Observations from the Peanut Gallery
The General Convention of the Episcopal Church--where have you been all my life? For someone who is into both politics and religion, it was squarely in my wheelhouse, and I found it fascinating and compelling on basically every level. I was able to follow the progress of things primarily on Twitter, but also via periodically checking into the livestreams and following along with the materials from the Convention that were available to the public online (which were excellent, by the way).
Having watched from afar, I have some observations on the event that is (as of this writing) wrapping up.
1. Democracy. Throughout the course of the Convention, you would from time to time see people complaining on Twitter about a lack of access, or marginalization of this or that group, or how pervasive clericalism was in the Episcopal Church. I want to avoid as much as possible discounting people's experiences along those lines, but as someone who recently came over from the Roman Catholic Church, it was hard for me to relate to many of those complaints. The notion that a lay person could go to something like General Convention and have a real, concrete say in the direction of the church is still kind of amazing to me, and something that will never, ever happen in my former church home. Surely there are places where that access and say can be better and more robust, and raising objections so that things can be approved is good. But perhaps a little perspective is in order--Episcopalians don't know how good they have it.
I found the experience of General Convention, even watching from afar via Twitter, to be enormously empowering and encouraging. The conversations that were going on felt like they mattered, in a way that none of the discourse in the Roman Catholic Church did or does. Some folks decided that they wanted an exclusive language version of the liturgy for use immediately, they drafted it, and now it is approved for trial use in the church. All in a period of two or three weeks. The Facebook group on Prayer Book revision that I participated in coordinated a couple of amendments to some of the texts that were under consideration, and those amendments ended up getting passed. All of that may be old hat to some, but it was incredible exciting for me to watch.
The sausage-making elements of ecclesiastical democracy are not the prettiest thing in the world to watch. But it's still very much worth doing, and it's not something that everyone gets to be a part of.
2. Trust. The Episcopal Church has a trust problem, and it was on display at General Convention. In its broadest formulation, there is a perception that there is a group of folks who are and have been running the show, and there is a significant body of people who do not trust that first group of people to make the right decisions on behalf of the church. There are several different ways in which this cropped up and alignments of people, but the single biggest dividing line was generational--the old, entrenched Baby Boomer leadership versus the folks in their 20s to 40s who have lost confidence in those people.
Perhaps the most shocking statement made at the whole Convention came from Bishop Andy Doyle of Texas (more on him in a bit; FYI, he's 52 and one of the youngest bishops in the church, both of which I think are relevant facts), who said something along the lines of "I've been a priest for 20 years and we have spent all of my priesthood fighting, and if we go forward with Prayer Book revision I'm afraid the leadership is going to screw it up and we will have another 12 years of fighting." What is so interesting about that is the way he referred to "the leadership," clearly implying that he, as a bishop, is somehow not part of "the leadership," or at least not the really relevant part of "the leadership." It came across, in a way, like he was referring to some sort of Episcopalian Deep State. It was a very unusual thing for anyone, but especially a bishop, to say.
There is a component to this that is theologically driven. It's pretty clear to me that the younger members of the Episcopal Church are, in the aggregate, more traditionalist in their theology than the Baby Boomer folks, especially if you take off the table things like the status of LGBT people and focus on core theological commitments. But the generational divide also seemed to cross the normal sorts of theological lines. I saw many people who were 100% in favor of Prayer Book revision and expansive language also express genuine skepticism over the ability of the current structures to do it right. The specific origin point of this skepticism is somewhat amorphous, but it seems to be some combination of a question of competence (along the lines of Bishop Doyle, the idea that these folks are just not very good at running things) and an accusation of narcissism (the idea that the Baby Boomers are focused on maximizing their power and impact in the immediate term and don't really care about future consequences).
I'm not sure whether any of this is true or fair--after all, I just got here. But whether or not this is true seems to me far less important than the fact that it is clearly perceived to be true, because it is causing people to act in response to the perceived reality. And I am not sure what can be done to fix it. Getting it out into the open, in a way that I sense has not previously happened, is probably constructive. Beyond that, I'm not sure what sort of confidence-building measures make sense. But it is a problem.
3. Bottom-Up. Lots of talk from this General Convention will likely center around the "Doyle Amendment," which ended up being the game plan for Prayer Book revision that was passed. Without getting into the weeds, the Doyle Amendment took a proposal for a top-down revision (where a single committee would eventually draft a text and then pass it down for review and comment) that would result in a single Prayer Book and replaced it with a bottom-up process (where texts would be developed locally and then passed up the chain to a clearinghouse-style committee that would compile them into a cohesive text) resulting in at least two different authorized Prayer Books (the current book and whatever the clearinghouse comes up with). In large measure, I think this approach, and the widespread support it received, is reflective of the lack of trust I mentioned above, since it essentially cuts the standing liturgy committee out of the process.
