June 13, 3006

Good morning from Columbus!

As I begin today, let me make mention as to what this is, and what this isn't. This report is just that - a report. It is not a "blog," nor is it intended to be one. What I am doing is what I have been doing since long before there were blogs - since 1997. This site is all about reporting back to my people in South Carolina about what happened on a particular day at General Convention, and about what I happened to see happening to our South Carolina people and to people we know and care about. That's all this is. There's no instant comment feedback or theological arguments between acrimonious anonymous posters like you'll find on a typical blog.

If you want a minute-by-minute intense blog experience, then may I suggest StandFirm? Matt Kennedy is putting everyone else to shame with his lightning quickness and amazing accuracy. Matt's reports are usually posted about 5 minutes after an event is over, and sometimes he blogs in real time, while the event is happening! 

Then there's Lydia Evans, who is posting several times each day and provides her opinions on what she experiences. Lydia is very insightful, and theologically, she has it all figured out. Worth some of your time.

If you want to see what the rest of the world is thinking about what we are thinking, the biggest blog in the world is still the best, and that would be TitusOneNine, the blog of our SC Canon Theologian, Kendall Harmon.

If you'd like to see what another diocese on the other side of America thinks, Rob Eaton and friends will thrill you at "Surrounded," the official weblog of the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin.

All these are blogs. This is not a blog. But hey - I do have a few pictures to show you!

    
                             This is our Hotel                                           This is looking down our street             

I began the morning with my friends from Forward in Faith. As they have since '97, Forward in Faith has provided alternative worship to the alternative services that pass for worship at General Convention. For a stroll down memory lane, HERE'S a report on one of the typical General Convention Eucharists in 2003. (Just skip down a few pictures) This year I simply resolved to no longer put up with the GC innovations. This is what the Forward in Faith chapel looks like:

And the worship was wonderful! A sung Rite II, with one of my heroes, Bishop Ackermen of Quincy as the celebrant. Laurence Bausch of San Diego delivered a fine sermon on the propers for the day, and my old friend Jay Atwood served as the deacon. I didn't get pictures, because you don't take photography during a worship service! I'll see if I can catch them tomorrow or in the next few days.

11:00 a.m. - The President gaveled in our 10:45 morning meeting. George Werner made a few appointments, and called for our chaplain to open us with prayer. I understand that we have three chaplains this year - not one, as in previous conventions, but three. Let me guess, Traditional, Contemporary, and 1928 BCP, right? I should be so lucky. Anyway, the chaplain du jour was the Reverend Dena Harrison and – believe it or not - she prayed straight out of the prayer book. The Episcopal Prayer Book, not the New Zealand one. Thank you, very much!

As we began, we played with our keypads – we have new ones this year! Digivote had the contract since 2000, but these are new and supposedly improved. We tested them by voting on making the cucumber sandwich the official sandwich of the convention. The vote failed.

We tried a multi-vote experiment by making your choice for the three favorite hymns of the church. The choices were: "Taste and See," "The Church's One Foundation," "Lift High the Cross," "Santos, Santos, Santos,"
(Yes, of course we had a Spanish option!) and lastly, "Veni Sanctus Spiritus."  Of course, I know that you would have chosen these as your top five hymns of all time, wouldn't you?  Oh yes. But of course!

Here were the results: There were 542 valid ballots cast, and 259 invalid ballots. (I have no idea why...)
272 needed needed to win. And the winners are (excuse me, the Oscar goes to):
Lift High the Cross – 452 votes
The Church's One Foundation – 389 votes.
And the third greatest hymn of all time is... (can I have a drumroll)... It's Veni Sanctus Spiritus! (Dah da!)

Deputy Samboni of New Jersey rose for a point of privilege - He said he believed he was one of those who voted in error. We were told that we will be reinstructed when we use the keypads again. Good idea.

 

Went through varied housekeeping details. This person appointed, that person appointed... that sort of thing.

We stopped for noonday prayer. And we used the order right out of the prayer book. Hmmm. This is too good to be true.

They tried to project the service on the screens - Nope! The print was blurred, and the typefont was way too small! What you see here is what we saw - It's not my camera.

We adjourned for lunch, and our delegation dined at the AAC. Oh, it was so good!  Sang a great newer hymn, and then Ellis Brust shared a fine devotion. After that, Ellis acted as MC for the day, and introduced Richard Crocker, and then Martyn Minns, and then the bishop of Springfield all of whom caught us up on where particular legislation happens to be at the moment. It’s so good that the AAC offers this bit of respite from the convention.

