In Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Book Silver Blaze we read this wonderful encounter:

I bring this up because I think the most important stories of General Convention are not what is being proposed, nor what is being opposed, but what is entirely missing–KSH.

The house will begin debate of Resolution D025 on Sunday afternoon. The resolution by the Committee on World Mission is a compilation of more than a dozen resolutions seeking to overturn, amend or repeal Resolution B033, the controversial resolution approved three years ago which calls on “standing committees and bishops with jurisdiction to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on the communion.”

Read it all.

Read it all (2 page pdf).

Today’s Center Aisle Editorial “Room for Optimism” is about Resolution D025:

The work on this resolution is not done. Bishops on World Mission voted 3-2 against the proposal, while deputies on the panel approved it 24-2. Though D025 doesn’t explicitly repeal B033, the compromise resolution from 2006, it does raise legitimate concerns by affirming that “God has called and may call” gay and lesbian persons “to any ordained ministry in The Episcopal Church.” That language could be interpreted as a unilateral lifting of the moratorium on gay bishops.

Still, it’s encouraging to see how effectively World Mission has drawn on language of reconciliation from past Conventions and how deftly it has integrated our Church’s “abiding commitment” to the Anglican Communion with a reaffirmation of our inclusiveness as a community of faith.

It’s a reminder of how precise wording can be far more than lawyerly nitpicking; it can be a catalyst to building bonds of trust. Recall past statements by Anglican bodies for “gracious restraint” and “bonds of affection.”

Check it out (16 page pdf).

A Senior Scottish clergyman has “come out” and launched a campaign for gay couples to be given the right to get married in church.
The Very Reverend Kelvin Holdsworth has spoken publicly about his sexuality and called for Holyrood to change the law to allow same-sex partners to tie the knot in the same way as straight couples.

In a frank and outspoken interview, the Provost of St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral in Glasgow said that gay clergy would eventually be able to get married in their own churches and offered a “blessing of peace” to an Anglican bishop who called on homosexuals to “repent”.

He also claimed he was aware of “numerous” gay and lesbian priests employed by his church and insisted that Scotland was “more grown up” than England in dealing with issues of sexuality.

Read it all.

The year was 1973, the place: Uganda:

Then [Idi] Amin ordered his soldiers to execute some of the people they had arrested. They were to take the prisoners to their home towns. The towns’ people would be ordered to watch the soldiers shoot the prisoners.

Three of the men were to be shot in the stadium in Kabale, the town where Festo [Kivengere] and [his wife] Mera lived.

“I should go to the president. I should talk to him about what is happening. Maybe he will listen to me,” Festo said to Mera. “He thinks we’re trying to overthrow his government. We need to convince him we’re not.”

Now, this was a very brave thing to do! To walk right into the palace and face the cruel president was risky, to say the least. After all, Amin was killing and torturing Christians and other leaders. He might kill Festo, too!

Festo went anyway. He drove to the president’s palace in Kampala, with Hark riding nervously in the backseat.
The president greeted Festo warmly. (Hark was surprised by this. And so was Festo!) Then Amin told lies.

“It is all right,” he said. “You are quite safe. Yes, some of the soldiers are doing bad things. But I am punishing them when they do. So don’t worry about it,” he said with a smile.

“Mr. President,” Festo said, “I hear you have told everyone in Kabale to come to the big stadium to watch three men be shot. Please let these men live. Forgive them for what they have done.”

Hark saw a big scowl on Amin’s face. Oh dear, Hark thought, now he’s mad.

Festo wasn’t allowed to stay any longer. Sadly, he (and Hark) left the palace and headed home.

“How terrible,” said Mera when she heard about it. “You mean thousands of people have to go to the stadium to watch the executions?”

“Amin thinks it will stop people from trying to overthrow him,” Festo replied. There was nothing for them to do but what the president demanded. When the day came, they went to the stadium.

Three thousand people were forced to attend the shooting. No one was speaking. Dark fear filled people’s hearts. Festo turned to two of his pastor friends.

“Let’s see if we can speak to the three men before they are shot,” he suggested.

“The soldiers will never let us,” replied his friend.

“Well, let’s ask anyway,” Festo said.

“Please, sir,” said Festo approaching the soldier in charge. “I am a minister. I’d like to speak some words of comfort to the three young men before they die.”

No one expected the soldier to agree. But to Festo’s surprise, he said gruffly, “All right. You can talk to them in the arena just before they are killed!”

Festo began to pray. Hark could hear the quiet prayers (angels can, you know). He wrote them down carefully.

“Please, Lord,” prayed Festo, “give me the right words to say to these men.”

A truck drove into the arena. The soldiers unloaded the three prisoners in the middle of the stadium. They were in handcuffs. Their feet were changed together. The firing squad stood at attention, their rifles ready.

