Bishop's Column
Posted Sunday, February 04, 2007
Looking Ahead in 2007
The Work of Diocesan Council in the Diocese of Pennsylvania in 2007
An Address to the Diocesan Council on February 1, 2007
It is my privilege to address this body whose members did such extraordinary work guiding our diocese through the session of the 223rd Diocesan Convention last November 11 and January 6. Welcome to those of you for whom this is your first meeting as deanery representatives! In the nine months now leading up to the 224th Diocesan Convention next November 3, our goals, as I see them, are the following:
Mission Development
As we continue to move from being a diocese of many small, often geographically-proximate churches to one with fewer, but larger, churches, our goal will be to see an overall aggregate growth in the number of individuals who find an abundant, transformed life in Jesus Christ. The measure of our faithfulness will be evidenced in the number, not of the churches we maintain, but of the Christian disciples we make. Discipleship is established through our relationship with Jesus Christ. Our relationship with Jesus Christ is established through our relationships of trust with one another. Where those relationships are broken, our central focus this year will be on mending our relationships.
We will continue to pursue conversations with clergy and people in six different areas of the diocese to create strong parishes where right now we have several geographically-contingent weak ones. Our planning will be informed by the urban mission strategy whose development is the responsibility, as charged by resolution of the 223rd Convention, of the Black Clergy Association. We will bear in mind that vehicles other than parishes – the Cathedral, Camp Wapiti, our campus ministries, Episcopal Community Services, Seamen’s Church Institute, Episcopal Academy, The School at Church Farm, etc. – can also be the places where individuals find Christ and, hence, are worthy of our support.
During the rich conversations among the seventeen clergy attending the third annual Black Aspirants Recruitment Consultation (BARC) at Wapiti on January 9-10, 2007, I was struck by new insights into the nature of our mission as a diocese – so new, in fact, that I need sniglets to define them. According to Rich Hall, a sniglet is a “word that should be in the dictionary, but isn’t.” Using words based on New Testament Greek roots, I have coined the following sniglets to describe four principles for our mission:
First, our mission must be strateg-ic – from the New Testament Greek word strata, meaning “hill” (as in “stratosphere” or “stratify”). Leaders at every strata of our diocesan structure must take much more time to get away from the fray “in the valley” and “climb the hill” in order to get an overall, general view of everything that is happening around us. We need more generals (the Greek word is strategos) who from the hilltop observe and direct the battle rather than getting lost in the fray. As Bishop and Diocesan Council, let’s endeavor this year to be truly strateg-ic.
Second, our mission must be paroch-ic – from the New Testament Greek word meaning “around” (par) the “house” (oikia). The connotation of this sniglet is the opposite of what we usually mean by “parochial,” e.g. “narrow,” “bounded,” or “myopic.” It is also the opposite of “congregational” – from the Latin con, meaning “together,” and grex, meaning “sheep.” If “birds of a feather flock together,” sheep follow a similar pattern. When a church becomes “congregational,” it becomes demographically-homogeneous; the more demographically-homogeneous it becomes, the less adaptable it is likely to be when the demography around it changes. We consequently end up with an Anglo church in an Hispanic barrio, a church with an aging population in a neighborhood of young couples with children, etc. Our goal should be to see that each church is paroch-ic – its membership reflecting demographically that of the area around it. As Bishop and Diocesan Council, let’s endeavor this year to stop talking about “congregational development” and focus instead on “mission development” that is truly paroch-ic.
Third, our mission must be kairo-ic – from the New Testament Greek word kairos, meaning “moment of opportunity.” Leaders standing strategically on a hill to observe the paroch-ic scene below must be nimble at adapting to the quick-changing demographic and environmental realities before their eyes. Most of the ten churches that have closed in the last four years could have seen transformation and revitalization had they adapted sooner to the changes around them. Like the prehistoric dinosaurs, because they did not change when the climate did, they died. As Bishop and Diocesan Council, let’s work this year to be as quick as possible in keeping our mission development contemporary with the changes that are occurring around us.
Fourth, our mission must be diacon-ic – from the New Testament Greek word diaconos, meaning “servant.” If we exist solely for our own ecclesiastical self-aggrandizement, we will fail to be what we are called to be – a church that really serves the people, up-builds our communities, safeguards the environment, and effects genuine peace. The real measure of our faithfulness will be the extent to which the world around us is a safe and healthy place. As Bishop and Diocesan Council, let’s work this year to be as quick as possible in directing our mission toward real human needs such as are set forth, for example, in the eight Millennium Development Goals to: (1) eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, (2) achieve universal primary education, (3) promote gender equality and empower women, (4) reduce child mortality, (5) improve maternal health, (6) combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases, (7) ensure environmental sustainability, and (8) develop a global partnership for development
Mission development of this sort requires clergy leadership that is wise, visionary, courageous, and persevering. For three years now a major concern has been our ability to raise minority candidates for ordination. Fortunately, this year we will see the work of BARC bear fruit. This month, three Black males, one Black female, and one White female are attending the annual pre-postulancy conference. I expect to ordain a Black female and a Hispanic female next June 9 as part of the largest and youngest class of ordinands in many years – nine in all.