I left a lot sooner than I wanted to, because I had to make it to one of my assigned Convention duties. I am supposed to monitor various committee meetings for the Dispatch of Business. Today's monitoring was for the Stewardship and Development Committee Hearing and Meeting.  Not a lot of fireworks, but the Committee feels like they are doing important work.

There was one very interesting moment. The co-chair, the Rev. Bud Shand, introduced the assistant bishop of Chicago as the assistant bishop of Pittsburgh. He got it wrong. There was a bit of nervous laughter as the assistant bishop Chicago of clarified his actual position and location. Henry Scriven, the Suffragan Bishop of Pittsburgh, is on this committee, and Bishop Scriven said, “He’d just like to be from Pittsburgh.” The assistant bishop pf Chicago replied, “Not in your wildest dreams or even your most remotest imagination." Half the committee broke into a good bit of laughter of approval and there was some scattered applause. Co-chair Shand said, “Now, now! Let’s get along here! Come on!”

Sigh…

Before we re-convened, I went into the display area. I Ran into Ellis Brust and David Anderson 

Ellis took one of the Canon and me.

Before we got started with our afternoon session I got a great shot of our Lay delegates:

And it does look like our clergy are up to the task, does it not!

I have no earthly idea what this was supposed to represent:

4:18 - the President Gaveled our 4:00 session into meeting.

Southern Ohio welcomed us. They read greetings from the governor of Ohio and the mayor of Columbus.
Governor, I would be here either, but I have to.  Mayor, you have a great town here.

We heard from the Episcopal Church Foundation President. According to the president of the foundation, they offer practical day-to-day advice on how to run a parish. I thought that was the role of the vestry…

Then the pension fund reported that all is well – we’re stable, and the president of the pension fund said they support giving pension funds to lay employees, since we’ve made so much money from our investments. Uh, how about giving the extra money to widows of retired clergy, since it is, after all, the clergy pension fund, and was paid for by the clergy? Many are just barely making it.

George Werner called our attention to the 15 flags behind the podium, and he said we have to stop calling ourselves ECUSA because the Episcopal Church (EC) is not just USA.

Of course, we haven’t been “just” the ECUSA for maybe 100 years, but hey, who’s counting?   George Werner said, "We are not a national church, we are international!
We are not ECUSA!. We are one of the most international provinces in the Anglican communion." Hmmm. Hey, if you don't want to be ECUSA, do you mind if a couple of my buddies and I apply to Canterbury for the position?

Oops – it appears we have the wrong flag for Haiti! Oh my, it seems that the one we have on the wall is the old one, from before the last revolution. It's not the current flag for Haiti. The President promises we will get the right one up there. Ohhhkay...

Next, we heard from the Archbishop of York, who read a message from Archbishop of Canterbury. The pictures are not that great because they were taken from way back where we are. Sorry!

The full text of the message and accompanying blog opinions on what the ABC said is available HERE.

Dispatch of Business then moved us to the very first of our bills! Yeah! we're actually getting started!

B004 – amend canon – motion is to refer to a committee on structure. We referred.

A002 – Amend canon 1.1 – refer to communications, not to interim body. We referred.

A112 – Got into our first real discussion. There were several attempts to amend the amendment – the whole vote process took almost 45 minutes! It was such fun! I do doubt this kind of thing will be fun about five or six days from now.

Here's some good friends of ours:

It was announced that the Open Hearing of Special Legislative Committee #26 will take place tomorrow evening from 7:30 to 10:00 at the largest of the meeting areas. 1500 seats will be available, and each delegation will get five good seats down front. Our bishop is supposed to be given one of the five, and we eight delegates, two alternates and one suffragan bishop are supposed to fight over the other 4 tickets. We'll figure it tomorrow. I do believe that the event will be broadcasted on the web, and THIS might be your link, if you want to watch some sausage being made, but I would deeply recommend you go HERE for play-by-play. Look for the SCECAC Wednesday Evening Session.

As we left today, I happened to catch the last song of a very fine South American band who were playing for us outside the Convention Center. After I took this picture, one of the band members thanked me and gave me a tote sack with their logo on it. Wasn't that nice!

It's 12:40 a.m. That's it from Columbus for this evening. Thanks for those prayers!

See you tomorrow!