Our reading this weekend, along with workshops on Saturday, is adapted from a program called Miqra, created in the Diocese of Kansas.

While I’ve had the good fortune of a few friendships with Muslims in this country, it turns out that Ramadan is a whole different kind of celebration when you’re in a Muslim area. For those of you who knew this decades ago, you can nod pityingly if you like. Before I write about that, here are a couple of photos from a stunning set of photos on the Big Picture.

What impressed me most about Muslims and their celebration of Ramadan is the extent to which it is all-encompassing. Men go to their neighborhood mosques for their five daily prayers, and then some. Women find places to pray. Workers set aside what might seem urgent to make time for prayer. Not only do most people fast (which, for Muslims, means no food or even water while the sun is up), but it’s not possible to buy food or drink. My hotel served lunch and dinner, but only to hotel guests.

This brings me to the next point. I was struck by the hospitality of my hosts. They cheerfully made sure I had water when we drove out into the countryside. They ensured I could get lunch. They were very gracious with my endless questions. When I thought about how we Christians usually keep Lent and our typical unwillingness to talk about our faith, I was humbled.

Given the rhetoric we often hear in the US (especially from the Fox News crowd), I was also moved by the generosity of the Muslims I met toward their Christian friends. Whereas most people in Western developed countries seem to fall on a spectrum somewhere between ignorance and hostility toward Islam, I did not find the opposite to be the case. Folks seemed to bear no ill will toward Christians or, for example, Americans.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying Islam is better than Christianity. But I am saying we Christians might have some things to learn. Maybe there is something to emulate in the desire of people to share the joy of their faith, even in trying circumstances. What if we shared the Good News of our faith, not in order to effect conversion, but for the sheer joy of sharing the Good News. What if we listened to the witness of others.

The question of who can be saved is way above my pay grade (and, I would venture, any other mortal’s). I have no delusions about finding false similarities between disparate world religions. I do, however, believe that in sharing our particularities — and in our encounters with others — we might grow in our faith even as we appreciate the faith of others. Rather than stopping at our identification of perceived problems with other faiths (sexism, for instance), maybe we could learn from the visible strengths of other faiths. Maybe our fault-finding would be better directed at ourselves and our own faith.

When is the last time you visited a mosque or synagogue? When is the last time you invited a non-Christian to your church? When is the last time you contemplated the astounding mystery that we are all children of God, even as we too often seek the destruction of others?

What really surprised me, however, was the intensity of objection from what I’ll call the “General Convention establishment.” (I realize this makes me sound like Jack Iker, but please humor me.) Wow. There are some people in the Episcopal Church who really don’t want anything to change. They especially do not want anything to change if the something is connected to General Convention, church committees, legislative process, or programmatic staffing levels at HQ.

Last week I spent a couple of days with leaders in the Episcopal Church who are ready to move past our “stuck system” and to hit the reset button. These folks love the Episcopal Church. They are bishops, cardinal rectors, associate clergy, and rectors of small churches. They love Jesus and want the church to share the Good News and to be Jesus in the world. They mostly would agree that our church needs some serious rethinking if we’re going to do those things to which we’ve been called as a church.

Since that meeting, I’ve been thinking a lot about the mission of the church and what kind of institution (if any) might support the mission. On a more practical level, our diocese is getting ready to elect Deputies to the next General Convention of the Episcopal Church, and I needed to decide if I would run again. More than one person told me, last spring, that if I didn’t like General Convention the way it is now, I shouldn’t come. The Episcopal Church welcomes you, unless you point out the irrelevance of its legislative structures.

I’ve decided to run for election as a Deputy from Rhode Island. I’ve also decided to encourage others to run, especially those who believe that the institution of the Episcopal Church needs some freshening up, if not reinvention. Maybe you, dear reader, will consider running as a Deputy if you are an Episcopalian. You see, I’ve learned that there are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of Deputies who believe that we can find a better way to be the Episcopal Church. If enough of us start showing up, we can begin to turn the page to the next chapter in our history. Lord knows, we need to do that quickly.

In the midst of all this, a friend emailed me this interview with Phyllis Tickle. She speaks about the Great Emergence — an increasingly popular way to talk about this shift we’re experiencing now in the life of the Church. Tickle says we need to “de-institutionalize” the Church. There’s more, so you should go read the whole thing. But I think she’s on to something.