Critical to this work is the Crossroads Anti-Racism Training our Anti-Racism Commission launched last December. I hope that each of you who are invited will make every effort to participate in the Crossroads Training on February 22-24 or May 3-5. The Crossroads process begins with the top leadership in a diocese and can go forward only after you are trained. I have asked the entire senior staff of the diocese, at the Cathedral, and at Wapiti to attend the February session. Six members of the Management Team of Episcopal Academy will attend, too, and I have invited the Head of the School at Church Farm, too. Various Deans, Wapiti Board and Diocesan Council and Cathedral Chapter members, and Church Foundation Trustees are being invited. We are on our way to taking seriously the challenge of becoming an anti-racist diocese.
Finally, as we anticipate our mission development efforts this year we realize that we must act in concert with the larger Episcopal Church in defending our right as a diocese and protecting for the use of the Episcopal Church parish churches whose vestries are in violation of the canons – All Saints’, Wynnewood, and Good Shepherd, Rosemont. In the face of a church-wide situation wherein some congregations have left the Episcopal Church and left property behind in accordance with the canons, in others, the property has been sold to departing congregations with varying formulas, in still others, the departing congregations has been allowed to continue to use property, and in still others the departing congregation has asserted its continuing rights to property, the Presiding Bishop said at a meeting I attended last Saturday that she opposes any settlements that would contribute to the establishment of a church governed by a foreign authority within the bounds of the Episcopal Diocese.
This position by the Presiding Bishop has been influenced by recent developments in the Diocese of Virginia where churches have recently voted to leave the Diocese and The Episcopal Church, causing Bishop Lee to assert that “the church buildings of the Diocese of Virginia were given by generations past to be Episcopal Churches for generations to come and we are committed to protecting that legacy.” I agree with Bishop Lee, and, as reluctant as I am do to so, I am asking the Standing Committee to fulfill this year our mutual, canonical responsibility to protect the properties of the two parishes named.
Campus/Young Adult Ministry
The return to and restoration of diocesan supported campus ministries three years ago, after an absence of almost two decades, is a mission initiative that is bearing fruit. Two generations of young adults, especially those on some of our local campuses, had
been bypassed in the missionary priorities and planning of the Diocese. Modestly this is now being rectified.
The centerpiece is the fulltime Lutheran Episcopal Campus Ministry (LECM) at Temple University staffed by the Rev. Gregory Wilson, a diocesan priest whose gifts
for this ministry are aptly suited for this major urban university complex. The ELCA’s Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod is a joint partner in this endeavor and officially endorses Greg Wilson as their chaplain at Temple. The Synod also provides funds for the LECM program budget. The LECM Board is composed of twelve members, six Episcopalians and six Lutherans, and is presided over by our own Penny Cutler.
The recent reduction by the Diocese in program funds for the Temple ministry is regarded as a fundraising challenge by the LECM Board. Through its efforts it intends to raise the $15,000 to $20,000 needed to carry the ministry’s program goals and needs as originally funded by the Diocese until this year. It has already made a solid start in accomplishing this.
The other diocesan campus ministry program currently funded in the 2007 budget are Peer Ministers on four other campuses: University of Pennsylvania, Swarthmore College, Bryn Mawr College and Haverford College. These undergraduate students are recruited and supervised by the clergy in the local parishes which sponsor and support them: the Rev. James Littrell, St. Mary’s Church, Hamilton Village at Penn; the Rev. Joyce Tompkins, fulltime Religious Advisor at Swarthmore College via Trinity Church, Swarthmore; and the Rev. Barbara Abbott, Church of the Redeemer, Bryn Mawr for the Peer Ministers at Bryn Mawr and Haverford Colleges. The work of these student ministers entails program, administrative, liturgical and some pastoral responsibilities on their respective campuses.
In short, the Episcopal Church through the Diocese of Pennsylvania is once again directly present and active in five major academic institutions in the greater Philadelphia area. It’s a good new beginning.
Bishop Edward Lee is the part-time coordinator of these ministries for the Diocese and renders oversight of them my behalf.
Cathedral Campus Development
Last December the owner of 3921 Chestnut Street, the sole remaining piece of real estate we need in order to move ahead on the development of a new building on our cathedral campus that will house diocesan and cathedral offices and meeting space volunteered to participate with us in the development his property. We have until June to reach an agreement on how to move forward. We have hired Cecil Baker Associates to work with us to create a plan for the property’s development that would justify our proceeding with the plan. Estimates for bringing the present Church House at Fourth and Locust up to code and preventing the water infiltration that is a constant problem with it stand at $2.5M. Real estate appraisals from both Coldwell Banker Realtors and Prudential Fox Roach Realtors indicate Church House could be marketed for sale for up to $6M. These facts make evident our need to pursue vigorously the proposed move from Fourth and Locust to the Cathedral Campus. Over the past four years we have spent $288,314.45 in developing our plan for the development of the cathedral property. (The Venturi Scott Brown Pre-Design bill for $113,627 was split between the Diocese and the Cathedral, each paying half, and the Diocese has paid the rest in full). As we go forward in the next six months with the Cathedral Campus Project, we estimate we will pay Cecil Baker $15,000 for Historical Commission work and $70,000 for zoning work – or a total of $85,000. Olin Belsinger, a member of St. David’s, Radnor, generously continues to offer his services pro bono as the consultant overseeing the development project.
