.Welcome to all clergy and lay delegates, to
all volunteers and staff, to our guests….Welcome to the 230th Convention
of the Diocese of New Jersey. A special
welcome to Bishop Victor Scantlebury, Acting Bishop of the Diocese of Ecuador
Central; to Bishop Blair Couch of the Moravian Church and to Pastor Wayne Zschech of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
It is great to have you here.
Our youngest son, Richard, visited us
last week. He’s 27. This past Monday, he and I decided to go
play. We drove up early Monday morning
to Shawnee Mountain to go skiing. Actually, I went to ski, he went to snowboard.
(It’s a generational thing.) Watching a
lot of the Winter Olympics gave us both the urge to hit the slopes.
Monday was a gorgeous day. I hadn’t skied in more than 14 years, nor had
he. We took a couple of test runs on the “bunny slope” just to get our ski legs. The conditions were icy, so it took a lot of
work, but we did all right. We decided
to take the chair lift to the top and try a more ambitious run.
The ride up was crisp and clear and
wonderful. I enjoyed the view and the gleaming,
white slopes beneath me. We exited the
lift. I skied down a bit to clear the lift and position
myself toward the beginning of an easy trail, to wait as Richard clipped his
boots to his snowboard. He was
concentrating on what he was doing. I
caught myself just looking at him,
remembering the little boy he had been, proud of the man he has become, deeply thankful for this moment, this rare
moment, when we could both take time out from our otherwise busy lives and be
together. I wanted it to last. I wanted it to last forever.
“Master,
it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings; one for you, one for
Moses and one for Elijah” (Luke 9:33).
I get Peter’s desire to hang on to the moment,
to memorialize the experience on Transfiguration Mount. I’ll bet we all do. I’ll bet many of us have preached that sermon. I have…I just did…It’s become a cliché. Still, it does resonate with us and with our
life experiences.
Of course, Peter’s situation is different. It’s a lot different. After all, Peter, James
and John were with Jesus, the Messiah, God’s Son. That makes a difference. The
context of the Transfiguration within the biblical narrative makes a difference. I’ll come back to that, I promise, but for
now, indulge me…Let me think of Richard
andwallow in the sentimentality of Peter wanting to preserve the moment, to freeze it in time….
“Master, it is good for us to be here…”
Yes, and it is good for us to be here
now….I can’t tell you how great a joy it is for me to be with you in this place
for my first Convention as your bishop. A
year ago when you gathered, the nominees for bishop had just been
announced. That announcement was the culmination of more
than a year’s work by the Episcopal Election Committee Co-chaired by Deborah
Schmidt and Fr. Ron Pollock.They labored diligently, along with consultant Ron
Clingenpeel, to develop a process to discern what God was doing in the Diocese
of New Jersey; to discern what God was up to in the neighborhoods of New
Jersey, to anticipate the theme of this year’s Convention key-note speaker
Dwight Zscheile.[1]
You all worked together to try to a call a bishop that would be a good fit for
what you felt the Lord was calling the Diocese of New Jersey to…And here we are,
in fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12), all
of us, hoping you have chosen wisely, that I have discerned faithfully and that
we have all been under guidance the Holy Spirit…
Master,
it is good for us to be here….
Susan and I have felt tremendously
welcome and supported from the moment we quite literally landed in Cape May
back in July. We have had wonderful
adventures across the diocese:
Spirit-filled worship at Cristo Rey and St. Peter’s Igbo Church in
Trenton; a joyous, joint celebration of the Eucharist with the people of St.
Mary’s Point Pleasant Beach and All Saints, Bay Head this summer before All
Saints returned to their beautifully rebuilt sanctuary this past December. I had the great honor and delight of being
present for that as well. We joined in
for a Vestry Barbecue at St. Francis, Dunellen and an energetic, faith-filled conversation
with their Vestry. We’ve shared lots of
other worship and fellowship experiences with different churches and church
leaders.
