Marty Gras the Crawfish assist our deputation with the proposed Rules of Order of the House of Deputies.
[by the Rev. Sharon Alexander, Chair of Louisiana Deputation]
On Wednesday, the second day of official business of General Convention, most of the Deputation spend time in Committee Meetings and hearings on the issues we will be deciding. The issues range from amendments to the Episcopal Church’s Constitution and Canons to new ideas for Christian Formation and youth ministry to ideas for possibly making changes to how the Episcopal Church makes decisions and implements them.
I spent most of the day in three separate committee meeting in which we analyzed ways in which the church can work more efficiently and effectively, and be better stewards of our resources. We heard many different ideas from people from all over the church. All clearly want to have a church that is focused on doing God’s work, but there are many different ways this can be done.
We also voted for the first time on the floor of the House of Deputies. We approved new Rules of Order, which are much less complicated than the previous Rules. We hope these new Rules will help move things along more efficiently without limiting the ability of people to express their views. We also approved a resolution expressing our sympathy for the members of Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston who were killed during a bible study and their friends and families. Bishop Thompson and John Musser both serve on the Social Justice and United States Policy Committee which recommended the adoption of this resolution. We will have more committee meetings on Friday and will be voting on the next wave of many more resolutions.
Today was also the first day of worship at General Convention. Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori was the preacher and celebrant at the Eucharist. The room was full of worshippers, including many volunteers and visitors.
We also had some help from our new mascot, a small crawfish named Marty Gras. He shows up to meetings, plenary sessions, meals and other events. He is not quite as helpful as he seems to think he is but he is very dependable.
If you have any questions about General Convention please feel free to send an email to me at sharon@trinitybr.org and we will do our best to get a response back to you. Our schedule is packed right now so it may take a while to respond, so please be patient.