It seems to me that there is much to recommend this approach. For one thing, if there is wide-spread engagement with the process, it will provide a sense of where people actually are in terms of liturgical reform, as opposed to having to rely on anecdotes. It also will avoid the perception that any new texts are being imposed on unwilling parties as part of a power play, since it preserves the option to use the current book. Finally, it off-loads much of the cost of revision onto localities and dioceses, which is probably smart given the other pressing priorities and the general budget environment.
On the flip side, it seems to me that this approach undermines in a very significant way the idea that the Prayer Book is the definitive statement of the theology of the Episcopal Church. More specifically, it opens up the retort "which Prayer Book?" One can easily imagine a scenario where the current book reflects one theology on a particular topic (say, marriage or gender or even atonement theology, which was mentioned as a topic for revision in a new book) and the new book reflects a very different theology on that topic. Partisans of each side will then point to authoritative texts in support of their theology. At a certain point, it seems to me that there will eventually have to be a reckoning regarding the rubrics and the Catechism in the current Prayer Book on things like marriage equality (which, as discussed below, was avoided this time around). Or, maybe not . . . .
4. End of the Line. It seems to me that the end of the road on the marriage equality question in the Episcopal Church is, if not here, at least in sight. In the aftermath of Resolution B012, the state of play is that every parish in the Episcopal Church where the rector of the parish is on board may perform same-sex marriages. If the bishop of the diocese disapproves of those marriages, he may elect to designate a different bishop as providing oversight of the parish for purposes of those marriages. This is done so that the bishop can say (primarily, it seems, to bishops in other parts of the world who are trying to impose "purity tests" of various sorts) that "his hands are clean." But, at the end of the day, he cannot prevent parishes in his diocese from celebrating same-sex marriages.
This strikes me as approaching the end of the line for a couple of reasons. First, this seems like such a thin reed for the conservatives that I can't help but see it as functionally capitulation. The "purity" that they are clinging to clearly exists in name only, as nothing now prevents a parish from going forward with same-sex weddings regardless of the views of the local bishop. But, nevertheless, most of the conservative hold-outs approved the scheme. I saw rumors suggesting that the Bishop of Albany intends to try to maintain the ban in his diocese, but I don't see how he can possibly succeed (though, it might require formal disciplinary proceedings, which would be ugly). But the fact he is proposing to openly defy the clear statement of the General Convention suggests that the rest of the hold-outs did cave.
But, on the flip side, it also represents a substantial, if mostly formal, concession for the pro-marriage equality side, as there is now a real chance that they will never get their definitive, unambiguous statement on marriage equality in the Prayer Book. B012 is specifically designed to time-out when the Prayer Book is officially revised, and it was drafted with the idea that eventually the singular new Prayer Book would unambiguously say that marriage equality is the theology of the church. But now with the Doyle Amendment that decisive moment may not be forthcoming, since there are likely to be multiple approved books. I thought that the folks that had been on-board with B012 when they thought full-scale revision was the end-point would jump off after the Doyle Amendment went through, but that didn't happen. It reflects, I suspect, a desire from the pro-marriage equality side to declare a practical victory and move on to other things, as opposed to pressing on for a maximum, symbolic victory.
At the end of the day, no serious person can dispute that the Episcopal Church as a whole believes in marriage equality as a theological principle, and that opposition to this notion consists in a relatively small handful of dissenters. The dissenters will be and are free to dissent, but only in certain ways. Whatever ambiguities might exist in the official texts, this is the clear practical reality on the ground. It is, I think, a done deal.
5. Israel. There were a host of resolutions offered dealing with a wide range of controversial political issues--immigration policy, climate change, #metoo, and a host of others. In general, it seems that the attitude of the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops was more or less the same as to all of those issues--certainly there was disagreement inside both bodies, but the size of the factions on each side was relatively proportionate.
The notable exception to this had to do with Israel and the Palestinians. Fifteen resolutions were proposed that had something to do with those questions, including one that would set up an "investment screen" on companies associated with the West Bank and Gaza that certainly seemed to me to be at least a "soft" divestment proposal. Most of them passed overwhelmingly in the House of Deputies, but all but the least controversial ones died in the House of Bishops, often by large margins.