We’ve joined with the youth of the
Diocese on a couple of occasions.
Wow! Are we blessed with
outstanding youth and outstanding youth leaders headed up by our Diocesan Youth
Leader Debi Clark with Julia Nemec and Arlis Astudillo, Co-Chairs of Youth
Council.
Of
course there was the magnificent Consecration at Trinity Cathedral on November
2. I am most grateful to the Greg
Bezilla and the entire Transition Committee, to Dean Rene John and to the people
of Trinity Cathedral, to the outstanding Liturgical Commission, to the Diocesan
staff who worked so hard to make that a glorious occasion for us all.
Since
then I’ve had my first ordinations, celebrations of new ministry; first
Christmas at the Cathedral as well as my first Bishop’s Ball, Acolyte Festival
and Absalom Jones Festival. (By the way, a very special Cathedral Day is
planned for Sunday, June 1 when we are all encouraged to celebrate the
important place the Cathedral has in our common life. More information will be
coming. I encourage you to support it).
Susan and I have shared fellowship, or
worship, or both, with about 50 of the congregations of the Diocese or their
representatives since I started on August 1st. I can assure you, wonderful things are going
on in the Diocese of New Jersey. The
living presence of Jesus Christ, the transfiguring light of Christ, is present,
vibrant and vital throughout the Diocese of New Jersey from Sandy Relief
efforts being led up by our own Disaster Recovery Coordinator Keith Adams, to
feeding ministries at St. Paul’s, Camden and so many other churches in our
downtowns and rural communities, to the rich and various ways God’s praises and
love are celebrated in the parishes and missions of this diocese every day and every
week….
Master,
it is good for us to be here!
I want to take a moment to acknowledge
the 11th Bishop of New Jersey, The
Right Reverend George Edward Councell.
It was a great blessing and privilege to work with him in those first
three months of the transition. Bishop Councell’s grace-filled ministry of care
and healing was a tremendous gift of God to us all. For his faithfulness, love of the Lord Jesus
Christ and his ministry among you I am deeply thankful, as I believe we all
are.
I am also deeply thankful for the staff
that Bishop Councell put in place at Diocesan House. They are superior in every
way. This was evident to me during the
Walk-Abouts. They have only confirmed
my feelings since I started working with them.
To a person, they are each a treasure.
We all understand that our primary reason for being is to serve and
strengthen you to engage in God’s mission in the communities of this
Diocese.
I would like to take this opportunity to
remember and give thanks for the life and ministry of Canon Cynthia McFarland
who died two weeks ago after a grueling battle with non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. Cynthia’s contributions to the Diocese of
New Jersey and to the wider Church cannot be numbered. Her death is a great loss. She leaves a lasting legacy with the work
she has done as Historiographer and Archivist.
May she rest in peace and rise in
glory.
Fr. Richard Wrede has offered to step
into the breach, for which I am thankful.
I am appointing him Acting Historiographer and Archivist so that the progress
and work Cynthia has done will not be lost.
I am also most thankful for the Lay
Leaders who volunteer in critical capacities in the Diocese: Paul Ambos has served as the
Acting-Chancellor since the untimely death of John Wood Goldsack. Paul’s love of the Lord and of his Church and
his knowledge and expertise of canon law are great gifts to me and to us and
so, with this Convention, I am appointing Paul Ambos Chancellor of the Diocese
of New Jersey. I am thankful for the
work, ministry and dedication of Jim Bathurst who serves as Treasurer, of Steven
Lewis who serves as Church Attorney and of Cheryl Browne, Secretary to
Convention.
With this Convention, Fr. Sunil Chandy
steps down from his service on The Standing Committee. There are particular pressures and
challenges on a President of Standing Committee during an Episcopal Election
and Transition. I want to acknowledge
his commitment and conscientiousness in fulfilling this important responsibility. Thank you, Fr. Chandy.
