Deputy Booker - Day Five

Several big pieces of legislation came to the House of Deputies today.  Yesterday we started talking about Resolution B012, and that conversation picked back up this morning after the day started with committee meetings.  B012, as you no doubt know, is this General Convention’s main resolution on same-sex marriage rites.  There were a number of ideas floating around prior to General Convention, and the Resolution was changed greatly in committee.  Basically, it does this:

• It extends the trial use of the same-sex ceremonies (approved three years ago) until the next version of the Book of Common Prayer.
• It does nothing to interfere with the general rule that clergy can decide whether to marry couples at their own discretion.
• If bishops don’t want to have same-sex marriages in their dioceses, “…the bishop exercising ecclesiastical authority (or ecclesiastical supervision) shall invite, as necessary, another bishop of this Church to provide pastoral support to the couple, the Member of the Clergy involved and the congregation or worshipping community in order to fulfill the intention of this resolution that all couples have convenient and reasonable local congregational access to these rites…”

Basically, this mandates access to same-sex marriage rites across the Episcopal Church (in those countries where it’s legal).  The Resolution passed by about 90%.

There was another Resolution that attracted a lot of discussion and that was a Resolution to divest from Israel (implement “investment screens”) and from companies that support Israel.  That passed, after a lot of debate, by 75%.

The final big piece of legislation was D016, which was a consequence of the “Me Too” movement.  It was approved pretty much unanimously after many testimonies about problems with sexual discrimination, sexual harassment and sexual exploitation in the church.  It’s a lengthy resolution; you can read it here: www.vbinder.net/resolutions/D016?house=hd&lang=en .

After a late-afternoon worship service (with a sermon by a priest from India), the Diocesan team met for a lovely dinner.  Bishop Smith was there, and he had some kind words about the delegation and the general experience of General Convention.