Raymond Dague:
General Convention 2006 CNY Journal

Even at the national level, “all politics is local,” said Tip O’Niell. That is as true in the church as it is in congress. Reflecting on the Episcopal Church’s General Convention which just concluded in Columbus, Ohio, most of the focus was on the resolutions adopted (or voted down) and the election of the new presiding bishop, and how they affected this once great but now declining denomination. But a look at the smaller picture at the local level is every bit as revealing as the pronouncements from the top.

The deputation from the Diocese of Central New York to the convention lead by Bishop Gladstone “Skip” Adams was not especially prominent in any of the big events in Columbus. Its low profile was probably similar to that of many other dioceses, as the bishops of the Anglican Communion Network, or the partisans of Integrity (the gay-activist movement within the Episcopal Church) took center stage with the media. But a close look at this one diocese at the convention is quite revealing, and explains much about how the Big Picture shook down in Columbus in mid-June of 2006.

The folks from the Diocese of Central New York posted announcements on the diocesan website describing what captured their attention. These messages found on the Central New York diocesan website make fascinating reading for what they say, and what they don’t say. The direct quotes from Your General Convention Deputation 2006 are in bold. link

Tuesday, June 13th, First Day

The message is entitled “Standing on the Threshold” and quotes “Author Annie Dillard [who] once compared crossing a threshold to opening a summer cottage. She said that when you enter, you have all the time there that you will ever have.” Quite a dreamy and exalted notion of what these people are there to do. Obviously there are great pronouncements coming from this body. We read on with great anticipation. There is a get-together session as people meet in small groups as sort of an ice-breaker. They write, “The House of Deputies’ discussion focused on community and story. Community is created by story and sustained by God’s love. We were given a set of three questions to help us share our faith story with deputies from all around the Episcopal Church, and invited to listen to each response around our tables with the “ears of curiosity, wonder, and love.” We heard some amazing stories and shared our own, mindful and thankful for the part that you, the Diocese of Central New York, play in the story of our own faith journey.” Community and story. Most interesting. In my parish we might get together and pray, or read and reflect on the Scriptures. That is the source of our commonness as a Christian community. Nothing much said of that here. Instead there is personal story as the source of community. Episcopalians are big on telling personal stories. That is what gay Episcopalians like to do over and over again. It is as if the personal story is the source of authority. They want us to have “conversation” with them where they can continually tell us their “stories.” Without a focus on the Scriptures, you have to look to something.

Thursday, June 15th, Third Day

“It has been a couple of very busy and long days here in Columbus, and we are beginning to settle into a routine. Each morning there are a variety of legislative hearings to attend where one may observe the work of the various commissions and committees that put together resolutions and amendments. If a Deputy is taking the day off, both the Deputy and Alternate must visit the credentialing office together to swap credentials both before and after the session(s) that the Alternate is seated as a Deputy in the House.” Apparently these folks are so heavily overworked that they must engage in a tag-team giving one another time to go to the Columbus zoo or take a nap. Good thing that this diocese spent the money to send its alternates as a second string so the starters would not be too overwhelmed by their duties. And it is only the third day! Whew!

There is no mention whatever of the huge public hearing on Wednesday evening where 1500 people stood in line for an hour to pack the grand ballroom of the convention hotel to hear dozens of speakers including Bishops Bob Duncan of the Network, Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, and the Archbishop of York (the second highest office in the Church of England) speak to the issue of compliance with The Windsor Report with implications as to whether the Episcopal Church will be excluded from the Anglican Communion. This event made the national news. Were the Central New York deputies even in attendance? Nothing of this was apparently worth communicating to the people back home, since the messages home are silent about it.

Friday, June 16th, Fourth Day

“Thursday was another very full day here in Columbus. The House of Deputies finally began to make some progress in moving through resolutions on the Daily Calendar.” In any other church convention, they would have adjourned by now and have gone home. Not these Episcopalians. It takes them till the third or fourth day to ‘finally begin to make some progress’ with the business of the convention. Maybe telling stories occupies too much of their time. And there is more. “Each resolution must be presented by the chair of the legislative committee responsible for bringing it to the floor. Others are given the opportunity to speak for or against, or to amend the resolution. At one point on Thursday there was an amendment to an amendment!” The very idea that convention life would be so complex that an amendment would be offered to an amendment! No wonder these folks need a day off now and then!

Saturday, June 17th, Fifth Day

“Many of the most difficult issues are still before us. Although we do sense some posturing going on around various topics, when we come together to worship God there is a prevailing sense that the Holy Spirit is very much among us. Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est. Where true love and charity are found, God is there.” Spiritual insight in the midst of “posturing,” they say. Canon Kendall Harmon commented that he has never heard as many references to the Holy Spirit as at this convention. God the Father is completely out of vogue, perhaps because of the need to revamp the Trinity to accommodate feminist sensibilities, and “Mother Jesus” would soon get attention with the election of a new presiding bishop. But the Holy Spirit is mentioned constantly. Mind you, it is the Holy Spirit unchecked by Holy Scripture. Some said that it was less the Holy Spirit than it was an appeal to Holy Self. “Me” and “my stories” were driving this convention. The only sense that this convention might be engulfed in controversy was the understated but non-specific comment that “we do sense some posturing going on around various topics.”

Sunday, June 18th, Sixth Day

“Celebrations” is the title of this post and “Saturday at General Convention was a day of celebrations.” The only hint of the business at hand is a comment that “We are kept busy from before dawn to long past dusk, but this is an incredible time. We are all making many connections with many friends both new and old, God’s good and faithful people. While we wrestle with difficult issues, there is indeed much to celebrate as the body of Christ in God’s Spirit-filled presence among us.” The post gives no sense as to what these “difficult issues” may be, or what thoughts the deputies from Central New York have concerning them.

