the Earth Charter. There is some concern in various quarters about how this affects commercial agriculture. Further research is needed.

We went into recess this morning before finishing debate on the budget. Two interesting points so far:

1. Two attempts have been made that would assume the restoration of a monthly Episcopal Life. One failed; the other is still pending. I am in favor of it, but it seems it will not pass. It’s sort of silly if we cannot get it done; Episcopal Life is self-funded.
2. A deputy from Chicago attempted to add funding for a feasibility study to move the Episcopal Church Center out of New York. He would have had more support, but he made the mistake of suggesting that it should move to Chicago. The suggestion felt a bit self-serving, and the amendment failed.

*Title IV revisions. This was a carryover from last convention. Title IV of the Canons pertain to ecclesiastical discipline. It wasn’t passed last time because of late concerns that some of the provisions could apply to lay people. This revision was well received; the old Title IV was based on the Uniform Code of Military Justice. The new revision is supposed to be better oriented to our identity as the Body of Christ.

*Denomination-wide health care plan. There are still some areas of the church not providing health care benefits to eligible clergy and lay employees. This plan leverages the buying power of the entire denomination into one single health care plan (with some exceptions, for example, in overseas dioceses that don’t have Blue Cross) so that over the first four years, something like $64 million will be saved over all. Of course in some places, the immediate costs will increase, so it’s been difficult for deputies from those areas to support the plan. However, we’re a church, not Wall Street. Sometimes decisions that are best for the whole church are painful for the local church.

* Mandatory pensions for lay employees. Didn’t used to be mandatory. Now it is. This is another problem for smaller churches who do not feel they can afford the cost.

*D025. There’s a lot of commentary about D025 on the web; I shan’t try to do any better right now. Besides that, it’s a carefully nuanced piece of legislation, and it will take awhile for us all to determine the end effects. It does affirm that all the baptized have access to discernment processes for all orders of ordination regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age, sex, etc. Some in the Communion will see this as the definitive action needed to justify labeling TEC as apostate and will start taking bold actions to have us cut off from the rest of the Communion. We’ve all been navel-gazing about it so much that I don’t know yet what the rest of the Communion thinks right now.

*Holy Women, Holy Men. It was approved for trial use. If it’s approved at the next convention, it will replace Lesser Feasts and Fasts, the book that contains prayers and materials for veneration of the saints. It’s much larger than LFF; there was a lot of concerns about it, who was included, who was not included, etc.

I have more notes, but I’ve left them at my seat in the House, so Part II will have to come tomorrow. Tonight I will see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince with Lori Johnson in a theater that serves wine and beer and doesn’t let anyone under the age of 21 in. I love Southern California!

UPDATE: I’m now aware that there is a resolution on the way which will address B033 more directly. One of our deputation voted against D025, for the reason that it did not address B033 directly enough. While he’s correct, I felt that D025 had important things to say and does capture the mind of the house. I don’t know which resolution on B033 we’ll see, or when, so I cannot predict what will happen with that just yet.

So, beyond that, some highlights of the past two days:

• The Integrity Eucharist was pretty fantastic, especially the sermon.  Bishop Barbara Harris, the first female bishop in the Anglican Communion, was the preacher and she knocked it out of the park.
• “Committee of the Whole” in the House of Deputies on B033 was intense and I think a good thing.  Too bad the bishops decided not to come and observe as was proposed to them.  That might have helped them understand the mind of the House of Deputies. 

At lunch I attended another First-time Deputy forum. This one was on the denomination-wide health care plan. Some of the questions were things we’ve heard before: what about dioceses in which health care costs may increase under the new plan, and what about dioceses that will see decreases in services or coverage under the new plan. These are real problems, and I don’t know how or if they will be fully resolved. I think the more vexing challenge is how Church Pension Group is going to find coverage in non-domestic dioceses and in those parts of the U.S. where the seven major insurance providers are not present. Also, I’m personally concerned about the possibility of church employers coercing their employees to “opt out” of coverage whenever possible as a means to manage costs. We’re doing this to help save money, yes, but we’re also doing it to expand heath care coverage to more of our employees. We’re a church, after all; we should be about caring for folks before we’re about the bottom line.

In the House of Deputies afternoon legislative session we tried to elect 12 seats on the CPF board of trustees. I say “tried”, because the electronic voting machines were not working. We ended up passing a motion to reschedule the vote to another time. We then re-elected Bonnie Anderson to another term as President of the House of Deputies (yay Bonnie!). We then moved into special session to discuss B033.

B033 was the resolution passed in the very last minutes of the previous General Convention (2006), whereby the Convention agreed to moratoria on elevating persons in same-sex relationships to the episcopate and from approving rites of blessing for same relationships. The chair of the World Mission Committee read a history of the issue, and then we were advised to find another deputy whom we didn’t know and discuss three questions (paraphrased, because I can’t remember the exact wording):

1. What is my story about B033?

2. What is the church’s story about B033?

3. Where is God calling us now?

I met a really lovely man from a diocese in the south. I won’t mention which one so that I can say more about what he told me. He mentioned he has a gay brother who has been in a relationship for 11 years. They have three daughters; Mr. Deputy is godfather to one of them. In a very unassuming way he made it quite clear to me that he felt strongly that it is time for the church to make a new statement about its position on the issues germane to B033, to the effect that we will not continue the moratoria.

