Wednesday 7/9/09
We spend our days looking through different lenses. Yesterday morning we came together for the Eucharist, and it was, as always, inspiring. These are the lenses of being farsighted. We began and ended with the big picture. The hall is filled with deputies, bishops, and the Episcopal Church Women, who are also having their convention. There were thousands.

The Presiding Bishop called on our Church and our world to have heart transplants. Using the text of Ezekiel, she reminded us Jesus’ mission is to give us a new hearts, his hearts, so that we might follow his heartbeat through the world. That heartbeat is mission.

Likewise at the end of the day, we heard from the Archbishop of Canterbury, ++Rowan Williams. He spoke about the world economic crisis, but did so as a crisis in faith and truthfulness. He said, the "task before us as people of faith is to name this as a crisis of truthfulness and to challenge ourselves about the truth and above all to live in the truth." It reminded me of the short version of our mission statement: “become disciples; engage the world.”

The middle of the day we were nearsighted. We went to our committees to work on individual pieces of legislation. I find this is where I get the wonder of the Episcopal Church because most of the time everyone wants similar ends, but in very different ways. On the Education Committee we talk about what we mean by Lifelong Christian Formation and its interplay with Christian Education but everyone sees that differently. The variety is a testimony to the richness of the Body of Christ.

What makes this process so difficult is that the detailed work is intended to happen in committee, but it’s impossible for anyone to be everywhere. Therefore, a committee will spend hours or days perfecting a legislation, only to have it revised on the floor of the House of Deputies or House of Bishops just because others not at the committee meetings have passions as well.

The pace is exhausting, but it also pushes you to become more aware of the Body. The Convention does not exist to make my schedule work or my wants met. At the end of the day, it’s not about me or any other individual. It’s about the catholicity of the Church gathering to discern God’s will in this moment. It reminds me Christianity is always about community and we don’t get to call people; Jesus does. If we called them, they’d all look just like us.
Finally, what we are here for, what we are all here for is heart transplants. I wonder if we keep of this pace to get tired enough to surrender to the will of Christ and get new hearts. Even if that’s not the intention, I hope it’s the result.

Keep us in your prayers.
+Porter