There are so many gifted and talented
people serving in this diocese, all of
you in this room. We are so blessed, how can we not join with Peter and say, Master, it is good for us to be here?
And yet, if we are honest, we must
confess that there are things about us, aspects about our being here that merit
some questions and some concern. I think it is important that we gather, share
time together, enjoy fellowship and do some of the necessary work of organizing
ourselves as a body, but it is also true that in too many ways, the mechanisms and organisms of structure become
the be-all and end-all of what we do. There
is too much bureaucracy, too much top-heavy structure, cumbersome canons and
customs that can, and often do, become obstacles to mission, God’s
mission. This very corporate way of operating can be, and
often is, a hindrance.
We need to continue to examine,
reimagine and simplify the structures of the Diocese of New Jersey, as the
larger Episcopal Church is seeking to examine, reimagine and simplify its own
structures. I understand this work had
been undertaken in the diocese a few years ago, I am going to support it being
restarted and continuing.
The primary locus of mission and
ministry is not Diocesan Convention, nor Council, nor Diocesan House and staff….It
is not even the parishes and missions of the Diocese. The primary locus of mission and ministry are
the communities we are called to serve; the
towns and cities where we are called to discover God’s presence and God’s
challenges and to respond .
Peter,
James and John may have wanted to stay up on Transfiguration Mount and hold a
Convention, but that’s not what that experience was about. They were blessed to experience a theophany,
a manifestation of God, but it was not a theophany for the sake of the
experience itself; there was a purpose for the event.
It’s worth noting that narratives of the
Transfiguration always begin with a reference to events some days before: “Now
about eight days after these sayings,
Jesus took with him Peter, James and John and went up on the mountain to
pray…” (Luke 9:28). Eight days after
what sayings?!
The printed lectionary many churches
use, unhelpfully tries to establish the context with an editorial insertion… “Eight
days after Peter declared Jesus to be the Messiah…” This is misleading. It encourages us to focus on what Peter says
rather than what Jesus says….
In Luke’s Gospel, eight days before,
Jesus had been praying, as he does frequently, especially in Luke’s portrayal
(Luke 9:18). In the course of his prayer he was, apparently, troubled. . He was
alone with his disciples. He turns to
them and asks, “Who do the crowds say
that I am?” (Luke 9:18). This question should intrigue us…How many people
today are asking who Jesus is? What a
wide variety of answers there are in the popular culture… “They answered, John the Baptist, but others say Elijah; and still
others that one of the ancient prophets has arisen” (Luke 9:19).
But
who do you say that I am? (Luke 9:20). To me this is among the most important
questions in all of Scripture. Every
generation must answer this question….Each person in every generation must
answer this question for him or herself….Who
do you say that I am? Peter answered
“The Messiah of God.” (Luke 9:20).
[Jesus]
sternly ordered and commanded them not to tell anyone, saying “The Son of Man
must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and
scribes and be killed, and on the third
day be raised” (Luke
9:21].
With this response, Jesus is defining what being Messiah means to
him. It is a shocking statement and identification of Messiah as the Suffering
Servant; so shocking that in Matthew and Mark, Peter is repelled by it and
rebukes Jesus (See Mt 16;22, Mk 8:32).
Yes, Peter got the identification of
Jesus as Messiah right, but his understanding of what that means was not in
accord with Jesus’ own understanding, at least as Mark and Matthew portray the
scene. Characteristically, Luke shields the reputation of the apostles and does
not portray that exchange nor Jesus’ resulting rebuke of Peter, “Get behind me
Satan….” (Mt. 16:23, Mk 8:33).
Jesus predicts his passion for the first
time and then says to his Apostles…. “If any want to become my followers, let them
deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those who want
to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will
save it (Luke 9:23-24).
