Get to know our new Presiding Bishop

A video introduction made when he was nominated: http://www.generalconvention.org/pbelect/curry

Video of the press conference he held after the election:

Bishop Curry is a powerful preacher. I encourage you to watch some or all of these sermons

From General Convention 2012:

From last year’s gathering of Episcopal Youth (EYE):

He’s published two books recently: Crazy Christians (2013) and Songs my Grandma Sang (2015)

Bishop Michael Curry elected Presiding Bishop

This is wonderful news indeed.

I had the great joy to hear Bishop Curry preach several years ago. He is a spell-binding preacher who communicates with joy and passion his love of Jesus Christ. That he is African-American, elected this week, is spine-tingling and significant. He has the gifts to help us share the Good News of Jesus Christ in our world and to help us confront racism and inequality in our church as well as our society

The full article from Episcopal News Service is here.

General Convention 2015

It’s less than two weeks away. I’ve been surprisingly disengaged from the whole thing, probably because of everything that’s going on in Madison and at Grace but I’m sure I’ll be paying close attention to the proceedings. It’s taking place against the backdrop of fast-paced and disorienting cultural change. It’s quite possible that the Supreme Court will make public its ruling on same sex marriage while General Convention is in session. But over everything looms the reality of enormous change in how Americans relate to religion and to religious institutions. The big news on the religion front this week will be Pope Francis’ Encyclical on the Environment and I wonder whether its publication will have any impact on General Convention. I hope to have more to say about thoese issues in the next couple of days, but for now, I thought that I should at least get some of the most important resources out to readers of this blog (and to folks at Grace) who might otherwise not have access to them.

It will be interesting to see whether the Episcopal Church can begin to reshape itself for the new world in which we live.

General Convention’s Website is here.

Information about the nominees for Presiding Bishop is here.

The Blue Book contains all of the legislation and reports of the various interim bodies

Blogs to follow:

Acts 8 Moment

Scott Gunn

The Diocese of Milwaukee’s deputation has its own website and Facebook page

In addition to electing a new Presiding Bishop, among the most important issues under discussion will have to do with restructuring the church and marriage (including same-sex blessings).