Christ
Church E-pistle - July 30, 2009
From the Christ Church Office:
Vestry Meeting: July's vestry meeting will be after the 9:30 service
on August second. See your vestry representative if you have any items
for discussion.
First Sunday of the month: This Sunday is the first Sunday of the month
and the loose offerings are for the Rector's Discretionary Fund.
Coffee Hour: This Sunday is a pitch-in. Please take a look at the coffee
hour schedule on the door of the kitchen. After August ninth, we don't
have any volunteers for the rest of the year.
From the Presiding Bishop:
Presiding Bishop’s letter to the church
on General Convention
“Above all else, this Convention claimed God’s mission
as the heartbeat of The Episcopal Church”
[July 22, 2009]
Episcopal Church Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has issued
a letter to the church about General Convention 2009.
General Convention 2009 was held July 8 to July 17 at the Anaheim Convention
Center in California (Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles).
The following is the Presiding Bishop’s
letter.
My
brothers and sisters in Christ:
The 76th General Convention is now history, though it will likely take
some time before we are all reasonably clear about what the results
are.
We gathered in Anaheim, as guests of the Diocese of Los Angeles, for
eleven full days of worship, learning, and policy-making. The worship
was stunning visually, musically, and liturgically, with provocative
preaching and lively singing.
Our learning included training in Public Narrative, as well as news
about the emergent church, in the LA Night presentation.
We welcomed a number of visitors from other parts of the Anglican Communion,
including 15 of the primates (archbishops or presiding bishops), other
bishops, clergy, and laity.
You can see and hear all this and more at the Media Hub: http://gchub.episcopalchurch.org/
The budget adopted represents a significant curtailment of church-wide
ministry efforts, in recognition of the economic realities of many dioceses
and church endowments, which will result in the loss of a number of
Church Center staff who have given long and laudable service. Yet we
will continue to serve God’s mission, throughout The Episcopal
Church and beyond. This budget expects that more mission work will continue
or begin to take place at diocesan or congregational levels. Religious
pilgrims, from the Israelites in the desert to Episcopalians in Alaska
or Haiti, have always learned that times of leanness are opportunities
for strengthened faith and creativity.
As a Church, we have deepened our commitments to mission and ministry
with "the least of these" (Matthew 25). We included a budgetary
commitment of 0.7% to the Millennium Development Goals, through the
NetsforLife® program partnership of Episcopal Relief & Development.
That is in addition to approximately 15% of the budget already committed
to international development work.
We have committed to a domestic poverty initiative, meant to explore
coherent and constructive responses to some of the worst poverty statistics
in the Americas: Native American reservations and indigenous communities.
Justice is the goal, as we revised our canons (church rules) having
to do with clergy discipline, both as an act of solidarity with those
who may suffer at the hands of clergy and an act of pastoral concern
for clergy charged with misconduct.
The General Convention adopted a health plan to serve all clergy and
lay employees, which is expected to be a cost-savings across the whole
of the United States portion of the Church. Work continues to ensure
adequate health coverage in the non-U.S. parts of this Church. The Convention
also mandated pension coverage for lay employees.
Liturgical additions were also included in the Convention’s work,
from more saints on the calendar to prayers around reproductive loss.
What captured the headlines across the secular media, however, had to
do with two resolutions, the consequences of which were often misinterpreted
or exaggerated. One, identified as D025, is titled “Anglican Communion:
Commitment and Witness to Anglican Communion.” It
• reaffirms our commitment to and desire to pursue mission with
the Anglican Communion;
• reiterates our commitment to Listening Process urged by Lambeth
Conferences of 1978, 1988, and 1998;
• notes that our own participation in the listening process led
General Convention in 2000 to “recognize that the baptized membership
of The Episcopal Church includes same-sex couples living in lifelong
committed relationships ‘characterized by fidelity, monogamy,
mutual affection and respect, careful, honest communication, and the
holy love which enables those in such relationships to see in each other
the image of God’”;
• recognizes that ministry, both lay and ordained is being exercised
by such persons in response to God’s call;
• notes that the call to ordained ministry is God’s call,
is a mystery, and that the Church participates in that mystery through
the process of discernment;
• acknowledges that the members of The Episcopal Church, and of
the Anglican Communion, are not of one mind, and that faithful Christians
disagree about some of these matters.
The other resolution that received a lot of press is C056, titled “Liturgies
for Blessings.” The text adopted was a substitute for the original,
yet the title remains unchanged. It
• acknowledges changing circumstances in the U.S. and elsewhere,
in that civil jurisdictions in some places permit marriage, civil unions,
and/or domestic partnerships involving same-sex couples, that call for
a pastoral response from this Church;
• asks the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music, and the House
of Bishops, to collect and develop theological and liturgical resources
for such pastoral response, and report to the next General Convention;
• asks those bodies to invite comment and participation from other
parts of this Church and the Anglican Communion;
• notes that bishops may provide generous pastoral responses to
the needs of members of this Church;
• asks the Convention to honor the theological diversity of this
Church in regard to matters of human sexuality.
The full text of both resolutions is available here: http://gc2009.org/ViewLegislation/
I urge you to read them for yourself. Some have insisted that these
resolutions repudiate our relationships with other members of the Anglican
Communion. My sense is that we have been very clear that we value our
relationships within and around the Communion, and seek to deepen them.
My sense as well is that we cannot do that without being honest about
who and where we are. We are obviously not of one mind, and likely will
not be until Jesus returns in all his glory. We are called by God to
continue to wrestle with the circumstances in which we live and move
and have our being, and to do it as carefully and faithfully as we are
able, in companionship with those who disagree vehemently and agree
wholeheartedly. It is only in that wrestling that we, like Jacob, will
begin to discern the leading of the Spirit and the blessing of relationship
with God.
Above all else, this Convention claimed God’s mission as the heartbeat
of The Episcopal Church. I encourage every member of this Church to
enter into conversation in your own congregation or diocese about God’s
mission, and where you and your faith community are being invited to
enter more deeply into caring for your neighbors, the “least of
these” whom Jesus befriends.
The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori
Presiding Bishop and Primate
The Episcopal Church