The Sixty-Sixth Synod of the Diocese of Saskatchewan

Saint Alban’s Cathedral, Prince Albert

October 16^th, 2009

The Charge of the Bishop of Saskatchewan

PART I

Thanks be to God

I thank God for you, the clergy and people of the Diocese of Saskatchewan, who have been so extremely generous with your prayers, support and gifts over the past few months.  I cannot tell you how moved I was by the consecration and installation services and by all the efforts and prayers of the people of our Diocese.  This is a great Diocese with a great missionary history and I hope and pray a great missionary future!

I thank God for calling me to work with you in this part of his Church and for our many and great forbears in the faith.  Others have laboured and we have entered into their labours.

I thank God for your leadership and ministry in your Parishes and Congregations as well as in our Regions, Diocese and beyond. 

But above all else I thank God for his love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, for the means of grace and the hope of glory. 

The Lord’s Day

I trust that it has not escaped the notice of the Clergy and Lay Delegates of this Synod that we are not meeting on Sunday.  Many will miss the longer meeting and the greater opportunities for fellowship and we will be rushed as we try to do the necessary business before us and have some brief but important conversations.  I deliberately called this Synod to avoid meeting on Sunday for two reasons.

Parishes and Personnel

In 2008 Bishop Arthurson retired as Suffragan Bishop of the Diocese.  He continues to serve All Saints’, La Ronge, as well as Weyakwin and Hall Lake.  This Diocese was a pioneer in electing and consecrating the first indigenous Bishop in Canada and we are now challenged to discern what the next steps God would have us take in providing for indigenous ministry and mission in our midst.

The Reverend Joanne Beacon has been appointed to serve as Chaplain (P) at the Saskatchewan Penitentiary.  She began that ministry on September 28th and I am delighted that we will be instituting her into that ministry this evening. 

The Reverend Kenneth Davis, of All Saints, Whitby, will be coming to us in the second week of January to serve as the Rector of Saint Alban’s Cathedral and Dean of the Diocese.  He will bring a deep commitment to Christ, a passion for transformed lives and congregations, personal integrity and strong leadership to the Cathedral and Diocese. 

Effective September 1^st, 2009 I reformed several congregations in the Turtleford Deanery as follows,

The Parish of Leask and Shellbrook

                                    All Saints’ Leask

                                    St. Luke’s Mont Nebo

                                    Christ Church Canwood

                                    St. Andrew’s Shellbrook

The Mission of Spiritwood and Timberland

                                    Christ Church Spiritwood

                                    St. Paul’s Timberland

I am currently working on appointments for the following positions,

½ time Priest in Charge of MacDowall – St. Louis

 ½ time Diocesan Youth Minister

Rector of the Parish of Leask – Shellbrook

Rector of the Parish of Tisdale

and considering how to provide ordained ministry and leadership for,

Ahtahkakoop

Spritwood and Leoville

Fort Pitt - Deer Creek

Onion Lake.

In all of our congregations there are admirable lay people providing extraordinary ministry and receiving generous and competent support from the Clergy of the Diocese and I am most grateful for this, especially in these interims and as we make adjustments to our Parishes.

Finances

I want to raise four things that need to be given serious consideration as we consider reasonable and responsible budgeting.

     1. Executive Secretary and Archdeacon

While I am concerned about the administrative burden I am shouldering along with Mary Brown and Terry Loehr and the need for an ‘extra’ priest to assist and fill in around the Diocese is obvious to everyone, I would not want us to hire someone for a position when the funding was not secure nor do I want to prematurely determine the shape of the Diocesan Office Staff.  If Administration is a priority for the next five years, then hiring an Executive Secretary would be an obvious next step.  I think that our God given priority is Mission and we need to think about the hiring and deployment of Clergy and Staff with that priority in mind.  My preference, for the time being, would be to continue covering the work of the Archdeacon/Executive Secretary/Principal of James Settee College by spreading out some of those duties among the Bishop, Bishop’s Secretary, Finance Officer and interim Principal. 

     2. Indigenous Self-Determination

If Mission is a priority of the Diocese which we are going to own and define together, then the desire for and moves towards greater indigenous self-determination within the Diocese will be an important step in changing the attitude in many of our congregations.  We receive $208,000 annually as a Council of the North Diocese.  The purpose of that money is to provide pastoral and sacramental ministry to communities in the North.  Since the retirement of our Suffragan Bishop the Diocese has spent a significantly smaller portion of its budget on ministry which is specifically undertaken by and for our indigenous members.  As different parts of the Council of the North discern the way forward with greater self-determination for their indigenous members, many Dioceses will be dedicating a large portion of their General Synod Grant to indigenous ministry.  A first step for this Diocese and Executive Committee would be to gather all those line items which have to do with indigenous ministry specifically and hand over the decisions about those monies to the Indian Council. 

     3. Financial Development

There are three areas where we need to do some work as a Diocese in developing greater resources for the Mission of the Church. 1.  While some efforts and strides have been made in Stewardship education, so many of us who claim to have had a conversion of heart have not yet had a conversion of our pocketbook.  There is still much to be done in Stewardship training and in inviting a Commitment to giving, especially in our indigenous congregations. 2. We may want to reconsider an annual Bishop’s appeal.  This was tried before with moderate success and while I am hesitant to do anything which would reduce people’s regular Sunday giving to their home Parish, the overwhelmingly generous response to the request for gifts for my vestments makes me think that a Bishop’s Appeal for a particular Diocesan project or ministry might be similarly supported. 3. I have had an initial discussion with the Bishops of Qu’Appelle and Saskatoon about the possibility of cooperating in promoting Planned Giving in our Dioceses.  We have done nothing in recent years to invite the people of the Diocese to make a planned gift for the mission and ministry of the Church and we are missing some great opportunities for building up a solid endowment for the future. 