Of course, we need institutional frameworks to nurture our work in the wider context of a nation and the world. But we need to become more aware that the institution is the means to an end, not the end itself.

I don’t pretend to have this figured out. As one person put it at the leadership conference I attended, our generation’s task is to begin the transformation of the church. We know that what the church has been will no longer work. It is not likely that we will see the church into its next era. Rather, our task is to get things ready to hand off to the next generation.

As another person said to me recently, every 500 years the Church has a big rummage sale. The last one was the Reformation, of course. Before that, it was the Great Schism a thousand years ago, and it was the establishment of Christendom 500 years earlier. Now it’s time again for a big rummage sale.

We need to figure out what is part of our core, and we need to keep that. And then we need to get ready to put out some of our non-essential, but treasured possessions.

Bible? Keeping. Patristic teachings? Keeping. Nicene Creed? Keeping. Ancient patterns of liturgy? Keeping. Threefold ministry? Keeping. Watered down Christology? For sale. Real estate? For sale. Program-oriented congregations? For sale. Byzantine committee structures? For sale. Endless battles about sex? For sale. Staff who are more than one step away from local mission? For sale. Idolized institutions? For sale. No, strike that. If you’ll cart away our idolized institutions, I’ll pay you.

That’s my list. What’s yours?

Check out the details here. If you get one of these and your stuff still doesn’t work, then I’m afraid you’re the problem.

I don’t pretend to have it figured out. There are moments, however, when God’s grace burns brightly in my life — and plenty of times when I can see it in the lives of others. Maybe we Christians need to celebrate new life more often. Maybe we could start by being honest about how hard it can be to let go. Dying is not easy, but the new life it brings is surely glorious.

He was walking toward the stairs when a teenage boy approached and pulled out a knife. “He wants my money, so I just gave him my wallet and told him, ‘Here you go,’” Diaz says. As the teen began to walk away, Diaz told him, “Hey, wait a minute. You forgot something. If you’re going to be robbing people for the rest of the night, you might as well take my coat to keep you warm.”

It gets even better. Go read the whole thing (or you can listen to Julio tell you the story).

I don’t know that Julio Diaz is a Christian, but in his simple actions he has manifest what it means to be a Christian. Was this safe? Of course not. But then no one ever said Christianity was meant to be safe. I’m not encouraging everyone who reads 7WD to risk their lives at every opportunity. I am simply asking you to ponder what your faith looks like, what our love of every person looks like.

Back when I lived in New Haven, I was frequently asked for money by people on the street. When I had time, I sometimes offered to buy them dinner or to accompany them into a takeout place where they could order what they wanted. Each of these encounters was infused with sacredness. I’ve never risked as much as Julio Diaz, but his example reminds me that practicing what we preach may take us to the mountaintop of grace-filled moments.

I’ll bet when their meal was finished, Julio and his mugger were glowing. For they had each encountered the face of God.

That’s the bad news, but you already knew all that since you could see the cobwebs all over the blog. The good news is that my blog hopper is full and I have lots of ideas of things about which to blog. Look for various rants, comments, and humorous bits over the next few days. We are gearing up for a fantastic program year at Christ Church, and I hope to share that with you too.

In the meantime, summon your friends & neighbors. Start staring at this blog. There will be more blogtastic stuff here before you know it.

This has been especially on my mind as I have offered pastoral care to the aunt of a solider who recently died there. We are fighting an enormously costly war, and for what? History will not be kind to the Bush administration, I’m afraid. In the meantime, the rest of us should pray for Iraq and its people and all those who are working for peace. As long as we keep ignoring what’s happening, the war will continue. It’s time to pay attention to Iraq and Afghanistan, and to ask our government leaders to do the same.

