How a resolution moves through General Convention

When our representatives gather at General Convention they take council together through a legislative process. That process begins with resolutions that are proposed by Deputies, Bishops, Committees, Commissions, Provinces, and Diocese of the Episcopal Church. Resolutions, when adopted by the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops, become the Acts of the General Convention and govern the way we live our understanding of the Christian faith as a community of believers.

Resolutions have four sources:

"A" resolutions are submitted by Committees, Commissions, Agencies and Boards

"B" resolutions are submitted by Bishops

"C" Resolutions are submitted by Dioceses or Provinces

"D" Resolutions are submitted by Deputies

The Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies assign each resolution to one of the parallel or joint legislative committees in the House of Bishops and in the House of Deputies. They also designate the resolutions to start in one House or the other. Parallel committees meet jointly to review resolutions and hold hearings, but vote separately on their recommendations. Resolutions with funding implications also go to the Program, Budget & Finance Committee for review.

The committees decide if the resolutions are accepted as is, or are amended or combined with another resolution. The committees then decide to whether to endorse the resolution.

Resolutions then go to the House of Bishops and House of Deputies where they are debated, sometimes amended, and then voted on. Once a resolution is adopted by one House, it then goes to the other for debate, amendment and adoption. Both Houses must concur on a resolution for it to be adopted by General Convention.

#prayersof - Praying with General Convention

At the request of the General Convention Liturgy Team, the Society of Saint John the Evangelist is offering a social media initiative called  #prayersof.

#prayersof invites everyone from around the globe to add prayers in words and images to The Prayers of the People at the Episcopal Church’s 78th General Convention. Each day, a number of submitted prayers will be incorporated into the spoken liturgy of that day’s General Convention worship.

Adding a prayer is incredibly simple. By using the hashtag #prayersof on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, anyone posting a public prayer in words or images will have that prayer included in the prayer website at General Convention - prayersofthepeople.org

#prayersof is based on the seven classic forms of prayers identified in the Book of Common Prayer: thanksgiving, praise, intercession, adoration, oblation, penitence and petition. Themes of life and celebration have been added as there are nine days of General Convention Eucharists.

How you can participate

Go to www.prayersofthepeople.org and sign up. You'll also find instructions there on how to post your prayers on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. One day in advance you will receive an email, a Request for Prayers in words & images. The next day you will receive a beautiful audio morning meditation and evening reflection on the Prayer Theme, read and sung by Brothers of the Society of Saint John the Evangelist and a link to the prayers of the people read at the General Convention Eucharist.

Electing a new Presiding Bishop

At the 78th General Convention, a new Presiding Bishop will be elected. Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, the first woman elected to head a national branch of the worldwide Anglican Communion, is not seeking a second nine-year term in office.

“I believe I can best serve this church by opening the door for other bishops to more freely discern their own vocation to this ministry,” Jefferts Schori, said in a statement, “I will continue to engage us in becoming a more fully diverse church, spreading the gospel among all sorts and conditions of people, and wholeheartedly devoted to God’s vision of a healed and restored creation.”

Previously Bishop of Nevada, Jefferts Shcori is the 26th Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church. Her term as Presiding Bishop ends at the conclusion of General Convention this summer. She was elected at the 75th General Convention on June 18, 2006, and invested at Washington National Cathedral on November 4, 2006.

More than 165 people representing over 60 dioceses submitted names to the Joint Nominating Committee for the Election of the Presiding Bishop (JNCPB) during the nomination period last fall. The JNCPB is composed of a lay member, a priest or deacon, and a bishop elected from each of the nine provinces of the Episcopal Church, plus two youth representatives who were appointed by the President of the House of Deputies, the Rev. Gay Clark Jennings.

Under church law, presiding bishops must be able to complete a full nine-year term before hitting the mandatory retirement age of 72, limiting candidates to those under age 63 at this year’s General Convention. The JNCPB, after a two year discernment process, announced its nominees on May 1, 2015:

The Rt. Rev. Thomas E. Breidenthal, Bishop of the Diocese of Southern Ohio

The Rt. Rev. Michael B. Curry, Bishop of the Diocese of North Carolina

The Rt. Rev. Ian T. Douglas, Bishop of the Diocese of Connecticut h

The Rt. Rev. Dabney T. Smith, Bishop of the Diocese of Southwest Florida

The election process

On Saturday, June 27, members of the House of Bishops with seat, voice, and vote will convene in St. Mark’s Cathedral in Salt Lake City, where the election will occur in the context of prayer and reflection.  Once an election has taken place, current Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori will send a deputation to the House of Deputies for confirmation of the election. 

The Rev. Gay Jennings, President of the House of Deputies, will refer the name to the House of Deputies legislative committee on the Confirmation of the Presiding Bishop without announcing the name to the full House. The legislative committee will make a recommendation to the House of Deputies whether to confirm the election or not confirm, and the House of Deputies will immediately vote on the recommendation. President Jennings will then appoint a delegation from the House of Deputies to notify the House of Bishops of the action taken.

The Presiding Bishop serves for a nine-year term.  The Presiding Bishop is Primate, Chief Pastor of the Church, Chair of the Executive Council, and President of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society.

