Episcopal News Service: Press Release # 88146

General Convention Moves Church Toward Revitalization

Episcopal News Service. July 14, 1988 [88146]

NEW YORK (DPS, July 14) -- In a city rebuilding from the rubble of economic misfortune, the Episcopal Church has stepped forward to make reality of its Presiding Bishop's program of revitalization through mission.

Presiding Bishop Edmond L. Browning's determination to move from listening and learning into a time of doing was immediately evident in the plain but inspiring opening service of the Church's 69th General Convention, in which he called the Church to a new sense of mission.

That call was heard over and over during the Convention, meeting in Detroit July 2-11, as 185 bishops and 857 clerical and lay deputies voted to accept or reject 487 resolutions that would rewrite church policy.

Most significantly, when the debate over homosexuality, the role of women, and other potentially divisive issues had ended, the Church appeared to be more unified than it had been before, and conservatives and liberals both felt they still had voices in it. Bishops headed for the Lambeth Conference in England able to project to the rest of the Anglican Communion an image of wholeness in controversy.

"The main accomplishment of this Convention is how we worked together," Browning said. "We have had enormous issues and challenges. I think both houses have responded with great sensitivity. We have been concerned as we discussed the issues with how we related to one another."

Among legislation directly related to the eight Mission Imperatives designated by the Presiding Bishop and the Executive Council as "guideposts" for the Church in carrying its mission into the world are:

The call for a decade of evangelism in the 1990s, in which Episcopalians are asked to "reclaim and affirm our baptismal call to evangelism...and reach every unchurched person."
Authorization for a three-year, $2.7 million overhaul to make the Church's Christian education program the centerpiece of parish renewal.
Revision of the canons on ministry to broaden the participation of lay people, including authorization of their administering the eucharistic bread as well as the wine, and directing recruitment of aspirants for Holy Orders.
The "Michigan Plan" for economic justice, empowering poor people in Detroit and elsewhere with more than $24 million. It was approved without a dissenting voice by both houses.
Establishing a framework for providing pastoral care to congregations opposed to ministry by women priests or bishops.

The convention also sought to resolve the much-debated differences over homosexuality in the Church by affirming basic biblical teaching but encouraging "open dialogue."

Also approved were inclusive language texts for Morning and Evening Prayer and eucharistic services. They are for optional use starting as early as next fall, and are intended to remove the sense of exclusion experienced by women and other worshipers during services.

After lengthy deliberation, the Convention decided against modifying the Church's 1979 statement against ordination of practicing homosexuals "or any person engaged in heterosexual relations outside of marriage." The Church's position remains as it was before this Convention.

The delegates agreed on the final day, however, on a revision of the Church's stand on abortion, emphasizing the sacredness of human life "from its inception until death," opposing abortion "as a means of birth control, family planning, sex selection or any reason of mere convenience," but no longer opposing legislation by state or national governments.

The Convention continued its support for ministry to AIDS victims, led by the Presiding Bishop, who pledged himself to initiate a personal relationship with a person with AIDS and challenged all the bishops of the Church and other religious leaders to do the same.

The delegates gave quick approval on the legislative floor to a much-studied and meticulously prepared budget of $38.2 million for running the Church in 1989, an increase of 5.2 percent over 1988. Assessment of dioceses by the national Church remains at four percent of "net disposable budget income."

The budget for planning and staging the 1991 convention -- to be held in Phoenix -- was set at $6.7 million, compared to $5.4 million for the Detroit gathering.

The convention elected members to the Executive Council and several major boards. The Very Rev. David B. Collins of Atlanta was re-elected president of the House of Deputies.

Meeting simultaneously on the floor above General Convention, some 500 Episcopal Church Women held their 39th Triennial meeting, the first since administrative restructuring of the ECW three years ago restored the system of elected rather than appointed officers.

Browning challenged the women to move into the world with their gift of healing as witnesses to the Church's work. He also installed Marjorie Burke of the Diocese of Massachusetts as new ECW President, succeeding Marcy Walsh of South Carolina.

The ECW's United Thank Offering awarded more than $3 million in Blue Box collections to causes around the world, and also made available $1,500 in seed money to any diocese which undertakes an outreach project before October 1989.

The Episcopalians, some 10,000 including spouses and visitors, gathered in the Cobo Hall convention center, a massive concrete-andglass complex full of exhibition space and meeting rooms.

Dominated by a 15-foot bronze statue of Joe Louis at its entrance, the renovated center and the shiny hotels around it represent Detroit's determination to return from economic hard times which lost it half of its population since 1950 and left the inner city a wasteland of abandoned buildings and factories and rubbled lots.

The city was chosen three years ago as the convention site to emphasize the Church's concern with social justice and ministry to the poor.

In overview, the Convention's achievements affirmed the hope of the Presiding Bishop to move the Church ahead without leaving anyone behind.

Browning made his purpose clear in his sermon on the first Sunday, saying the Church's mission is "to go out into the highways and byways to the outcasts and rejects of society" -- even if it means it has to "say 'Godspeed' to those who wish to travel another road."

Said Bishop William C. Frey of Colorado as the Convention neared its end: "The message I get is that the center of the Church is holding and neither extreme is getting its way completely."

"We still have a long way to go, but I think this Church has tried to respond to all of its people," said Browning.

That, he said, is the message of this Convention.