It is eight days after this in Luke,
eight days after these sayings, that Jesus took with him Peter and John and
James and went up on the mountain to pray, Transfiguration Mountain (Luke
9:28). It is eight days after these sayings that Jesus is transfigured before
them; eight days later when the voice speaks from the cloud, speaks in the
midst of the theophany and says to those three apostles, “This is my Son, my Chosen, listen to him!” (Luke 9:35). Exclamation point!
Listen
to him when he tells you he must undergo great suffering and be rejected ….Listen
to him when he tells you that he will be killed and on the third day rise
again…Listen to him when he says to you, “If any want to become my followers,
let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For those
who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my
sake will save it. Listen to him!”
The Transfiguration is, without
question, a hint and harbinger of Easter but, it also serves an interpretive function within the gospels. It affirms Jesus’
own understanding of what it is to be the Messiah, the Christ, and also what it
is to be his disciples: The Son of Man must suffer…., If any want to
become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross daily and
follow me. For those who want to
save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will
save it….It is about Jesus’ mission….It is about God’s kingdom…..It is about
who we as disciples are to be in joining up with God in that mission….It’s about
our cross-bearing and bringing the light of Christ and going up to the Jerusalems
of the world and confronting the dark places and places of abusive power and
shedding the light and love of Christ.
Master,
it is good that we are here! Yes, yes it
is, but we can’t stay here. We have to
go up to Jerusalem. We have some
cross-bearing to do. We have to lose our
lives so that we can gain them. Wonderful, grace-filled things are going on in the Diocese of New Jersey; I’ve already
mentioned some of them. There are also enormous
challenges in front of us….Challenges that result from the diminished place of
the Church in our society and culture, or shifts in population away from urban
areas and blight; challenges that result
from our own short-comings and too often our failure to adapt to changing circumstances and
to the beckoning call of God to go forth from the relative safety of our sanctuaries
into the world to engage in deep ways the communities where our parishes and
missions are located.
We know from the study before the Election of
a Bishop and from the Profile that many parishes and communties are struggling.
(See http://www.bishopsearchnj.org/profile/)
The economy has been difficult. It is clear that we need to be adaptive in the
face of these challenges…Many congregations need to reconsider how they
approach God’s mission and ministry. Most
of us recognize that we have too many buildings that are being
underutilized….We have too many buildings, period.
In far too many instances these
buildings are in a poor state of repair. Small handfuls of people are doing
everything they can to keep the doors open. I’m challenged by this. I hope you
are too. Is that what we’re supposed to
be doing? Is the mission of the Church
to keep buildings open? To pour enormous
amounts of money into structures that are decaying, falling apart, and serving
a dozen or even two dozen people? Is this
what Christ came to earth and died for? Our
buildings are to serve God’s mission, God’s mission is not to serve the
buildings. In too many instances we have got this backwards.
I
love many of our buildings….Many are beautiful works of art that were built to
praise and glorify God. Precious
passages and milestones of life have taken place in them; they are repositories
of history and faith. Many continue to
serve the purpose for which they were constructed: They are centers of gathering, worship and
service, of observing life’s passages; places supporting God’s mission in the
world and in the communities in which the buildings are situated.
But some of our buildings are barely serving
the purposes for which they were constructed; they have become albatrosses
hanging around the necks of remnant congregations. These buildings are draining resources that
could be converted and used for dynamic mission and ministry that serves God’s
purposes. We need to be intentional in
assessing in each instance the purpose or purposes our church buildings are
serving.
We have congregations that should give
very serious consideration to merging with other congregations. Not only would this result in more efficient
use of space and finances, it would help create a better critical mass of
people to engage in mission and ministry .
I have enjoyed being in conversation
with the leadership of St. Francis, Dunellen and with the leadership of St.
Elizabeth’s, Elizabeth, both of which overcame the fears and anxieties of
merger and discovered in the process that it brought about resurrection – new
understanding of purpose, new understanding of priorities, enriched community
and enriched commitment to ministry beyond their buildings.