In the stands, the silent people sat as still as statues. There was a horrible feeling in the air. Festo and his friends walked across the huge arena and came up behind the prisoners.

“Oh, dear Lord Jesus! What shall I say? What shall I say?” Festo said out loud. The three prisoners heard him and turned around to face the church leaders.

“Oh!” gasped Festo when he saw their faces. They seemed so peaceful!

Festo didn’t have to say anything. As he approached the prisoners, one of them suddenly thanked Festo for coming! The man told Festo he knew Jesus had forgiven his sins. Then he asked Festo to tell his wife and children he would be waiting for them in heaven. He hoped they would accept Jesus, too, so he could be with them there.

The second man said the same thing. He raised his hands in joy and smiled bravely at Festo. Then the third man said, “I am at peace!”

Festo looked at the wonderful smiles on the men’s faces. “Why,” he said to his friends, “we need to talk to the soldiers in the firing squad, not to these men!”

Festo explained the prisoners’ words to the soldiers. When they heard what Festo said, they were shocked. For a moment, they didn’t seem to know what to do!

The three prisoners stood tall, smiling at the huge crowd of people. Then they raised their handcuffed arms and waved. Everyone waved back! People who were near had heard the brave words the prisoners had spoken. They saw the peace of God on the men’s faces.

Then the shots rang out, and the three men fell.

Now they’re safe in heaven with Jesus, thought Hark, standing beside Festo.

Then everyone went home.

–Jill Briscoe, The Man Who Would Not Hate:Festo Kivengere (W Pub Group, 1991), which was read by yours truly in this morning’s sermon

The best thing that could happen to the proposed covenant for the Anglican Communion at this General Convention is nothing at all.

Though there undoubtedly will be strongly worded resolutions proposed from several quarters, the committee or committees handling these resolutions would do well to promote one that expresses the ongoing commitment of the Episcopal Church to the Anglican Communion in general and to the Windsor/covenant process in particular””and nothing more.

That’s because the present draft of the proposed covenant is not yet in its final form. There has not been sufficient opportunity to study it carefully. The time is not yet ripe for General Convention to engage in extensive debate and formal consideration of this proposal.

Read it all.

Best Line of the day – Overheard at lunch:
I’m so tired of being invited to tell my story. Let’s tell God’s story – the story of redemption in Jesus Christ!

Read it all.

(ENS) Following a public hearing and several late-evening and early-morning sessions, a WMC subgroup offered an amended version July 11 for committee review and approval. After cordial discussion and revision, “perfecting the resolution and passed it handily” the vote split between the two houses — with deputies voting 24-2 for approval and bishops rejecting it 3-2 — appeared to come as a surprise.

Afterwards, Douglas said: “I am very moved by the way the deputies on the world mission legislative committee were able to trust the process, including the Committee of the Whole sessions and the legislative hearing and then, based upon what we heard and experienced in these sessions, were able to come together in an effective, positive, forward-looking manner and I believe that the work of this committee was both faithful to and led by the Holy Spirit.”

Despite the split vote, the measure will move to the House of Deputies since the committee on dispatch decided it is the house of initial action “and we’re recommending it be adopted,” Douglas said.

When asked why the measure failed with bishops, he replied: “You’d have to ask the bishops that. For some reason or another, while participating in the process when it came time for the vote, three of them couldn’t support the final product.”

Read it all.

The 76th Episcopal General Convention is underway in California, where clergy will deliberate whether to bless same-sex marriages, and if an informal ban on gay bishops can be dropped. Ed Little, the Episcopalian Bishop of Northern Indiana, and the Rev. Susan Russell of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, Calif., debate gays in service to the Episcopal church.

Listen to it all.

Dr. Te Paa served on the Windsor Commission. I started trying to type what she was saying, but I had to stop and simply listen. Her word were incredible and moving. (After we adjourned I ran to the Media Center to see if they had the text of her speech, but it was hand written. Someone is typing it. When the text is posted, I’ll send the part of it that was so captivating.)

She said that as she worked on the Windsor Commission, “We were never fully apprised of your policy.” She said that they didn’t understand the policy of shared leadership that is so core to the Episcopal Church’s decision making. She regrets the vilification of the Episcopal Church, especially its leadership, within the Windsor process. She thanked us for “Your generosity of spirit, despite what you have suffered through these years.” “I am a little surprised and saddened that too many Episcopalians are being affected by their sense of loss of face or vulnerability in belonging to the Anglican Communion,” she said. “I am dismayed at the extent to which that seems to be prevalent.”

As the others nodded in agreement, Te Paa said, “I don’t believe that that is so ”¦ it is not how I perceive the rest of the communion regarding the Episcopal Church to be honest.” This is another perspective of the Anglican Global South she said of the group on the platform.

Read it all.

