Bishop Alan Scarfe, Diocese of Iowa
Maybe it is because my maternal grandparents were Mormons, but I find Salt Lake City a fascinating place. Its location right up against the mountains in such a wide valley is as breathtaking as you fly into it, as it probably was for those first Mormons who literally came across it from the mountain ridge. As we flew in from the north, I instinctively looked for the spires of the Temple – not quite as gleaming white as I had imagined, and rather lost in the taller skyscrapers around it. I also find myself wishing we could capture the missionary zeal of the Mormons, their insistence on the tithe and their ability to make people belong as a family. Yet as we gather to reflect upon the Lambeth Conference, we know that we don’t have to go far for our own testimonies on that score. For three weeks in July and August, they were all around us.
Both the ecstasy of being part of the Anglican Communion and its agony are before us as we enter into these two-and-a-half days as Bishops in The Episcopal Church. In one day, we have managed to relate our experiences, joys and disappointments from Lambeth, with many more positive experiences expressed than not. We have shared the overwhelming opportunity within the relationships that make up the Anglican Communion to engage the serious call of God’s mission, made all the more so as the economic crisis swirls around us, the impact of natural disasters has to keep some bishops at home, and most of our instincts tell us that ministry for, as well as on, this fragile planet is no longer business as usual. Yet as this same day comes to its close, we face the agony of ascertaining when is it that the broader Communion attachment cannot hide us from difficult choices and actions we must make in defining our own actions’ boundaries within the Episcopal Communion. This becomes our central task tomorrow.
There is no doubt that the Archbishop of Canterbury’s goal of helping us become better bishops is still at work within many of us. For myself, I returned home from Lambeth unable to articulate readily the deeper impressions and learnings of the time together. I find I am not alone in this. But it is probably in the theological stimulation of the way arguments were expressed at Lambeth that has given rise to a desire to give more intentional time in my day to my theological processes. It is clear that with our Bible study members from Lambeth we have a built in network for ongoing discussion and sharing of our common life as bishops. We may not be able to bring Lambeth any closer to more frequent meetings, but there is a great hunger for opening up more everyday avenues for the relations made at Lambeth to be maintained.
It is our own ability to be honest and true with each other closer to home that makes its demand on us as we tend to our business today. It is also our openness to the Spirit of God that is in demand, who from within each of us seeks to help us discern what is the height and the depth of God’s will. Sometimes that feels very much like being left to our best practices. Perhaps it is all we leave God when we create circumstances that place God’s children on different sided of a divide, and we have been doing that for a while.
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