• You all those bits about firmament and sheol in the Old Testament? Next time you are leading a Bible study, this stunning graphic will help explain how the writers of the Bible saw the world. There’s nothing that wasn’t in my Bible 101 class in college, but this graphic is way more beautiful. Thanks to The Lead.
• Grieving is always hard work, and everyone’s grief is unique. I was moved by the vulnerability of my colleague in writing about her own grief. Beyond her willingness to open up a well of emotion and struggle, there is great strength and faith in her blog post. Have a read, and say a prayer. Hankering for the Holy, indeed.
• When is the last time you used a floppy disk? Do you miss them? Of course not! So why is that in the rest of our lives, we are willing to let things go, but in the church we insist on clinging to outmoded things? I’m not talking about matters of faith, but simpler things. Service leaflet? Bound hymnals? Printed newsletters? Pews? Let’s allow the church to move on, shall we?
• Generosity begets generosity. Even in computer operating systems. Try being generous. The benefits are amazing.
• Time to bring back morning prayer? Dan Martins+ wonders what the church is doing to offer itself to the unchurched. Perhaps Solemn Mass isn’t the best way to do this? I remember a few years ago, before I was ordained. I was singing in the Trinity Choir at Trinity, Copley Square. Each Sunday, close to 1,000 people packed themselves in to savor Rite I Morning Prayer. Lots of college folks were in their number. Perhaps Dan is on to something…
• Did Jesus die on a cross? Maybe not. Still, the author is making noise with semantics. Whether he died on a cross or a tree, Jesus brought our salvation. Still, it’s interesting to wonder if we got it wrong with the cross as a symbol.
• Craig Uffman, fellow priest and blogger extraordinaire, is moving on. He’s not going to stop blogging (I hope), but he’s going to a new cure. No doubt he’ll be missed where he’s been serving, but I also have every confidence that his new congregation will benefit from his faithful leadership.

Wave of the dongle to Yanko Design.

Saturday brought some stunning news, in that Synod narrowly voted down an amendment that had been proposed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York. As it is worded, the provision for women bishops would allow a parish to request pastoral care from a male bishop if their diocesan bishop is female. This is unacceptable to many conservatives, who do not want to have to request delegation from their female bishop; they would like to deal only with male bishops. There were various amendments to deal with this in different ways. The archbishops’ amendment was perhaps the most subtle, but it was unacceptable to many, including a bare majority of the House of Clergy, which voted it down on a vote by orders.

Some saw this as a defeat for +Rowan Williams as a leader, but I don’t know enough of the situation to gauge that. For Synod as a whole, there has been a fairly consistent desire to enact the ordination of women bishops in a way that provides for those who do not accept the ministry of woman while also ensuring that there are no second-class bishops. The defeat of several amendments to weaken the measure as it emerged from committee is largely, I think, in line with what Synod has been saying for some time now.

Listening to the debate, it seems to me that General Synod is infected with a pretty serious trust problem. Absent clearly prescribed legal protections, conservatives do not trust progressives to make space for them in the Church. Liberals do not seem to trust conservatives’ word that their concerns are principled theological objections, not mere sexism. It wasn’t expressed in Synod debate so much, but many members of the church no longer trust that +Rowan is leading faithfully, believing that he has sold out to (depending on who you listen to) liberal or conservative interests.

As a progressive, the most noticeable trust gap to me is the conservatives’ unwillingness to accept a code of practice in which their space within the Church would be ensured. To read the press releases from the far right, you’d think that Synod had voted not to care for them in its rejection of the archbishops’ amendments. That’s just not true. The original measure provides for pastoral care and sacramental ministry for those who cannot accept women bishops. It’s just that conservatives are either unwilling to accept delegation by a woman bishop (headship?) or they fear that liberals in power will further push them out by unspecified means.

I am fortunate to live in a diocese where my bishop, who is a woman, has been arranging delegated episcopal/pastoral care for some parishes since she was ordained bishop in 1996. We have no legal requirement for this, but she graciously works with the clergy and lay leaders to ensure that their pastoral and sacramental needs are met. Her legal jurisdiction as bishop is preserved, but she permits other bishops to exercise episcopal functions as needed. It seems ideal to all parties. I cannot imagine why another arrangement would be better. This is just the Christian thing to do.

This arrangement also requires a good deal of trust. Vestries (PCCs for you Brits) have to trust that the bishop will approve their choice of clergy when it’s time to call an incumbent. Clergy have to trust that the bishop will say “yes” to delegation when it’s time for confirmations, visitation, or an ordination. The bishop, for her part, has to trust that none of this is an affront to her personally and that these parishes are not seeking to undermine the unity of the diocese.

Now some people will object that it doesn’t always work this way. It’s easy to point to a litany of offenses: liberal bishops who have refused to yield their authority, vestries who have been unable to call the priest of their choosing, and parishes who have been forced to welcome a visitation from someone whom they weren’t ready to welcome. But we live in a broken world. Despite widespread divorce, I continue to believe in the goodness of marriage. We can’t let sinful shortcomings define our hopes and fears.