And I will be tempted to quit the Episcopal Church once and for all ”¦ as I did during my “sabbatical from TEC” in July 2006, after B033. If the bishops of TEC choose schismatic bullies like Akinola over me, then I will have to look elsewhere. I do not want to be “tolerated” or “accepted on sufferance.” I recognize what I experienced back in 2006: that no other church has the theology and liturgy that drew me to TEC. I tried them all: Romans, UCC, Disciples, ELCA. In this part of the world, they are all spooky-conservative and/or liturgically impoverished. Having made those explorations in 2006, I know I won’t find another church home in this place. I’ll just join the increasing number of Americans who worship at St. Arbucks on Sundays.

I love this church. The Episcopal Church has challenged me again and again to wrestle with my baptismal covenant and forces me ”“ Sunday after Sunday ”“ to consider whether I am living the holiness of life personally and in community. If I have to leave this church, it will be as painful as the most painful divorce.

Read it all.

Dr Rowan Williams flew to America last week ahead of moves by church leaders in the US to introduce rites for same-sex unions and to promote more gay bishops.

Conservatives in the Church of England are threatening to divide worldwide Anglicanism if the liberal Americans force through radical reforms at a crucial meeting in California this week.

Dozens of members of the General Synod have backed a motion that calls on the Church to recognise a breakaway movement in the US opposed to the pro-gay agenda.

Read it all.

Today we heard Ray Suarez, Correspondent of the Lehrer Report News Hour preach at the daily Eucharist. He spoke of our being a welcoming church, made references to his and his family’s involvement in mission trips to the Lakota Reservation and Honduras and so many of the things we as the Episcopal Church have to offer.

I have been serving on the World Mission Committee. This has been particularly time-consuming. We have been dealing with this convention’s response to B033 (the moratorium on consenting to bishop elections whose lifestyle would cause a problem in the larger Communion) and the Covenant, among other issues. On most days my day starts with committee hearings at 7am and ends with the close of committee hearings at 10pm

Read it all.

General Convention’s Committee on World Mission spent nearly 90 minutes Saturday morning revising a resolution that, while using polite language about preserving the unity of the Anglican Communion, ultimately repeals Resolution B033.

The amended form of Resolution D025 says the 76th General Convention acknowledges that God may call gays and lesbians, “like any other baptized members, to any ordained ministry in The Episcopal Church.”

Read it all.

Read it all and read it very carefully noting the changes.

Right now, I confess that I am in the Great Bewilderment to see how our Church can take all the resolutions about human sexuality and find the great Convergence. The resolutions around B033 and same sex blessings go everywhere. However, I am hope filled because in the past I have seen deputies and bishops in General Convention let go of their political stances to win a point or a cause and collectively be moved to discern God’s will. In the middle of bewilderment it’s hard to believe it happens, but I know it does. Scripture and tradition and our own history tell us so.

Read it all.

In addition to reports from representatives of Episcopal Relief and Development and Forward Day by Day, the House of Bishops received with great respect and enthusiasm two of the Episcopal Church’s previous presiding bishops, Edmond Browning and Frank Grisw…[o]ld. Bishop Browning was elected presiding bishop in 1985, and made the comment to us that he noticed that 24 years later, we are still debating many of the same issues that he dealt with when he led the House of Bishops.

Read the whole thing.

(1) Comments are supposed to be about the content of the post on the blog. A number of people are doing what I call “leapfrog” comments where they take the basic subject of a post and then leap off on their thoughts about that particular subject. This soon takes the thread too far afield, and makes it incoherent. We really are interested in your thoughts about the content of the posted article, sermon or whatever it happens to be.

(2) There is a continued problem with the tone of posts. Biting sarcasm is not appropriate. Neither is cyncism drifting into despair. Ad hominem comments are to be avoided. Jumping to conclusions without evidence is not helpful. A good example of this latter activity took place on a post about a priest who went to California from Louisiana, whereupon a number of posters made accusations about what the Bishop of Louisiana did or did not know on the basis of no evidence.

(3) Threads are sometimes being diverted because of the subagendas of posters. If you want to interact with another poster on a personal level for example, we can, with their permission, help you do that off blog. But we have posters making numerous comments recently about other posters, their activities and in some cases their ministries. To say this is off the playing field is to put it mildly.

(4) It really would be a good idea if you not only prayed after you wrote your post (which I hope you are doing in a word processing program before you post it here anyway since putting it in WordPress first can cause it to be lost), but also if you considered what someone would think of what you were about to post were they of a very different viewpoint than yours. We have enough “shock jock” stuff and gotcha journalism in other venues, I do not want it here.

In closing, let me say that I very much appreciate each blog reader and the opportunity for this joint endeavor….

Read it all (and if you have a moment the comments are fascinating)

–Honest to God, I thought titusonenine was Kendall Harmon’s day job, or some significant part of it. I mean, wouldn’t publication be part of the role of a Canon Theologian?

