Grande Finale

If the old adage "May you live in interesting times" holds any appeal for you, General Convention 2006 is right up your alley. Despite predictions that "nothing would happen" and the despite the glacial progress on legislation in the House of Deputies we have not only given the Anglican Communion its first female primate, we have come to clarity that:

* we are committed to our interdependence as members of the Anglican

Communion (passing resolutions affirming interdependence, regretting the impact of the actions of General Convention 2003 on some members of the communion and committing to participate in exploring the creation of an Anglican Covenant)

and

* we are committed to the inclusion of gay and lesbian people in the life

and work of the church, refusing to pass a resolution that included moratoria on consecration of gay/lesbian bishops and same sex blessings.

Here's one analysis from Kendall Harmon's titusonenine

<http://titusonenine.classicalanglican.net/>: The strategy of leaders of the Anglican church at Columbus had been to engineer the moderate middle ground to be Windsor-compliant, marginalising the radical liberals and the orthodox, for the sake of unity. This strategy failed. In the end, the key resolutions were too liberal for the conservatives or too conservative for the liberals.I think Kendall is probably right. I also think the strategists mis-read the "moderate middle" — both in Deputies and Bishops — who are just not willing to turn the clock back on inclusion or to make gay and lesbian people bear the burden for our participation in the Anglican Communion.

I think two of the watchwords for this convention have been "clarity" and "honesty" — and yesterday we got both. Anyone who has ever done relationship counseling knows that one of the core values of authentic relationship is honesty — and so for us as the American Episcopal Church to be in authentic relationship with our Anglican family we MUST be honest about who we are.

I applaud the courage of a church not willing to "hold its nose and vote anyway" for a resolution that did not tell the truth about who we are (as urged by Special Committee member Dan Martins) and believe the action of the House of Deputies in defeating A161 yesterday set the stage for creating a response to Windsor that will give us a way forward rather insist on a way

apart: either from our Anglican family or our gay and lesbian baptized.

I deeply appreciated Bishop Charles Jenkins' words in the House of Bishops

yesterday: we must be honest about the fact that we are a church of two minds on some issues AND a church willing to walk together anyway. "We must give back the anxiety to those who handed it to us," he said by finding a way to express that to our Anglican Communion family so we can move on in mission and ministry.

Our last legislative day will begin with a called joint session where deputies and bishops will together receive a "mind of the house" statement being crafted as-we-speak by a committee appointed last night by the Presiding Bishop.

Interesting times, as they say. "They" also say "it's not over until the fat lady sings" and she hasn't even warmed up yet … so stay tuned!