House of Deputies president sets out plan for naming vice president's successor
Episcopal News Service. November 17, 2009 [111709-02]
Mary Frances Schjonberg
Episcopal Church House of Deputies President Bonnie Anderson sent a letter Nov. 16 to diocesan deputies and first alternates that outlined the process she will use for replacing the Rev. Brian Prior as the house's vice president.
Prior was elected Oct. 31 to be the next bishop of the Diocese of Minnesota. Pending consent, he will become the ninth bishop of Minnesota on February 13.
Prior's vice president position will become vacant on that day, Anderson said, according to Episcopal Church Canon V.4.1(b). Prior was elected to a second term as vice president of the House of Deputies during the July 8-17 meeting of General Convention in Anaheim, California.
In the letter, Anderson noted that there is no canonical provision for filling a vacancy in the office of House of Deputies vice president until the first day of the next General Convention.
"Following the precedent set by Dr. Pamela Chinnis, president of the House of Deputies in 1993 when a vacancy in the office of vice president occurred prior to the General Convention of 1994, I will nominate a clergy deputy, respected by the house, who has agreed to serve, if elected, for the 77th General Convention only, and not to run for any office to be elected by the House of Deputies at the 77th General Convention," Anderson wrote. "This would enable the house to be served by a vice president without compromising the election of the vice president to be elected to serve during the succeeding triennium."
Anderson's letter is not yet posted on her website, but is available here.
The 77th meeting of General Convention will take place in the summer of 2012 in Indianapolis.
Once all deputies are elected in the year prior to convening in Indianapolis, Anderson said, she will inform the deputies of her nominee "and make available to him/her the necessary preparation required to enable him/her to preside in the House of Deputies at the 77th General Convention in my absence should he/she be elected to serve."
Anderson said she had asked the House of Deputies Study Committee on Church Governance and Polity to look into the current canons regarding filling a vacancy in the office of vice president of the House of Deputies and the possibility of proposing canonical revisions on this matter to the 77th General Convention.
Canon I.1.1(b) says that the vice president assumes the duties of the president "in case of resignation, death, absence, or inability, of the president." Section h of that canon says that in the case of the resignation, death, or total disability of both the president and vice-president between meetings of the General Convention, the secretary of the House of Deputies, currently the Rev. Dr. Gregory Straub who is also the church's executive officer, shall perform the president's duties until the next convention "or until such disability is removed."
The study committee, Anderson has said, is meant to "to examine and explain the history, theology, political structure and practical realities of the ways in which we believe God calls us to govern the [Episcopal] Church."