In a while we will see a short video
that tells their stories along with that of St. Andrew’s Bridgeton and Trinity,
Vineland. When it comes to the kind of
faith, courage, creativity and initiative demonstrated through stories like
these in re-imagining ourselves as church, diocesan leadership is committed to
offering strong financial and administrative support. We can no longer, however, justify supporting
failing buildings and missions.
While the finance and budget proposals
that will be placed before you today remain fairly conservative, and in total
dollars the operating budget remains basically flat when compared to the budget
a year ago, the proposals do contain three important initiatives that I pray
you will support:
The first initiative calls for an
allocation of $44,234 from the Disposition of Church Assets Fund to the
operating budget to support the creation of a staff position - Canon for Congregational Development and
Mission. This person will have
responsibility for coordinating our diocesan efforts to assist congregations in
developing and implementing plans for renewed mission and ministry, investigating
new opportunities, developing regional collaborations and working with our
Congregational Development Committee to expand our capacity in all of these
areas. I imagine a process developing
whereby teams from parishes and missions will come together to share ideas and
best practices and to encourage one another in carrying out the Lord’s
work.
The second initiative calls for an
allocation of $45,500 from the Disposition of Church Assets Fund to support the
establishment of a Regional Hispanic Missioner in the Monmouth/Ocean County
areas of Red Bank, Toms River, Point Pleasant Beach and Lakewood. This is a cooperative partnership in terms of
both human and financial resources between the Diocese and three parishes. It serves as the foundation for a visionary
plan to go up to four of our Jerusalems and use the Good News of Jesus Christ
to break down barriers that currently
keep cultures separated, unifying them as one community of faith.
The third initiative is to create a
process whereby parishes, missions and others in the diocese can apply to use
the DCA Fund to support new ideas for
mission and ministry. This is a good
beginning towards streamlining some of the cumbersome structures that have kept
resources trapped on the mountain, releasing and re-tasking them to do God’s
work in the world around us. All three
of these proposals are very much in the spirit of previous recommendations to
Convention for the use of these funds, and especially in strengthening Hispanic
Ministry which is, as you know, a major area of growth in the diocese and in
the wider church.
In order for us to be more effective and
unified in carrying out mission and ministry, I am enhancing the place of the
Convocations and strengthening the role and authority of the Deans in the
Convocations. I will work more closely
with them, and am asking them to work more closely with the Congregations in
their Convocations, and especially where congregations are struggling.
During Convocations in the fall, I heard,
loudly and clearly, a greater desire from the people of the Diocese to
decentralize from Trenton and to be more regional in our offerings of
resources. Staff and I are committed to
doing this. This past month, Phyllis,
Cecilia and Jonathan went out to different parts of the Diocese to lead Vestry
and Treasurer workshops. We will do
this more often.
Nonetheless, Trenton and our Cathedral
is still a center of our diocesan life.
Cost and time limits often make it the best choice for some events. This is true of our March Parish Leadership
Day when Hugh O’Doherty of Cambridge Leadership Associates and the Kennedy
School for Government at Harvard University will be with us to share the basics
of Adaptive Leadership.[2] This is a follow-up to the outstanding work
he did with the clergy at Clergy Conference this past November.
Among my objectives for the Diocese of
New Jersey is a renewed commitment to Christian formation. This is an adaptive problem. The traditional
Sunday School model has become less effective.
Individuals and families are devoting less and less time to Church and
to Christian formation. It’s a complex
problem that requires real creativity. A Church-based, school-instruction model
will not be the primary model of delivery.
We have to find ways to get into people’s homes.
We have to recognize that formation is
beyond what happens in a class, and embrace an understanding that everything we
do, every occasion for which we gather, including in this home, perhaps most
especially in the home, has the potential of being a formative event. We also need to get up to speed with the
technological delivery of Christian education – through videos and webinars for
example. The Diocese can and will be a
resource in developing the thinking and strategies around these concerns. I
will be reforming and re-commissioning the Committee on Lifelong Christian
Formation to accomplish this.