I have no handle on why there is such a significant difference of opinion and approach on that issue (and seemingly only that issue) between the bishops and the rest of the church. I will confess that I am not convinced that any of these sorts of resolutions matter much, so I don't think this division has much practical impact in any event. But I would be curious if anyone has any sense of why this is how it is.
Having watched from afar, I have some observations on the event that is (as of this writing) wrapping up.
1. Democracy. Throughout the course of the Convention, you would from time to time see people complaining on Twitter about a lack of access, or marginalization of this or that group, or how pervasive clericalism was in the Episcopal Church. I want to avoid as much as possible discounting people's experiences along those lines, but as someone who recently came over from the Roman Catholic Church, it was hard for me to relate to many of those complaints. The notion that a lay person could go to something like General Convention and have a real, concrete say in the direction of the church is still kind of amazing to me, and something that will never, ever happen in my former church home. Surely there are places where that access and say can be better and more robust, and raising objections so that things can be approved is good. But perhaps a little perspective is in order--Episcopalians don't know how good they have it.
I found the experience of General Convention, even watching from afar via Twitter, to be enormously empowering and encouraging. The conversations that were going on felt like they mattered, in a way that none of the discourse in the Roman Catholic Church did or does. Some folks decided that they wanted an exclusive language version of the liturgy for use immediately, they drafted it, and now it is approved for trial use in the church. All in a period of two or three weeks. The Facebook group on Prayer Book revision that I participated in coordinated a couple of amendments to some of the texts that were under consideration, and those amendments ended up getting passed. All of that may be old hat to some, but it was incredible exciting for me to watch.
The sausage-making elements of ecclesiastical democracy are not the prettiest thing in the world to watch. But it's still very much worth doing, and it's not something that everyone gets to be a part of.
2. Trust. The Episcopal Church has a trust problem, and it was on display at General Convention. In its broadest formulation, there is a perception that there is a group of folks who are and have been running the show, and there is a significant body of people who do not trust that first group of people to make the right decisions on behalf of the church. There are several different ways in which this cropped up and alignments of people, but the single biggest dividing line was generational--the old, entrenched Baby Boomer leadership versus the folks in their 20s to 40s who have lost confidence in those people.
Perhaps the most shocking statement made at the whole Convention came from Bishop Andy Doyle of Texas (more on him in a bit; FYI, he's 52 and one of the youngest bishops in the church, both of which I think are relevant facts), who said something along the lines of "I've been a priest for 20 years and we have spent all of my priesthood fighting, and if we go forward with Prayer Book revision I'm afraid the leadership is going to screw it up and we will have another 12 years of fighting." What is so interesting about that is the way he referred to "the leadership," clearly implying that he, as a bishop, is somehow not part of "the leadership," or at least not the really relevant part of "the leadership." It came across, in a way, like he was referring to some sort of Episcopalian Deep State. It was a very unusual thing for anyone, but especially a bishop, to say.
There is a component to this that is theologically driven. It's pretty clear to me that the younger members of the Episcopal Church are, in the aggregate, more traditionalist in their theology than the Baby Boomer folks, especially if you take off the table things like the status of LGBT people and focus on core theological commitments. But the generational divide also seemed to cross the normal sorts of theological lines. I saw many people who were 100% in favor of Prayer Book revision and expansive language also express genuine skepticism over the ability of the current structures to do it right. The specific origin point of this skepticism is somewhat amorphous, but it seems to be some combination of a question of competence (along the lines of Bishop Doyle, the idea that these folks are just not very good at running things) and an accusation of narcissism (the idea that the Baby Boomers are focused on maximizing their power and impact in the immediate term and don't really care about future consequences).
I'm not sure whether any of this is true or fair--after all, I just got here. But whether or not this is true seems to me far less important than the fact that it is clearly perceived to be true, because it is causing people to act in response to the perceived reality. And I am not sure what can be done to fix it. Getting it out into the open, in a way that I sense has not previously happened, is probably constructive. Beyond that, I'm not sure what sort of confidence-building measures make sense. But it is a problem.
3. Bottom-Up. Lots of talk from this General Convention will likely center around the "Doyle Amendment," which ended up being the game plan for Prayer Book revision that was passed. Without getting into the weeds, the Doyle Amendment took a proposal for a top-down revision (where a single committee would eventually draft a text and then pass it down for review and comment) that would result in a single Prayer Book and replaced it with a bottom-up process (where texts would be developed locally and then passed up the chain to a clearinghouse-style committee that would compile them into a cohesive text) resulting in at least two different authorized Prayer Books (the current book and whatever the clearinghouse comes up with). In large measure, I think this approach, and the widespread support it received, is reflective of the lack of trust I mentioned above, since it essentially cuts the standing liturgy committee out of the process.