The House will have further discussions tomorrow morning. I understand that the House of Bishops was asked by one of its membership to consider requesting an invitation to the House of Deputies as silent observers for that discussion. I understand also that the measure was defeated. Bishop Gene Robinson has expressed some dismay on his blog at his perception that some of the bishops are feeling a rather inflated sense of their own importance and function in the church.

It fits in well with some of the developments on the Anglican stage, particularly when Anglican bishops asked our House of Bishops for a further assurance (post B033) that they would not consent to any more gay bishops. It continues to be obvious that The Episcopal Church’s inclusion of priests, deacons, and lay people in the highest level of its governance is simply not understood or accepted by other provinces in the Communion. As much as I may be open to arguments that TEC’s “innovations” fly in the face of the precepts of catholicity, I will not abide other provinces’ refusal to accept our polity. It particularly describes Ubuntu, and I think it is a gift to the Communion.

(He wasn't dressed like this when I met him)

And I was invited to meet him. One of the deputies from the Diocese of California organized a request to the presiding bishop and the president of the house of deputies that they invite the Archbishop to have a private meeting with a small group of LGBT deputies during his visit to General Convention. Surprisingly enough, he agreed, and miracle of miracles I was invited to be part of the group.

One of the wonderful things about this meeting was that we were not driven by anyone else’s agenda. Since it was not an official meeting between the Archbishop and any church body or other organization, we were not coached or guided or beholden to anyone but ourselves. The group’s roster is available elsewhere online, but let me just comment briefly. This group of priests and laypeople, theologians and scholars, ministers and God’s beloved children was truly extraordinary and I am so blessed to have been able to meet and know them, much less the Archbishop.

In planning what we wanted to do and say, we worked through a number of possible formats and ideas. After much discussion we decided the most effective use of our time with the Archbishop would be to tell our stories. We knew that even though there were eminent theologians in our group, we wouldn’t likely have anything new or critical to say in those terms that the Archbishop hadn’t already heard or known. We felt that telling stories would be the best way to share ourselves with him.

So we did that. In thirty minutes we prayed three times, told eight personal and powerful stories of LGBT ministry and experience, and heard the Archbishop’s response. Since this was a private meeting, I will not divulge details of the conversation; we all agreed that it was in all our best interests (and the Archbishop’s) to keep it private. Doing so also allowed for a depth of vulnerability and detail that would not have been possible if we knew that what we were to say might be later reported in any news media.

I know that the Archbishop heard us. He specifically reflected back the theme of my story in his remarks. So I know that he was taking me seriously and that he is extremely perceptive and thoughtful. Everyone says this about him, largely based on his published work, but I now know it from experience. What I don’t know is whether or not our meeting will inspire any further response. We left him with the message that we wanted to be put to work by him. We did not come to air grievances, but to describe our experience and offer to work with him to change hearts and minds. I hope he calls on us someday.

Later we attended orientation for the legislative process – lots of Robert’s Rules. They did a nice job. Tomorrow starts the first legislative session. We learned how to vote with the little electronic voting devices, and we heard from Michael Battle about Ubuntu, the theme of GC2009. I would have included a link here to a page describing Ubuntu, but the official General Convention website only has a description of the logo, so here’s what I’ve been able to glean thus far:

Ubuntu is a deeply embedded concept in sub-saharan Africa. If you think about the Western outlook on rugged individualism and every man for himself, Ubuntu is diametrically opposed to that. Someone operating in an Ubuntu paradigm knows nothing about herself save what she learns from others. It is a way of thinking about community that is rather difficult to grasp if you’re not born to it. Theologically speaking, you could say that salvation of any one of us is only possible when all of us are saved. Some of the pithy adages that have been tossed about include “I am because you are”, and “I in you and you in me”.

After the orientation session I had another planning meeting for tomorrow’s soiree with the Archbishop. I’m feeling much better about that than I was. We will have a powerful witness to share with him.

Later tonight around 9:00 we’ll all gather in the bishop’s room to debrief and have some fellowship. We’ll probably do that almost every evening, keeping in mind the need to let the bishop get adequate rest.

There may be some late breaking news about B033. If I get any news on that I’ll try to post it late tonight or early tomorrow.

Exterior of the convention center

I took a couple of pictures. I’ll try to do more; I’m not good at remembering to pull out the camera at opportune moments.

As I write this post, I’ve just gotten back from a reception given by Integrity. President Susan Russell gave some rousing remarks, and I met the Integrity “whip”. All signs are good for the Integrity platform at this Convention. Time will tell.

The ABC group decided, sort of, to make some changes to our original plans for our meeting with the Archbishop. Folks noticed that we have generated too much content for our 30 minute meeting, so now we’re going to focus not so much on theology and context but rather on our personal stories. This makes sense to me, since it’s not likely we’re going to say anything that the Archbishop hasn’t already heard, in terms of theology and context. However, we know for certain that he hasn’t heard our stories. So I need to spend some time now reworking that.

I also ran into the former director of EUIP. I’m very glad to be cosponsoring a resolution commending the work of the newly formed Episcopal Service Corps. I’ll post a link to the resolution after I find it.