Monday – June 19, 2006 – Day Seven

"It's a great comfort to know that God's faithful people have always been in trouble. In fact it's the sure sign we're following God, and not men."         --Lloyd Ogilvie--

Thank you, Rob Kerr for that quote from my hero. As Rob has heard me say more than a few times, Lloyd Ogilvie is the man that I want to be when I grow up.

The sun is back out today, but the feel is not as sunny as in previous days.  In spite of it all, I WILL Joy!

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior. (Habakkuk 3:17-18)

Syl and I had breakfast again, but for the final time. Sigh. She has to go home today, and she’ll leave for the airport after we eat. I wish I was going with her.

At breakfast we saw the Louisiana, Upper SC, and Texas to name a few:

     
                    Brad Drell                                             Bishop Jenkins                              Jim Workman                        Kevin Martin

As I wished Rick Belser a good morning at our delegation table, he pointed to a slab of candy he brought with him and said, "I’ve got some fudge here." I said, "Rick, we’ve got fudge all around us!" He said, "I got this to serve as a reminder of that."

Convention worship ran long this morning. It’s 10:50 and no one’s here yet. (We were supposed to start at 10:45)

11:03 – Gaveled in by Bonnie Anderson, the VP.

The chaplain du jour is Silvestre Enrique Romero. So we now know that they are not rotating directly through the four chaplains. Romero would not have been scheduled to have been up again until Wednesday. He was just here day before yesterday.

This is a shocker!  Judy Mayo read a statement from the Fort Worth Diocese asking for immediate Primatial Oversight!

Here's what she said:

The Bishop and the Standing Committee of the Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth appeal in good faith to the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Primates of the Anglican Communion and the Panel of Reference for immediate alternative Primatial oversight and Pastoral Care following the election of Katharine Jefferts Schori as Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church.

This action is taken as a cooperative member of the Anglican Communion Network in light of the Windsor Report and its recommendations.

That is profound! I understand the exact same statement was also read into the record by Bishop Iker in the House of Bishops. Fort Worth is one of the few true Anglo-Catholic dioceses we have left in the United States. As Catholics, they can not, in good conscience, ordain women. (Neither can about 90% of the worldwide Communion.) They appealed to the Archbishop of Canterbury to let some other archbishop serve as their primate, instead of the Presiding Bishop-elect.

I wonder if any other dioceses will do the same?

Cyndae Wilson gave the morning “testimony.”  We’ve been starting every morning with a personal testimony from someone about how they came to faith. Ms. Wilson turned the time into an opportunity to advance the gay agenda, which is not what these testimonies were intended to do. She ended her speech by telling the too-often told joke about Forest Gump being interviewed to get into heaven, and answering three questions necessary for entrance. (Don’t get me started on the heresy in that!) Gump, of course, answers in a way no one would have expected, but his answers could be interpreted as being correct, so he gets in. So she as she closes, Cyndae says, “My dear friends, new winds are blowing in our church - not saying what is expected, but they are right.”

Oh well.

Next, we met our ecumenical partners and heard from the Methodist member of the group. He said he was excited about the future that the Episcopalians and Methodists might have together. Ahh... after yesterday, I'm not so sure we have a future to share.

Dispatch of business proposed changing of the debate rules to limit the time.  Delegate from Springfield made sure the limit didn’t affect any of the Windsor resolutions.  We spent 15 minutes of our figuring out if we would limit our time.

In order to debate A160 Expression of Regret – (p. 80) proposing a time of 20 minutes for presentation by chair and committee. Proposed setting the time for debate to be 45 minutes. It passed.  A161 would follow, and then A166.  For A161 (p.104) – Committee presentation time 5 minutes. 45 minutes debate, 2 minutes each speaker no procedurals for 30 minutes – 45 minutes total time.

By the way, if you were wondering what resolution is what, THIS page will be of a help to you.

We broke for NoonDay prayers. The service, just like it was two days ago, was in Spanish – the whole service.  Sigh. He did pray the extra prayers in English, but all else was in Spanish. The pages delivered us a copy of his meditation in English, so we could understand what he was saying. His meditation went on for 15 minutes. In Spanish.

After today's Spanish lesson, we passed a bunch of not so important resolutions. One dealt with ordering the United States military to immediately stop torturing prisoners. Sigh.

In the 1997 Convention, we passed a resolution that was about on par with that one. We apologized to Japan for bombing Hiroshima. The following week, Fr. Larry at the Stella Maris Catholic Church on Sullivan’s Island quipped the following in his parish newsletter: “I didn’t even know the Episcopalians had an air force.” 