Camp Wapiti
On December 4 the Conservation Fund agreed to extend our Option Agreement with them to September 30, 2007 to allow for enough time for us to receive a purchase approval from the state and get through the timely process of the state funding appropriation and settlement. On December 18 our Sketch Concept Development plans for the Wapiti parcel and the Walnut Lane parcel were approved by the Cecil County Planning and Zoning Commission, which preserves the density ratios on those parcels and protects appraisal values from diminishing for a 2 year period. We have already received permission to sub-divide the “North Parcel” (across Turkey Point Road) into 6 lots. We have received 2 appraisals on the Wapiti parcel easement valuing the easement at $4.8M and $4.2M. The previously received purchase offer for the fee simple purchase of the Walnut Lane Parcel stands at $1.8M. We are hoping that the state will provide us with a purchase offer for the easement at $4M or more, which would result in a total of $6M gross for these two transactions with the state. Mark Retz and Bill Bullitt met with Maryland Department of Natural Resources personnel in Annapolis on January 30.
We will not know for sure if DNR has $6 M to pay for the combined purchase of the conservation easement on the Wapiti Farm parcel and the fee simple purchase of the Walnut Lane parcel, until they make us a purchase offer (est. sometime in Feb). CF did mention at a meeting on December 4 that the Program Open Space budget was around $140M; however, we don’t know what projects they have committed to and/or if that is an annual budget, or multiyear, etc.
In other actions, at its January 2 meeting, the WBOD elected William C Pickett III and Verne Blodgett to its membership, agreed to meet bi-monthly, and established an Executive Committee to guide its work between meetings – with Ken Werner as its Vice-Chair, Roberta Torian as Secretary, and Verne Blodgett as Treasurer. WBOD member John Sorensen has organized a Spiritual Guidance Committee constituted by clergy most of whom will serve as camp chaplains next summer – Eric Bond, Meg Buerkel Pamela Cooper-White, Jane Cornman, Alison Harrity, Heather Patton-Graham, Susan Richardson, John Sorensen, and John Williams.
Diocesan Staff
Despite the reductions we have endured, the Diocesan Staff continues to do outstanding work. The Rev. Bud Ruby tendered his resignation as Assistant to the Bishop for Diocesan Properties, effective January 12, due to severe back pains he has suffered for several weeks. During his four-month tenure Bud did extraordinary work securing the closed church properties of St. James-the-Less, East Fall, St. Alban’s, Olney, St. Martin’s, Boothwyn, Emmanuel and the Good Shepherd, Kensington, St. Peter’s, Germantown. He was of great assistance to All Saints’, Crescentville, St. Aidan’s, Cheltenham, St. Philip’s, Gray’s Ferry, and numerous other churches in the care of their properties. He created on our diocesan website a list of Preferred Providers that congregational leaders seeking various services can access. He has carried out real estate appraisals on various church properties, cared for Church House, and was an invaluable source of wisdom and counsel to our staff and various governance bodies. While I will miss him greatly, I applaud his making his own health his priority.
On December 31, the Rev. Rudy Moore ended his exemplary services to the diocese due to cuts in the Program Budget. Stephanie Hesbacher left the staff on December 31 in order to enter graduate school. Arlene Willis has left the staff due to the fact that we had planned to no longer use Raisers’ Edge.
Besides the “goings” there have been some wonderful “comings.” The Rev. Christine Ritter has succeeded Bud and is doing a terrific job overseeing our diocesan properties. We are incredibly blessed that the Rev. Frank Donoghue is volunteering his time to work for us in development.
A Balanced Budget
For the first time in three years we will end the year 2007 in the black without using any UNA’s. We will reconcile our diocesan-wide misunderstandings regarding Unrestricted Net Assets, continue the impressive progress we have made in achieving accuracy, thoroughness, and transparency with regard to our diocesan finances, bring to Convention a proposed Program Budget that includes what we are asked to give to the Episcopal Church, and rebuild trust in our own diocesan house. Moreover, we will find a way to honor in due course our 2006 pledge to the Episcopal Church, on which we owe a balance of $453,353.
And so ….
I anticipate that in the next nine months we in our diocese will see:
Increased discipleship through a deepening of our relationship with Jesus Christ
and our relationships with one another in the Body of Christ
New parishes created out of small, fragile congregations
Completion of a diocesan urban mission strategy
Property claims on All Saints’, Wynnewood, and Good Shepherd, Rosemont
Significant steps toward becoming an anti-racist diocese
Noticeable progress on raising up minority candidates for ordination
Completion of the Wapiti land deal and our first-ever 8-week Camp Wapiti
Acquisition of 3721 Chestnut and great progress on the Cathedral Campus Project
Consolidation of the gains already made in campus/young adult ministry
A balanced budget and the completion of our 2006 and 2007 pledges to TEC