HOD State of the Church Committee issues statement, offers bulletin insert

The House of Deputies State of the Church Committee (SOTC) has concluded its work for the triennium. The report, submitted as part of the Blue Book, is available here.

The charge of the House of Deputies Committee on the State of the Church, the oldest committee of the Church, is to prepare a report for the House of Deputies that shows an accurate picture of The Episcopal  Church and to approve the form of the Annual Parochial Report. Its mandate states: “CANON I.6.5(b) A Committee of the House of Deputies shall be appointed following the close of each General Convention, to serve ad interim, and to prepare and present to the next meeting of the House of Deputies a report on the State of the Church; which report, when agreed to by the said House, shall be sent to the House of Bishops."

The Committee on the State of the Church has partnered with Forward Movement , working together to offer an overview, or “snapshot,” of the 38- page report.  This summary report is available as a PDF document in two formats — as an 8 1/2 x 11 full sheet here or as a half-sheet suitable for use as a bulletin insert, available at no fee here. Congregations are encouraged to print and distribute this information so that Episcopalians across the church will gain an awareness of the state of our Church.

Equality of Representation

Equality of representation between lay persons and priests was enshrined from the beginning of General Convention, as was the equal representation of states - the words "state" and "diocese" were synonymous in the church's early years.

To protect the rights of states with fewer church members the constitution made provision for votes by states for major issues. This provision was the ancestor of our votes by orders in which each diocese casts one clerical and one lay vote on amendments to the constitution, revisions of the Book of Common Prayer and other weighty matters.

Because the organizing conventions and the first General Convention under its constitution did not include bishops, the House of Deputies is sometimes referred to as the senior house (by date of establishment). To encourage the church in New England to join the General Convention, provision was made in the church's first constitution for a House of Bishops at such time in the future as there would be at least three bishops. After the passage of the constitution, the election of bishops required the consent of both houses of the General Convention, and consecrations could take place only during a meeting of the convention. When this proved unworkable, the convention voted in 1799 to allow diocesan standing committees to vote consent in place of the House of Deputies, except when the election fell within a reasonable time before a meeting of the General Convention.

Even after the formation of the House of Bishops, the House of Clerical and Lay Deputies could override a "no" vote in the House of Bishops by a 4/5's vote. This provision was amended in 1808, allowing the bishops to veto legislation passed by deputies, but only if they did so within three days of passage. (The House of Bishops did not get parity with the House of Deputies until 1901, when the "three days clause" was deleted from a revision of the constitution.) Since then, for legislation to be enacted, it must be passed in identical language by both houses. If either house fails to concur, the resolution does not pass.

Presiding Bishop nominees announced

The nominees for the 27th Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church have been announced. The 27th Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church will be elected on Saturday, June 27 during The Episcopal Church's 78th General Convention which will be held June 25 - July 3 at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City, UT (Diocese of Utah).
 

Nominated for Presiding Bishop are:

The Rt. Rev. Thomas E. Breidenthal, Bishop of the Diocese of Southern Ohio
The Rt. Rev. Michael B. Curry, Bishop of the Diocese of North Carolina
The Rt. Rev. Ian T. Douglas, Bishop of the Diocese of Connecticut
The Rt. Rev. Dabney T. Smith, Bishop of the Diocese of Southwest Florida

The Presiding Bishop serves for a nine-year term.  The Presiding Bishop is Primate, Chief Pastor of the Church, Chair of the Executive Council, and President of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society.

What is General Convention?

The 78th General Convention of the Episcopal Church will meet in Salt Lake City, UT this summer, June 25 to July 3. The General Convention gathers every three years and is a bicameral legislature that includes the House of Deputies, which has more than 800 members (up to four clergy and four lay people from each diocese), and the House of Bishops, which is comprised of more than 300 active and retired bishops.

How does General Convention work?

The General Convention is the primary governing and legislative body of the Episcopal Church. With the exception of the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and the Constitution and Canons, it is the ultimate authority in the Episcopal Church. General Convention comprises two houses: the House of Deputies and the House of Bishops. It meets regularly once every three years; however, the House of Bishops meets regularly in between sessions of General Convention. All bishops, whether active or retired, have seat and vote in the House of Bishops. Each diocese of the Episcopal Church, as well as the Navajoland Area Mission and the Convocation of Episcopal Churches in Europe, are entitled to representation in the House of Deputies by four clergy deputies, and four lay deputies. Resolutions must pass both houses in order to take effect.

The first General Convention - Virginians were there!

Before the American Revolution, there had been no Anglican dioceses or bishops in the colonies, thus when the American congregations were separated from the Church of England, "the chain which held them together [was] broken". In 1782, William White, the father of the Episcopal Church, wrote in his pamphlet The Case of the Episcopal Churches in the United States Considered, "it would seem, that their future continuance can be provided for only by voluntary associations for union and good government". The first General Convention of Episcopal Church was held in Philadelphia in 1785, with clergy and lay representatives from Delaware, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Virginia. The convention authorized the preparation of an American Prayer Book and named itself the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America.