We had a great Lunch at the AAC. We sang, and we sang, and were urged to remember that “It is well with my soul.”  That certainly affirms my thoughts from last night, and for days now.

The afternoon legislative session began with the PB&F (Program, Budget, and Finance) presentation. It's a joint session with the bishops and it's a traditional time to get the deputation together for a photo opportunity.

Here's ours:

So who's missing?     Right.      Lonnie Hamilton is missing.
Lonnie let Bob Bell serve as a delegate today, and thus he couldn't be on the floor.
Pete Cooper, our Clergy Alternateness also had to miss the photo-op.

You can't get on the floor if you don't have a nametag with a red line at the bottom.
Of course, there are exceptions:

During the PB&F presentation, they played “You can get it if you really want” while they passed out the budget. Lydia remarked that the song was a perfect choice, because it's one of those "Me-Me-Me" tunes. I still remember them playing “You can’t always get what you want” at the 2000 Convention.

At 4:15 we took a break and got back into it. We first voted for General Seminary trustees and the Executive Council.

At 5:01 we finally started on A160.  And boom - there go the people to the microphones!

Frank Wade, Chair of the special committee (Committee #26) said no one is being asked to stop being different – the question is how can we live together. Said the Windsor report is not an ultimatum, and this does not require our ultimatum in response. "The voice of many must by necessity lack the simple clarity of the one. The words before you are imperfect, the people around you are imperfect, we are all imperfect. When they are offered in love, they become perfect as the people of God."   Ooookay... 

When we went to debate, we went back and forth - for and against. 

Here are three “againsts” of interest:

Teen presence: An 18 year-old young man said we never have to express regret when we’ve acted out of love. A generation ago, that quote went this way: "Love means never having to say you're sorry." It was just as insanely wrong then, as it is today.

He continued:
"Gene Robinson has done so much to help our youth. We can’t ask forgiveness for something that has been so good."

By the way, the teen presence gets voice but no vote, and they generally speak a lot. They are mentored, coached and given talking points by Integrity, so you can guess where they stand on the issues.

 Another said if we apologize, it will not be long before we find ourselves having to apologize for electing Katharine Jefforts Schori.

Another said it is simply disingenuous to say we apologize when we don’t. And let’s be clear about this, we don’t have anything to apologize about!  Let us tell the truth! Let’s not apologize!

Several times now we have heard people say things alone the line that, “We prayed, and the Holy Spirit directed us to do what we did.”  As nice as that sounds, it is most erroneous. God can not and will not contradict Himself. The Holy Spirit will never do something that would contradict the written Word of God.

 An amendment was offered - changes lines 10 & 11 - strike the words “breaching the proper constraints of” and replacing with “straining.”  

The comment was that we have not breached any constraints. the proposer said we've made some people mad and maybe hurt a few, but the Communion isn't breached. We're still together. She said, let's not say what isn't so.

Her amendment passed – 530 for, 305 against. Sigh.

The Vote for A160

Yes - 563

No - 267. 

SC voted no, due to the amendment which deliberately took out the Windsor language.

Time for a break. Read THIS.

Next, we moved moved to A161

Members of the committee spoke to it – for about 15 minutes. One said: "There is something here for everybody not to like. Hold your nose and vote yes. Without amendment!"

Like before, we went back and forth, alternating between those in favor and those opposed. Kendall spoke well for those of us who don't like it.

A lot of the progressives are urging defeat of the resolution. This is fascinating. It appears that they don’t like the “refrain from” language that replaced "considerable caution," and they don’t like the “no” on the authorization of same sex blessings.

If I were a gambling man, I'd take the money that this resolution is going to fail.

We somehow got off on the no/yes ratio, and the President tried to fix it by adding to the minutes of debate.

At 7:20, the President finally adjourned us. I came back and began work on this report.

 By the way, you may have noticed that Kendall's Blog and Matt Kennedy and some others are experiencing occasional technical difficulties. It's the volume of traffic that's overloading servers. Kelley Hollowell promised me that we can handle any and all traffic that might come our way. I hope he's right!

If you'd like to follow the daily floor fights, Mary Ailes is covering the event live.

Another server has picked up Matt Kennedy to get him back on the air.

And don't forget, Lydia has a great way with words.

Well, that's about it from where I'm sitting tonight. I appreciate all your emails, even though I don't have time to answer them right now. Please write if you want, I do read every one. Above all, thank you for lifting us in prayer.

We have two days to go, and a whole future ahead of us. See you tomorrow.

It's only 12:20! Mercy!

Good night from Columbus!