Administration as Gift: Diocesan Execs Meet
Episcopal News Service. May 17, 1984 [84106]
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. (DPS, May 17) -- "Administration: Gift and Ministry" was the theme for this year's annual meeting of the Conference of Diocesan Executives (CODE). Held at the Franciscan Renewal Center here, the four-day meeting was attended by 80 people, both clerical and lay, from more than 40 dioceses. Participants came from all nine provinces of the Episcopal Church and from four dioceses of the Anglican Church of Canada.
Formed in the mid-1960's, the Conference's membership includes full-time diocesan staff persons whose titles and responsibilities range from canon to the ordinary, archdeacon, and administrative assistant to officers for communications, finance, deployment, or program and personnel. Its stated purpose is to "serve the Church with the bishops through the diocese in the development of effective organizational and executive procedures, and to provide a primary vehicle of communication among and with the national church for planning, program and administration."
Daily highlights of this year's gathering were provided by the meditations of its chaplain, the Rt. Rev. William B. Spofford, assistant bishop of Washington, and each morning's keynote by the Rev. Charles P. Price, professor of systematic theology at Virginia Theological Seminary. Their mutual subject was "The Theology and Mission of Administration".
Participants had available to them afternoon and evening workshops on relevant topics, including executive burnout, racism, 1985 General Convention issues, and pastoral issues of intervention and authority. In addition, resource people from the Episcopal Church Center were on hand to answer questions and present up-to-date information on the Church Pension Fund, Church Deployment Office and the National Association of Episcopal Schools.
At its business meeting, the group agreed to forward the offerings from the opening and closing Eucharists to support ministry in the Navajoland Area Mission and requested that the steering committee study preparation of a talent directory of diocesan resource people, encourage minority and Province IX participation in the Conference, and provide some Conference presence at the 1985 General Convention.
In elections, the Ven. Charles Wilkins, Diocese of New Westminster, Vancouver, B.C., and Mary Lou Lavallee, Diocese of Western Massachusetts, were added to the board. Continuing members are the Rev. Canon William F. Kirkpatrick, Diocese of Washington (chairman); Joyce McConnell, Diocese of Olympia; Mr. Edward L. Freeland, Diocese of Alabama; and the Rev. Charles Johnson, Diocese of Virginia. The Conference also expressed thanks to its outgoing chairman, the Ven. Mark S. Sisk, newly named dean of Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, and to the Rev. Henry B. Mitchell, who will soon retire from the Diocese of Michigan.