Tuesday, June 20th, Eighth Day

The title of the message to the folks back home for this day is entitled “Whale Songs.” The message explains why. “Bishop Jefferts Schori drew a question related to shepherding House of Bishops, and was told that it might be like trying to herd cats. She thought for a moment, and said she didn’t know much about herding cats. The metaphor that she prefers, which best reflects her hopes, is that of the humpback whale. These whales come together to meet once or twice every year. They come from all parts of the ocean, each singing a song from their own region. When it is time to part, they all return home singing a new song. What a great metaphor for the House of Bishops, and for all of us. When we come together for communion we come singing our own songs and, unified and strengthened in the Blessed Sacrament, we go home with a new song in our hearts.” Am I actually reading this, or making it up?! Meetings of bishops and other Episcopalians are like a bunch of humpback whales? I guess that is what you get when you elect an oceanographer, turned inexperienced priest, turned inexperienced bishop to the highest office in the church. I wonder what songs there were singing when they went to Columbus, and what songs they sang as they left? Do these “songs” refer to doctrinal messages, or just to emotional feelings, or something else? Is this just some sentimental stuff without any real meaning?

And there were other high points, the Central New York deputies tell us. “Speaking of singing, Elisabeth Von Trapp of the famous Von Trapp family (The Sound of Music) provided music for the Eucharist. At the end of the service we sang Edelweiss with her; there aren’t words to describe what an incredible joy that was.” And to think that my church experience is impoverished with the lyrics of Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley, and the English hymns arranged by Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Wednesday, June 21st, Ninth Day

The title for this message is “Middle of the Road” and it reveals much in the thinking of the deputies from this diocese, and perhaps others. They write on Wednesday morning (and before the last minute joint meeting of the house of bishops and house of deputies) of the Tuesday defeat of the Windsor “Resolution A161, regarding the election of Bishops, authorization of Rites for the Blessing of same-sex unions, and pastoral care to gay and lesbian Christians, ... Those on the extremes (conservative and liberal) joined together to defeat the resolution. There is a large contingent, however, who remain in the middle of the muddle and who hope very much to find a way to move forward in a positive direction in our response to the Windsor Report.” This “large contingent” however was overwhelmingly defeated when this resolution was voted down. So much for the attempt to cling to the “Middle of the Road.” There is no via media (middle way) on this.

You can have a middle way between Anglo-Catholic and Evangelical wings of the church as the term was originally used in the 17th century when it was used under the reign of Elizabeth I in the Church of England. Both sides were orthodox Christian, albeit with different liturgical and doctrinal spins. But neither tried to remake the Trinity, nor cook up a new set of moral rules to replace Biblically established moral behavior. Sure they argued, but they both believed the Nicene Creed, and neither side sang it only as an art form.

Today the tent of the 21st century Episcopal Church has no middle, except a tent which is torn to shreds. The tent which once stretched from the dioceses of Albany and Ft. Worth on the conservative end, and the dioceses of New Hampshire and California on the liberal end,
represent two incompatible versions of faith. One is Christian as articulated by two millennia of church expression: Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox. The other is syncretistic and Unitarian, but with the old liturgical language which they either do not believe, or which they revise to accommodate current cultural sensibilities with the claim that it is a new work of the Holy Spirit.

Central New York Bishop Skip Adams years ago expressed these thoughts on this when he reflected on the actions of the Episcopal Church consecrating a homosexual bishop who had a same sex partner in 2003:

"I do not in any way want to minimize the seriousness of these actions for the Church. Some of us see it as a great error cutting at the very root of what it means to be Christian. Others of us, including myself, see it as a movement of God’s Holy Spirit and a decision made in order to be more fully faithful to the Gospel of Jesus Christ."

The difference illustrated by these two views are as wide a gulf as can be, and they are irreconcilable despite the sentiments of “the muddle in the middle” to reconcile them under one broad tent. The tent is shredded, and both sides are running in opposite directions each with their tent poles, stakes, and canvas, while the “middle way” dissolves into a world of denial.

Thursday, June 22nd, The Day After

“By now, many of you will have heard about various resolutions that were considered on Wednesday, the last day of Convention. Difficult choices were made carefully and prayerfully.” This was all the Central New York deputies said about the last minute non-binding resolution by the convention which reads, “That the 75th General Convention receive and embrace The Windsor Report’s invitation to engage in a process of healing and reconciliation; and be it further Resolved, that this Convention therefore call upon Standing Committees and bishops with jurisdiction to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion.”

Talk about a "muddle in the middle”! It was rammed through, and opposed by both liberals and conservatives alike. It was a vague attempt to sew up the tent and patch the holes. To no avail. Nobody is happy with this, and we can all argue about what this means. Bishop Chane of Washington, D.C. issued a statement saying it means nothing, and that he is not bound by it. Moderator of the Anglican Communion Network Bishop Bob Duncan said, “The tear has widened. While we had hoped that this Church would repent and return to received Faith and Order, General Convention 2006 clearly failed to submit to the call, the spirit or the requirements of the Windsor Report. The middle has collapsed.”

Afterward

Where does this leave folks like people from Central New York and their bishop as they trudge home and claim that they cling to the “Middle of the Road” while really embracing the left? I suppose like humpback whales they could all sing Edelweiss, and go home with a new song as they think about the “Muddle in the Middle.” Such folk tend to scorn those of the left and the right. But to do so is to deny reality. There is not one church, but two churches with those in the middle standing on the open ground looking both left and right at a tent torn in half.

Jesus said in the Gospel of Mark, “If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.” Can the Episcopal Church long defy the logic of Jesus’ words?

Raymond Dague is an attorney with the Anglican Communion Network and a member of St. Andrews in the Valley, Syracuse, New York. He spent several days at General Convention 2006.