The church could rise above this. Could we live in a trusting way? Could long-time opponents set aside years of bitter division? To do this would be to proclaim the Good News with startling clarity and boldness. If everyone behaves as if this isn’t possible, then we might as well say the tomb was never empty. Where is our faith? Where is our belief in God’s power to turn fear into hope, hatred into love, and scarcity into abundance?

I would love to see General Synod pass the measure as it was presented by the Revision Committee, with a code of practice to come later. This would mean lots of trust. Synod would have to trust that the Revision Committee considered every option and that this is the best one available. Synod would have to trust that the forthcoming code of practice is going to be something with which everyone can live. Conservatives would have to trust that they are loved, that their presence in the Church is valued, and that they will receive sacramental and pastoral care in a way that they can accept it. Liberals will have to trust that women bishops will receive the respect of their office and that those who have difficulty with this are people of good faith struggling to live the same Gospel as every other Christian.

C of E insiders will read this and probably point out that I’m hopelessly naive. Fair enough. But I’ve seen the terrible cost of mistrust and bitter division in the Episcopal Church and in the Anglican Communion. It has to stop. We have to learn to live as if the Gospel we proclaim is really true.

Imagine, for a second, a couple of worst case scenarios. What if we progressives are wrong? What if women really can’t be validly ordained as bishops? It seems impossible to me, but part of trusting another is the willingness to confront the possibility that one is wrong about contested matters. Surely then, in that case, the Church would benefit from the witness and the presence of conservatives.

On the other hand, what if conservatives are wrong? What if the Holy Spirit has been pushing the Church forward on this for years and we haven’t been acting quickly enough? Perhaps that seems impossible to some. Here’s the thing: not everyone has to move forward at the same pace. Surely there is room for a few stragglers while the vanguard presses on.

Either way, isn’t the Church big enough for comprehension on this issue (and some others)? A reading of the New Testament suggests there was variety of practice in Paul’s time. I’ve been reading Diarmaid MacCulloch’s History of Christianity, and there has been considerable variety in belief and practice in the Church throughout its history, especially in the first few centuries. Moreover, there have always been heretics and there have always been those on the vanguard of doctrinal change. Why should this not be the case now?

My hope for Synod and for our whole church is that we can learn to trust God in our deliberations, that we can learn to trust those with whom we disagree, and that we can trust ourselves to have the courage to admit our own sinfulness — our imperfection, our need of one another, and our need of God.

If there’s room for trust, there is room for women bishops. If there is room for trust, there is room for those who do not accept the ministry of women bishops. If there is room for trust, there is room for grace.

Here’s my idea: simply allow parishes who don’t care for women bishops to transfer their allegiance to the Church of Nigeria! That way, they’ll be guaranteed to have a bishop who is not a woman and who won’t have touched them in the course of ordinations. The Church of England won’t have to deal with complicated flying bishops, flying dioceses, or flying anything.

What’s that, you say? Parallel jurisdictions are messy?! That’s ridiculous?! We can’t divide the church that way?! Well, it turns out that Synod more or less approved this kind of scheme back in February when it gave some recognition (or at least failed to condemn) this exact plan as it gets lived out here in the US. Synod members expressed their outrage at lawsuits and clergy discipline against those who have transferred themselves to CANA from ECUSA.

So here’s the plan. For those who wish to remain in the Church of England, the single clause measure, as presented, can be passed. Women will be bishops. Period. No need to devise a scheme that compromises the integrity of women bishops diocesan.

For those parishes who can’t abide the thought of women bishops, their PCC can vote themselves out of the C of E and into the Church of Nigeria. The C of E will give them their building and avoid discipline against departing clergy. It really should work out just fine, at least based on Synod’s previous assessment of how things have worked here in the US.

This way, everyone gets to live happily ever after. The C of E gets the ministry of women bishops, unfettered. Conservatives have a home within Anglicanism, and no need to head off to Rome. The Church of Nigeria can lay siege to Canterbury, since they seem to enjoy a good battle.

