While The Episcopal Church General Convention meets in Indianapolis, the General Synod of the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia is meeting in
Episcopal News Service (ENS) has reports of today’s hearings, meetings, and events of General Convention. One hearing with passionate testimony was by the committee dealing
The Mainstream Media (MSM) reports on General Convention. Sex and gender lead the stories, of course:
Follow debate in legislative hearings @jimNaught on Twitter. Today – Israel-Palestine among others.
At stake is a way of governing our church that allows lay people and clergy to act as equals to our bishops in making decisions. Our concept of sharing power between lay, clergy and bishops is not the way much of the Anglican Communion is governed. Our General Convention is far more democratic than church councils in other nations. If we are to sacrifice the General Convention as a “sacred cow,” we’d best have a much better way of making decisions than has been suggested to date.
The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori
Surrounded by controversy since it was learned she had recently signed a same-gender wedding license in Washington, D.C., 220th General Assembly vice moderator Tara Spuhler McCabe stood down from that office today (July 4). The news was greeted with a chorus of “no!” and a standing ovation from most of the commissioners as she concluded her statement.
Politics is not a dirty word – it refers to the art of living together in community, and it applies to Christ’s body as much as it does to the various nations in which this Church is present. We don’t yet live in the fullness of the reign of God, even though we do see glimpses of it around us and among us. Our task is to gather the various parts of this body of Christ, together with any partners who share our values, for the work of building societies that look more like the reign of God
“We’re on the Promised Land highway, and we’re spending a lot of time acting like the Israelites. We whine, we don’t trust each other, and we try to hoard what we have been given even though it won’t keep. Even though when we take more than we need, it breeds worms and becomes foul. And I’m pretty sure that we can all name some golden calves that we’ve been worshiping. We need to cut it out. All of us.”