Fellow blogger Marshall Scott

Most deputies shared stories of the effect of that resolution on their friends and parishes. LGBT people experienced it as the door swinging shut once again and clergy had difficulty explaining how the Episcopal Church could really Welcome You if LGBT people are only welcome so far. One deputy quoted from Acts 10 – the reading we’ll hear at tonight’s Integrity Eucharist – where Peter says that we should not call anyone profane or unclean. That, he claimed, was the actual effect of B033.

Read it all.

They are proposing to drop just the three little words “Communion of this . . .”, and to replace them with just one word: “Episcopal”. To paraphrase Neil Armstrong, “That’s one small step for a church, but one giant leap away from the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”

With that single change, buried in the midst of thousands and thousands of words revising Title IV, the leadership of ECUSA will accomplish the goal toward which it has been striving ever since 1976: a complete and final divorce of its polity and orders from the rest of the Anglican Communion, and in consequence from the Church Catholic as well.

No longer will it be possible, after these changes are voted (and they will be, without any doubt: how could they go back on the strategy at this point?), for Episcopal clergy to avoid a charge of “abandonment” when they seek to transfer to another church within the Anglican Communion. No longer will anyone refer to these Canons as the “Abandonment of Communion” Canons; they become the “Abandonment of ECUSA” Canons. The Communion, as such, is through, as far as ECUSA is concerned. Finito. Not “Ite – missa est”, but Ite – finis est.

Read it very carefully and follow all the links also.

Read it all.

“All praise to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the source of every mercy and the God who comforts us. He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When others are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us.” (2 Corinthians 1.3,4, New Living Translation)

I have been asked, and often wonder myself, “Why do you bother going to General Convention?” When committee testimony in favor of the blessing of same sex relationships or repealing B033 is five to one, the task of opposition seems futile and discouraging. After a full day of testimony on these matters, I confess I was discouraged and not looking forward to the ‘beat down’ the conservative opposition would likely experience when resolutions from the legislative committees are finally considered in the House of Deputies or Bishops.

Then came Friday morning.
Friday morning brought other deputies to our table, thanking us for speaking on their behalf at the committee hearings because they had other commitments.

Friday morning brought emails from other conservative deputies serving on the legislative committees before whom we had testified, thanking us for giving them a voice.

Friday morning brought emails from the Cathedral, Central Florida and around the country encouraging us to continue to bear witness to a classic understanding of the Christian faith.

Friday morning brought a gift from God, helping me understand why I am here. I am here to encourage other deputies, Classic Christians around the country and myself by simply bearing witness to a classic understanding of the Christian. As you have encouraged me, I hope that I have encouraged you.

We still have several days of legislative committee hearings, tedious legislative sessions in the House of Deputies, and discussion on pointless resolutions. We will continue our witness to the classic Christian faith in order to encourage you and other deputies. Please continue to encourage us – the grind of making sausage takes it toll – so that we may continue our encouragement in the Lord.

Watch this also.

Watch it all.

The Prayer Book / Liturgy group has before it various proposals for blessing same-sex relationships. This is important and controversial, but will also be well-attended by other members of Maine’s Deputation. So I trot off to a workshop of the Ecumenical Relations panel.

This group has been making its way through a forbiddingly titled “Theological Statement on Interreligious Relations.“ Today the topic is the delicate one of salvation: How we talk to others, especially to non-Christians, about what is, for us, Christ’s role in salvation, without bringing the discussion to a screeching halt? It was impressive to watch these learned and gracious theologians, both lay and clerical, tackle this head-on at 7:45 a.m. in the morning.

Could you even say ”soteriological exclusivity” (this is what they were trying to avoid) before your second cup of coffee?

Read it all.

[Barbara] Harris referred briefly to a reading from Acts about St. Peter hearing God’s call to welcome Gentiles into the church. Otherwise, her sermon was a collection of barbs””most aimed at conservatives, but with a few challenging her fellow progressives.
”” “Unfortunately, many people who need to be reminded of these truths are not here,” she said, referring to the lesson from Acts.
”” “Some glibly speak of our diversity. ”¦ I am reminded that there was diversity at the Tower of Babel.”
”” Resolution B033 was “not just a grudging response to the Windsor Report, but a ticket ”¦ to attend the Lambeth Conference and to make false peace.”
”” The Archbishop of Canterbury’s message to General Convention, as condensed by Bishop Harris: “Don’t make another unilateral move on the Communion chess board.”
”” “If you don’t want GLBT folks as bishops, don’t ordain them as transitional deacons.”
”” “Better yet, don’t baptize them in the first place.”
”” “Don’t initiate someone and then act like they’re half-ass baptized.”

Read it all.

I now will take comments on this submitted by email only to at KSHarmon[at]mindspring[dot]com