Deputy Booker - Day Three

Day Three

Well, things are starting to get interesting here in Austin.

My day started with a meeting of my committee (Committee 19: the Legislative Committee on Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations).  One thing I really like about the committee is that the 28 of us (7 bishops, 13 clergy, 8 laypersons) are all quite passionate about the subject and we really agree on what we’re trying to accomplish.  Our disagreements are about how to best do our work, not about the ends we hope to achieve.  There’s a strong sense that we’re all pulling in the same direction.  That is not true of all committees at General Convention.

We then went to a legislative session where we talked about Prayer Book revision, a topic that produced a lot of disagreement.  As with yesterday, there were a lot of procedural motions that felt like they really clogged the system.  When 842 people are trying to work on legislation at the same time, it can get rather heated.  There were five approved amendments, a couple of which we didn’t get to vote on for some reason I’m still not clear on.  Finally, it came to a vote. 

As you can see, the House of Deputies voted in favor of starting the process of Book of Common Prayer revision.  The Resolution now travels to the House of Bishops where I suspect that it will be substantially transformed.  Stay tuned.

The Diocesan Deputation and the Bishop had lunch together and discussed some of the topics that had been initiated the day before.

In the afternoon, there was a second Joint Session, this one about Evangelism.  We heard several speakers and one musical group who all had contributions to make on the subject of Evangelism.

We then moved across the river for an event hosted by the Diocese of Texas.  It featured food and a Revival with a presentation by Presiding Bishop Curry.  I’ve heard him speak many times before, but I think this was far and away his best sermon.  A lot of the fun of the sermon consisted of his interactions with a young woman (Dinorah Padro) who was translating his message into Spanish.  I’d try to explain it, but the Church’s News Service has it (already!) posted online here:  www.episcopalnewsservice.org/2018/07/07/presiding-bishop-preaches-god-is-love-and-gives-life-message-during-austin-revival/ 

I suppose I ought to also mention that the Westboro Baptist Church showed up outside the event.  They were, I think, more objects of amusement and pity that anything actually disruptive to the event.