We are blessed in this diocese to have
vibrant College Chaplaincies – at Rutgers, Princeton and at The College of New
Jersey and at Rowan, and to have the Procter Foundation which supports much of
this. I am thankful for the ministries
of Greg Bezilla, Peter French, Lisa Caton and Deacon John Hanson and am
committed to supporting them and the growth of our engagement with the colleges
and universities in the diocese. I am
also committed to being a presence on those campuses in whatever way I can be.
I am thrilled that many of our
Postulants and Candidates for Holy Orders are here. It’s an exciting time to be called into
ordained ministry. You [who are feeling
called to ordained ministry] all are coming to realize that the old models of
traditional ministry are no longer as secure as they once were….This is
especially true for those of you moving toward priesthood. Today’s newly ordained are going to have to be
much more creative, more entrepreneurial than clergy in days past. There are very few entry level positions –
curates and associates positions - where
we can train people. There are
increasingly fewer full-time clergy positions overall. In part, some of this goes back to our
having too many buildings with too few people.
But there are also larger global issues that are contributing to this,
such as the cost of maintaining full-time clergy. Again this is an adaptive problem and it will
require experimentation and flexibility from everyone.
I am, however, committed to trying to work
with parishes to create some curates’ and associates positions where they would
be valuable. This is something I will be
working on in the next year. I am
equally committed to trying to retain the newly ordained of the diocese in the
diocese. Recently, we have been sending
people to seminary, supporting them through the process, and then releasing
them to other dioceses because we don’t have positions to offer them. We’re losing vital, young talent by doing
this. I want us to work on ways to keep
them here.
The Diocese of New Jersey is blessed
with a strong diaconate and a strong Deacons School, ably administered by Canon
Linda Moeller and her faculty and assistants.
This strong diaconate was a very real part of the attraction of New
Jersey to me. Three Archdeacons have
overseen the work of the diaconate and will be stepping down at the conclusion
of this Convention. They are: Archdeacon Victoria Cuff who oversaw the
formation and ordination process along with Canon Moeller; Archdeacon Keith
McCoy who oversaw Deployment; and Archdeacon John Hansen who oversaw Pastoral
Care. They have been dedicated and
faithful servants of this ministry and have done extraordinary work. Thanks you
all. Few dioceses have as strong a
diaconate.
I will be working to build on their
efforts and with the Convention am appointing four Archdeacons: Deacon Lynn Johnson will continue to serve as
Co-Chair of the Committee on the Diaconate and will also assume
responsibilities for Ordination Process and Formation. Deacon Carmen Viola will assume responsibilities
for Deployment. Deacon Denise Cavaliere will assume responsibilities for
Pastoral Care. Deacon Pete Cornell will
assume responsibilities as Co-Chair of the Committee on the Diaconate and will
also have oversight of the Deacons’ Council.
Throughout the election process and since
my call to New Jersey, I have underscored the centrality of the Baptismal
Covenant as the basic ground from which our ministries flow, both corporately
and individually.[3]
The promises we make at baptism, that we renew each time a baptism takes place,
provide the framework for us as we join in God’s mission in the world. They are
concrete promises that make real demands of us and are the very heart of our
existence and reason for being.
I was impressed that last year at
Convention you endorsed a Covenant of Abundant Life.[4]That
Covenant was the culmination of the work of the Vitality Task Force led by
Canon John Sosnowski and the viability and vitality characteristics built
around the Baptismal Covenant. We will
be reminded about the Covenant you endorsed later today as it will form the
backdrop of our work together in the year ahead.
Throughout the Anglican Communion we have
committed ourselves to 5 Marks of Mission[5]:
·
To
proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom
·
To
teach, baptize and nurture new believers
·
To
respond to human need by loving service
·
To
seek to transform unjust structures of society, to challenge violence of every
kind and to pursue peace and reconciliation
·
To
strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of
the earth
We are living into these marks of
mission on many fronts.
