TENNESSEE: Episcopalians skip sticky votes

By BRIAN LEWIS Staff Writer The Tennessean

The annual convention of the Episcopalians Diocese of Tennessee adjourned here yesterday afternoon without voting on several controversial resolutions.

The motion to adjourn was based on a complicated point involving the legality of proxy votes for clergy who were not in attendance at the meeting at Christ Church Cathedral at Ninth Avenue North and Broadway.

However, another consideration for many was that the bulk of the convention's required business was finished, and there was concern about the tone of the meeting.

"There was a lot of tension in the air," said the Rev. Freddy Richardson of the Church of the Holy Cross in Murfreesboro, who made the motion to adjourn. "I felt that legal decisions were being made on the fly and we needed time."

The motion to adjourn passed 105-93, more than 2½ hours before most delegates had expected to leave.

Heated debate was expected surrounding how the convention would respond to last summer's General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Minneapolis. At that meeting, the Episcopal Church ratified the election of the first openly gay bishop in church history, Bishop Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, and acknowledged that some bishops in the church were allowing blessings of same-sex unions.

"We've come to an interesting point in our common life," Bishop Bertram Herlong of the Diocese of Tennessee said after the vote to adjourn. "It's sort of interesting that we continue to have surprises." The Diocese of Tennessee covers Middle Tennessee.

Herlong said he would call another special meeting of the convention to take care of business that the church is required to do. However, he later added that it is possible that the special convention could be as short as five minutes and be held on the day of the 2005 annual convention. It would be necessary for him to confer with diocesan lawyers before a final decision could be made, he said.

A resolution that would have allowed churches to designate that their money not go to the national Episcopal Church was on the floor when the motion to adjourn was introduced.

Before the adjournment, the convention passed the budget while defeating a resolution that would have greatly reduced the amount of money sent to the national church. Some delegates said that indicated the directed giving resolution likely would not pass.

"I can't come to any conclusion except that they thought they would lose the vote," said Brad Reed, a delegate from Christ Church Cathedral.

However, votes on the motion to adjourn were not cast along strictly liberal or conservative lines, and some saw other reasons for the success of the motion to adjourn.

The Rev. Ken Swanson, dean of Christ Church Cathedral, said the vast majority of delegates were against proxy voting, including many liberals and moderates.

"That unified us," said Swanson, who is a moderate.

Although yesterday's early adjournment was unconventional, many delegates were pleased that the passionate, personal, vitriolic debate that many anticipated did not happen.

"It prevents a lot of rancor that the other resolutions may have caused," said the Rev. Peter Whalen of St. Philip's Church in Nashville. "It gives us time to reflect on what we're about. Sometimes you lose perspective and forget that we're here to bring Christ to others and not to win our petty little battles."

In his closing remarks to the convention, Herlong charged the delegates to return to their churches refocused on their mission, to pray longer and to give more of themselves to their congregations, both financially and spiritually.

"I really believe in my heart that we have a common goal and we are all working toward that goal," he said. "To go forward separately is not going to do anything at all. Problems are opportunities. When we get caught up in these things and let them dominate us, we lose our focus. God can fix things up better than we can mess them up. God can forgive better than we can sin. And our faith is in God, isn't it?"

ALBANY NY: Bishop acts to avert 'internal warfare' June meeting will confront issue of joining a new network opposing gay clergy

By BRIAN NEARING, Staff writer Times Union January 31, 2004

Albany Episcopal Bishop Daniel Herzog is confident that clergy and church members will support his work to bring the diocese into a new national Episcopal group opposed to gay clergy.

The bishop, under fire from some who say the move could split the church, also predicted victory on that step in a vote by diocesan clergy and lay leaders at the annual convention scheduled for June.

"We are not leaving the church. This step will help avert internal warfare" over the issue of homosexuality and the Episcopal faith, said Herzog in an interview this week at the diocese's offices on South Swan Street across from the Cathedral of All Saints. "It's a way of reducing the steam in the pressure cooker."

The issue of gay clergy has been rocking the Episcopal Church since August, when American Episcopal bishops voted to ordain openly gay Bishop Eugene Robinson of New Hampshire. Herzog and other opponents see homosexuality as biblically unacceptable, while supporters call that view outdated and prejudiced.

"I do not have any problem with gay parishioners. I have had gay parishioners," the bishop said. But he said the Bible limited sexual relations to those between men and women in the context of marriage.

Herzog said the "vast majority" of the 12,000-member Albany diocese sides with him and will vote accordingly this summer on the question of joining the new network, which is headed by Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan. "People say I may be getting beaten up over this, but they are proud of me," Herzog said.

A local opponent to Herzog conceded that defeat in June on the network was likely, adding some churches in the diocese were exploring whether members will travel to other dioceses for rituals.

Earlier this month, Herzog joined with Duncan and 10 other bishops in Plano, Texas, to create a network of dioceses that will defy the national church over Robinson's ordination.

Herzog said the network, which hopes to offer oversight to like-minded conservative parishes in outside dioceses, is not an attempt to split the church. Together, the 12 dioceses in the network represent churches with a membership of 235,000, or about 10 percent of the 2.3 million American Episcopalians.

Herzog already had won a local vote on the issue of homosexual clergy when about 70 percent of delegates from the 19 counties at a special diocesan convention in September 2003 in Speculator, Hamilton County, voted to disavow Robinson's ordination.

Herzog said Tuesday he expects similar voting results on the network issue when the church holds its next annual convention in the diocese's Camp of the Woods in Speculator. The convention will include about 400 clergy and elected lay delegates from about 130 churches in the diocese.

A local opponent to the new network conceded that Herzog's predictions are likely correct, although the vote may be closer this time than in October as some lay delegates will be newly elected since then.

"The vote among the clergy probably won't change, but we have been trying to educate the laity on this issue," said the Rev. James Brooks-McDonald, rector of St. Stephen's Church in Schenectady.

In the diocese as a whole, "We are definitely the minority," but he said he believes his own congregation supports him.

Brooks-McDonald is co-president of Albany Via Media, a group of clergy and lay people from Albany, Schenectady, Lake George and Plattsburgh who oppose the network. Albany Via Media has taken no position on the issue of gay clergy or same-sex unions.

At the September convention, the Albany diocese vote was 161 to 65 to disavow Robinson's ordination, said Brooks-McDonald. Clergy voted 93-33, while the lay leaders' vote was 68-32, he said.

Some churches are exploring whether members can visit other dioceses in Syracuse and Burlington, Vt., if they want to avoid confirmations and other services headed by Herzog, said Brooks-McDonald.

Albany Via Media is also exploring ways for congregations opposed to Herzog to send donations to the Episcopal Church USA, bypassing the bishop's control.