What, you don’t like that plan? You think maybe Synod was wrong about how things have worked out in the Episcopal Church? Or, more accurately, what Synod thought to be OK in the USA won’t fly (no pun intended) in England? Yeah, me too. I really think the single clause measure, as presented, is the way to go. It preserves the apostolic authority of all bishops whilst expecting that people will behave in a grace-filled manner, providing pastoral care and sacramental ministry for those with whom they disagree.

I hope Synod passes the Measure without amendment, as the Revision Committee worked on it. Won’t it be nice when the debate in the English House of Bishops is informed by women? Wouldn’t it be nice if Synod could spend most of its energy on mission instead of minutia of polity?

UPDATE: Another idea occurred to me. Instead of creating more flying bishops, why not fly a few bishops from the US over there? They could offer some oversight to parishes who want to get on with things. In exchanges for services rendered, the ECUSA House of Bishops could take Jeffrey John as its newest member.

You can check the proposed schedule here (PDF). Papers are online here and here. Excellent blog posts are likely to appear here and here. The latter link could also feature cartoons. Live streaming audio should be available here. Thinking Anglicans is probably the best catch-all to follow what’s happening. Except for this esteemed bastion of journalism/silliness, of course.

By the way, here’s some info on how different things are in the C of E. Yes, someone could swoop in and compel everyone to practice their archery skills. That is the law, friends.

Wave of the quiver to Ember Days, who noticed the bit about weapons.

Tip of the biretta to the FAIL Blog and to the Bad Vestments blog.

Over on Facebook, I asked my friends what I should blog about for this 1,000th post. The suggestions ranged from a video I had posted (about William Shatner stealing Leonard Nimoy’s bicycle) to millennialism. There were further suggestions to write about the current mess over in the Church of England or cupcakes. Mmmm, cupcakes. The latter suggestion came via Twitter, perhaps because “cupcakes” is well short of 140 characters. Having ranted about the CofE in post 999 and chocolate in 998, I felt it wise to eliminate those. Not feeling inclined to cover all things millennial, I decided to follow another suggestion: write about why I do this.

So here’s why. Firstly, I enjoy it. This is what I do to stretch my brain beyond the parish and, on a good day, to engage with folks around the world. Secondly, I am eager to push conversations within the church toward mission and away from petty squabbles. Thirdly, my peculiar sense of humor isn’t always valued locally (surely not because of any defect in my sense of humor), but two or three others on the planet get some yucks here. Fourthly, I’ve met some fantastic people (quite a few in real life!) through blogging. Finally, when I am at my best here, I find that this is an extension of my priestly ministry to share the Good News.

There are some down sides to all this. Many bloggers report an ailment from which I sometimes suffer. It’s pretty easy to get obsessed with traffic numbers. Really, it shouldn’t matter if anyone reads what I’ve written, but I’m not always so serene as that. Most of the posts which have gotten the most traffic are the ones in which I’ve waded into matters of Anglican controversy. The more righteously indignant, the bigger the traffic spike. A good number of these posts are one of which I am proud, feeling that I’ve contributed either humor or balance to an often shrill conversation. Some of the posts have been less helpful in the conversation, though I’ve never deleted a published post. The solution, of course, is to follow the same advice that’s given for emails: never hit “publish” when one is worked up. I’ve gotten better at this, I think, and I hope I continue to remember that I’m doing all this as a priest and not as a cranky internet guy.

Another area in which I hope to improve is proofreading. More to the point, I suppose I should start reading what I’ve written before I publish it. I’m often stunned by the typos (usually missed or incorrect words) when I have occasion to go back and look at something. You’ve been patient, dear readers, and for this I thank you.

Then there are the periods of neglect when parish life doesn’t leave enough time for blogging. As I continue to sort through all that, I hope to be a bit more disciplined so that I can produce a steady stream of choice content for the legion of 7WD fans. (For “legion” you should read “several dozen”.) I admire Bishop Alan and his “one excellent post per day” discipline. Wow. If he were running the Church of England, no one would be gearing up for croziergate, purplegate, tippetgate, purificatorgate, fontgate, or noticeboardgate.

Well, anyway, thank you for reading this post and for visiting 7WD. Interactions with readers through comments, Facebook messages, tweets, and emails are what I have enjoyed the most. Please keep responding with the good, the bad, and the ugly. And the proofreading. If there are things you’d like to see more of or less of, let me know.

The pace of writing has picked up since I started. It won’t take me two years to get to 2,000 posts. So look for another post like this one, perhaps in a year or so. Meanwhile, I’ll see you around the nets.