Our Anti-Racism Committee led by
Co-Chairs Reverends Joan Fleming and John Thompson-Quartey do an outstanding
job in helping us confront the unjust
structures of racism that continue to exist and to work toward more complete
racial reconciliation. All leaders of
the Diocese – lay and clergy – are mandated to attend anti-racism
training. It is important that we do
this. It is about wellness. I will be attending the three-day training in
April and hope I see many of you there.
Concerned, as I am, about continuing
threats to rights and safety of the LGBT community in our nation and in in the
world, I will be forming an LGBT Commission after Convention to raise our
consciousness about the persecution of this community, exemplified in the
attempts to effect a discriminatory law that failed in Arizona and which were appallingly
successful in Uganda. I know we are not
all of one mind on issues of human sexuality, but persecution is persecution. It violates the demands of our Baptismal
Covenant. I believe we have a holy obligation
to speak out about it, as we do to speak out wherever persecution and the
threat of violence exist.
I am deeply troubled by the level of
violence in our nation, and especially the level of gun violence, particularly
in our urban areas. Trenton experienced
a record number of homicides this past year.
Camden continues to rank high on the nation’s list of violent
cities. I am part of a coalition of
Bishops Against Gun Violence that is being proactive about this issue.
Poverty and the increasing gap between
the wealthy and poor in our nation, budgets that increasingly target the poor
all demand our attention and the most vulnerable demand our advocacy. I am grateful
to our MDG Committee under the leadership of Lisa Caton who have kept the
issues of poverty and the poor in front of us this year. Great work!
I am excited to inform you that Fr. Skip
Vilas has agreed to Chair the Environmental Commission. I met with him and with Fletcher Harper,
Executive Director of the interfaith organization Green Faith.[6] We discussed ways that the diocese can
partner with Green Faith through the work of the Commission. We are going to start by working on an energy
audit program that can help congregations be more efficient in their use of
energy and also realize significant savings on energy costs…..Being Green makes
sense in every way.
The
Baptismal Covenant, our Covenant of Abundant Life, the Anglican 5 Marks of Mission - these are
our priorities, they provide us with clear direction and purpose as we engage
with God and with the communities and contexts in which God has set us, and to
which God sends us.
It is a wondrous, exhilarating,
frightening, joyous, awesome time to be the Church. We can no longer rely on a dominant
Christendom model of Christianity where our place in society is assured and easy. Our times are more like those of the Apostles
and the early Church. The context around
us is often indifferent, sometimes hostile.
Yet there is a yearning….There is a yearning for the holy….There is a yearning
for the kingdom of God, even if so many don’t realize what the kingdom is.
Master,
it is good that we are here…..
Yes….But we can’t stay here….The Lord
has work for us to do….
How grateful I am to be your bishop, to
be called to take up the cross with you and to go forth at this time in this historical
diocese. May God grant us grace, strength, courage and faith to bring Christ’s
light, Christ’s transfigured, transforming, light into every corner and crevice
of New Jersey and beyond. Let’s get to
work. Right Onward!
[1] For
biographical information about Dwight
Zscheile see http://www.luthersem.edu/faculty/fac_bio.aspx?contact_id=dzscheile001
[2] For information about Adaptive Leadership see
Heifetz, Ronald et. Al The Practice of Adaptive
Leadership: Tools and Tactics for
Changing Your Organization and the World (Boston: Harvard Business Press, 2009).
[3] See Book of Common Prayer, 1979 – pp. 304 –
305.
[4] See Vitality Task Force – Report to the 229th
Convention of the Diocese of New Jersey – Document 22 at http://www.newjersey.anglican.org/DiocesanConvention/2013/Reports/Doc%2022%20Vitality%20Task%20Force.pdf