It seems to me that there is much to recommend this approach. For one thing, if there is wide-spread engagement with the process, it will provide a sense of where people actually are in terms of liturgical reform, as opposed to having to rely on anecdotes. It also will avoid the perception that any new texts are being imposed on unwilling parties as part of a power play, since it preserves the option to use the current book. Finally, it off-loads much of the cost of revision onto localities and dioceses, which is probably smart given the other pressing priorities and the general budget environment.
On the flip side, it seems to me that this approach undermines in a very significant way the idea that the Prayer Book is the definitive statement of the theology of the Episcopal Church. More specifically, it opens up the retort "which Prayer Book?" One can easily imagine a scenario where the current book reflects one theology on a particular topic (say, marriage or gender or even atonement theology, which was mentioned as a topic for revision in a new book) and the new book reflects a very different theology on that topic. Partisans of each side will then point to authoritative texts in support of their theology. At a certain point, it seems to me that there will eventually have to be a reckoning regarding the rubrics and the Catechism in the current Prayer Book on things like marriage equality (which, as discussed below, was avoided this time around). Or, maybe not . . . .
4. End of the Line. It seems to me that the end of the road on the marriage equality question in the Episcopal Church is, if not here, at least in sight. In the aftermath of Resolution B012, the state of play is that every parish in the Episcopal Church where the rector of the parish is on board may perform same-sex marriages. If the bishop of the diocese disapproves of those marriages, he may elect to designate a different bishop as providing oversight of the parish for purposes of those marriages. This is done so that the bishop can say (primarily, it seems, to bishops in other parts of the world who are trying to impose "purity tests" of various sorts) that "his hands are clean." But, at the end of the day, he cannot prevent parishes in his diocese from celebrating same-sex marriages.
This strikes me as approaching the end of the line for a couple of reasons. First, this seems like such a thin reed for the conservatives that I can't help but see it as functionally capitulation. The "purity" that they are clinging to clearly exists in name only, as nothing now prevents a parish from going forward with same-sex weddings regardless of the views of the local bishop. But, nevertheless, most of the conservative hold-outs approved the scheme. I saw rumors suggesting that the Bishop of Albany intends to try to maintain the ban in his diocese, but I don't see how he can possibly succeed (though, it might require formal disciplinary proceedings, which would be ugly). But the fact he is proposing to openly defy the clear statement of the General Convention suggests that the rest of the hold-outs did cave.
But, on the flip side, it also represents a substantial, if mostly formal, concession for the pro-marriage equality side, as there is now a real chance that they will never get their definitive, unambiguous statement on marriage equality in the Prayer Book. B012 is specifically designed to time-out when the Prayer Book is officially revised, and it was drafted with the idea that eventually the singular new Prayer Book would unambiguously say that marriage equality is the theology of the church. But now with the Doyle Amendment that decisive moment may not be forthcoming, since there are likely to be multiple approved books. I thought that the folks that had been on-board with B012 when they thought full-scale revision was the end-point would jump off after the Doyle Amendment went through, but that didn't happen. It reflects, I suspect, a desire from the pro-marriage equality side to declare a practical victory and move on to other things, as opposed to pressing on for a maximum, symbolic victory.
At the end of the day, no serious person can dispute that the Episcopal Church as a whole believes in marriage equality as a theological principle, and that opposition to this notion consists in a relatively small handful of dissenters. The dissenters will be and are free to dissent, but only in certain ways. Whatever ambiguities might exist in the official texts, this is the clear practical reality on the ground. It is, I think, a done deal.
5. Israel. There were a host of resolutions offered dealing with a wide range of controversial political issues--immigration policy, climate change, #metoo, and a host of others. In general, it seems that the attitude of the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops was more or less the same as to all of those issues--certainly there was disagreement inside both bodies, but the size of the factions on each side was relatively proportionate.
The notable exception to this had to do with Israel and the Palestinians. Fifteen resolutions were proposed that had something to do with those questions, including one that would set up an "investment screen" on companies associated with the West Bank and Gaza that certainly seemed to me to be at least a "soft" divestment proposal. Most of them passed overwhelmingly in the House of Deputies, but all but the least controversial ones died in the House of Bishops, often by large margins.
I have no handle on why there is such a significant difference of opinion and approach on that issue (and seemingly only that issue) between the bishops and the rest of the church. I will confess that I am not convinced that any of these sorts of resolutions matter much, so I don't think this division has much practical impact in any event. But I would be curious if anyone has any sense of why this is how it is.
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