Mitregate

In case you were living under a rock, sanity departed the Church of England in last month’s incident in which the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church was told she could not wear her mitre whilst celebrating the Eucharist in Southwark Cathedral. Yes, the primate of the Episcopal Church, who was vested as a bishop at the Lambeth Conference in 2008 (among other places), was ordered not to wear her pointy hat, lest this bring about the ruination of Christendom. At first it seemed that this was Lambeth bureaucracy being too efficient for its own good. Then it emerged that plenty of women bishops have been wearing mitres all over England. It’s just Katharine who can’t wear hers. How would one satirize such a thing?

The Betrayal of John (redux)

Then there’s the recent kerfuffle in which it was rumored that Jeffery John would be named as the Bishop of Southwark. John, who was to be named as Bishop of Reading until the Archbishop of Canterbury betrayed him in 2003, has behaved nobly through this whole sorry mess, managing to refrain from saying anything to the newspapers.

Well, no surprise about whether this inspiring preacher, respected administor, and gay man will become a bishop. Today’s newspapers report than John’s nomination has been scuttled by (guess who!) an angry Archbishop of Canterbury, who didn’t like the way things had unfolded. Given the nature of the story, and its very existence from press leaks, there’s plenty we’ll never know. But plenty is clear.

Ewww! It’s a ‘Bishopess’!

Just one more little rabbit hole to go down. It turns out, if you didn’t know, that the Church of England only allows male bishops. Women can be priests, but there are cootie barriers baked into the system to protect men who don’t like such things. Parishes can sign little papers so that they don’t even have to talk to a bishop who has possibly been tainted with girl cooties. There are special (I am not making this up) “flying bishops” who pop in to dispense cootie-free sacraments. In special cases, there are even separate communion lines for consecrated communion bread with and without cooties.

As they are finally getting around to making provision women bishops, it seems that some people want to have back-of-the-bus bishops and front-of-the-bus bishops. General Synod keeps saying no to these schemes, and some bishops keep finding ways to institutionalize apartheid in the ordinal. Most recently, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York have produced a plan that is cruel in its cynicism, claiming to uphold a single bus ticket, while arranging for there to be a boys-only section in the front (oh, gee, I guess you’ll have to go to the back, but you’re equal!).

The triumph of fear

What is shocking in all of this, aside from the rank sexism and clubby patriarchy of it all, is that the leaders are allowing fear to rule over mission. When you start parsing the arguments for and against, some themes emerge. Those who oppose women or gay bishops usually cite scriptural warrant, traditional practice, ecumenical relations, and institutional damage. Those who favor women or gay bishops usually cite scriptural warrant, gradual change through church history, justice, and institutional mission/vitality. I won’t rehearse all the arguments here, and most readers will know where they stand already.

However, the most shrill argument that pops up again and again is that allowing the House of Bishops to be tainted by cooties will cause massive exodus of clergy to that bastion of moral rectitude, the Roman Catholic church. Here’s what I say in response. First, let’s call your bluff. Not many will go, especially when they realize that Rome’s hierarchy will have far less patience with their petulance. Second, since when did it become a good idea to allow people to take the church (or any organization) hostage by their threats to take their toys and leave?

Why does this argument carry such weight in England? Let’s suppose everyone from Forward in Faith and everyone who is under the care of the flying bishops (guffaw) departed tomorrow? What would that be like? Presumably those folks would be happier — and more able to worship as they feel called. And everyone else could get on with things. In other words, the church would thrive.

I’m too weary of all this to take up every aspect of the arguments, though I will gladly opine at the request of my beloved readers. Let’s just say I think the leadership of Synod should do what they’re going to do and get on with it. And perhaps General Synod might invoke the Holy Spirit in its deliberations.

Is there room for the Holy Spirit?

In the Episcopal Church, progressives love to talk about the Holy Spirit. “Oh, that vote was amazing. The Holy Spirit was truly present.” That means the left won the vote. For progressives the Holy Spirit never urges a conservative vote. In that sense — ratifying what we already think — we could all stop, um, blaspheming the Holy Spirit by dragging her into every mundane bit of parliamentary minutia.

When we move past our caricatured invocation of the Spirit, we begin to make room for her actual presence. Here’s a sure sign of the Spirit’s presence: nearly everyone, regardless of theological position or ideological agenda, will sense her. That does happen sometimes, but it’s pretty rare. Prayer is what opens our minds and our hearts for the Spirit’s presence. More prayer would be a good thing, surely.

There are plenty of problems with the American process of selecting bishops and of running our church. However, there is also plenty to celebrate. The openness of our legislative process and our episcopal elections is (mostly) a good thing. At their worst, episcopal elections can degenerate into political competitions. At their best, an electing convention can open itself to the Holy Spirit and find itself basking in a grace-filled moment.

There’s no reason why the process of choosing English bishops and of its synodical governance should not be Spirit-infused. Indeed, they probably already are. But I was struck by this description of the bishop selection process by Bishop Pete Broadbent in a blog comment:

A lot of this is based on ignorance of the way the Crown Nominations Commission works. Those meeting will have a number of names before them (when last I did it, we had six going into the final decision process). They talk and pray and gradually whittle it down to the final choice or choices. It suits the drama merchants of the media to make this a matter of one person being accepted or rejected. The prosaic truth is that there will have been several plausible candidates discussed…

It sounds like a political calculation, in which players in the smokey back room advance the man (ahem!) who will toe the party line. In all the comments I’ve read, on blogs to the right and to the left, the tenor has been similar to this: it’s an institutional process — a force not to be trifled with. One wonders if there is any room for the Holy Spirit? Is prayer a part of these meetings? Is it only about a career arc, or is there room for a bishop who might be a brave visionary?

If this were only a comment or two, I’d chalk it up to American misunderstanding of English culture. Indeed that may be exactly what’s going on here. But every comment I’ve read, and I’ve read a few hundred of them, has been written in like manner. In this instance, I very much hope I’m wrong. I hope that choosing apostolic leaders in the church is deeply enriched by prayer and infused with grace.

Maybe it’s time to start speaking differently. Maybe it’s time to make sure that, whatever we decide, our church is a sign of grace in a fear-filled world. This is my hope for the Church of England, for the Episcopal Church in the USA, and for every church. May we always seek to be no more and no less than followers of Jesus Christ.

If we could pull that off, I have a hunch that our nets will be so full that we won’t have time for idle scandals about hats.

Whatever its original date of introduction in Spain, chocolate did not stay there. Spanish friars spread the gospel of Theobroma cacao throughout Europe as they traveled from monastery to monastery. Hot chocolate became a hit with French royalty after cocoa enthusiast Marie Therese married Louis XIV in 1660. At the Palace of Versailles, courtiers regarded the drink as an aphrodisiac. London’s first chocolate house opened in 1657. English cafe society believed the drink to be a cure-all medicine capable of treating tuberculosis. Initially flavored with coffee, wine and pepper, hot chocolate finally achieved liftoff in the early 1700s when English and Dutch impresarios hit on the idea of adding milk and sugar.

So go celebrate! Eat some chocolate. Here in New England, I’ll be taking mine in the form of ice cream on this stifling hot day.

This Sunday many people will probably focus more on cookouts and fireworks than on offering thanks to God. At Christ Church, we’ll gather as we do every Sunday to feast on God’s presence in Word and sacrament.

Of course, there’s nothing wrong with fireworks and cookouts. But we Christians should make sure that we have our priority straight: God comes before everything else. Period. While we are celebrating the birth of our nation, we would do well to put God in the center. How might we do that?

• We should give thanks to God for all the blessings of our lives. All that we have is a gift from God, not the result of our own labor.
• We should pray for our nation’s leaders — and all voters — that we might be guided to bring justice and dignity to all people.
• We should pray that we might continue to grow as a nation, celebrating our strengths and also admitting our need to improve.
• We should pray that our nation might be a beacon of hope to all nations, and that we might be worthy of that vocation.

So here’s an idea for this Sunday. Come to church in the morning. Remember what it’s all about. Then fire up the grill and get ready to watch the fireworks. Maybe it would be good to offer a prayer before chowing down on burgers & hot dogs. This is a pretty good one:

Lord God Almighty, you have made all the peoples of the earth for your glory, to serve you in freedom and in peace: Give to the people of our country a zeal for justice and the strength of forbearance, that we may use our liberty in accordance with your gracious will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Happy Independence Day weekend! And, even more important, I hope to see you on Sunday as we gather to celebrate the Lord’s Day!