     4. Strategic Planning

I have identified Mission and Indigenous Self-Determination as two priorities for the future of the Diocese.  These are of course part of our great history from the very beginning.  While there is much in our past that we may regret, from the very beginning this Diocese has been about spreading the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ and about raising up Cree leaders, lay and ordained, to preach that Gospel to their own people in their own language. 

I want to discern God’s vision for us with all of you and then shape our budget, our staff, our committees and our plans around that.  In the next year we will need to work hard and together to discern what God would have us do as a Diocesan family and to build a commitment of time and talents and treasure to the specifics of that mission. 

Speaking the truth in love

In 2003 the Diocese of New Westminster adopted and approved, for limited use, a rite of blessing of people in committed same sex unions.  Since our last regular meeting of Synod the Diocese of Niagara has also approved the blessing of same sex unions.  They have adopted the use of what is called the Niagara Rite of Blessing of Civil Marriage.   For many this amounts to the public acknowledgment of same sex marriage in a Church service.  The General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada meets in June of 2010 in Halifax and it is not yet clear what motions, if any, may be brought before that Synod. 

The last General Synod may have been correct in resolving that the question of the blessing of same sex unions is not a matter of core doctrine but we need to be honest enough to admit that our present differences on matters of sexual morality reflect a profound difference in our approach to the Word of God written in the Scriptures.  That difference, in regard to the Word of God written (the Bible), has its roots in a different regard for the Word of God incarnate (Jesus).  What really can and must divide us is whether we recognize the full and unique divinity of Jesus of Nazareth and the necessity and meaning of salvation in him alone. 

In February of this year the Primates of our Anglican Communion issued a communiqué entitled, Deeper Communion; Gracious Restraint in which they called for a commitment to the three moratoria from the Windsor Report which had been reaffirmed by the Bishops gathered at the 2008 Lambeth Conference.   Those three moratoria are the only way forward together for us in the Anglican Communion and the House of Bishops of our Province of Rupert’s Land have committed themselves to honour these individually and collectively.  The three moratoria are about refraining from the

• Consecration of Bishops living in a same gender union
• Permission for Rites of Blessing for Same Sex unions
• Interventions in Provinces.

In this context the traditional Christian teaching on human sexuality needs to be clearly and unambiguously restated.  There is a common humanity, ‘man’, created by God in body and soul which exists in the complimentary distinctions of male and female.  The purpose of this distinction, as we read in Genesis and find restated in our Prayer Book, is the procreation of children and the mutual society, help and comfort that the one ought to have of the other in both prosperity and adversity.  In marriage, the voluntary and lifelong union of one man and one woman, these two become one flesh.  All other sexual activity, outside of that exclusive relationship, falls short of the mark and biblical standard.  Within that union there is a call to sexual purity, to a very high standard, to self-denial, to the honouring and preferring of the other.  “Let marriage be held in honour among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled; for God will judge the immoral and adulterous.” (Hebrews 13.4)  Marriage is a sign of the union between Christ and the Church in exclusive, selfless commitment.

When we remember the standard that Jesus himself sets, equating a lustful glance with adultery, we may well rightly conclude that in matters of sexual immorality “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”  In this, as in all moral questions, the standard is simple, “Be ye therefore perfect.”  To everyone then we proclaim the good news in the name of Jesus who died and rose again, “thy sins be forgiven thee”, “neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.”  We need to beware of singling out only one small part of our contemporary sexual confusions.  Our wholesale adoption of our society’s and culture’s views and mores on divorce, abortion, birth control and pre-marital sex also need to be challenged by the light and truth of the Scriptures.  We should also be very thankful for the greater acceptance and tolerance in our place and time of people who have long suffered the pain and violence of prejudice, bigotry and ‘scapegoating’. 

      So as we struggle together with these issues and questions let me put two warnings before us. 

Bishop Ridley and Bishop Latimer

We remember today two Bishops of the Reformation who were burned at the stake, Nicholas Ridley and Hugh Latimer.  Ridley served as Bishop of Rochester and later of London.  His biographer reports of the popularity of his preaching, “To his sermons the people resorted, swarming about him like bees, coveting the sweet flowers and wholesome juice of the fruitful doctrine.” (Foxe’s Book of Martyrs) Hugh Latimer served as Bishop of Worcester.  The two were imprisoned and eventually tried and executed together in Oxford.  When the fire was lit underneath Ridley, Latimer called out to him,

"Be of good cheer, Ridley; and play the man. We shall this day, by God's grace, light up such a candle in England, as I trust, will never be put out."

In his correspondence from jail Ridley wrote of how he regretted the undoing of the reformation in Mary’s reign.  In that writing he referred to the wrath of God, made manifest in return for the lukewarmness of the clergy and the people in justly appreciating the blessed light of the Reformation.  This is a day then for us as Reformed Christians to ask whether we appreciate the English Reformation.  That reformed emphasis upon the Scriptures and Saving Faith is still very much alive in our Prayer Book Tradition.  But these same issues, the authority and sufficiency of the Scriptures and obtaining salvation only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by Faith, are before us in our day.  Are we willing to take our stand for the Scriptures and for Justification by Faith?

Influenza

            Flu season is almost upon us and there are many precautions we should all be taking to avoid contracting and transmitting seasonal flu and the H1N1 flu virus.  Many people have expressed concerns about the risk of certain practices within Church.  Hand shaking is a certain way of transmitting infection and every Church should have a bottle or other dispenser of hand sanitizer near the door.  Frequent hand washing is one of the most effective ways of avoiding getting and passing on the flu. 

            In light of specific fears about the flu and the common cup, I am issuing the following guidelines.

-          Hand washing:  Anyone administering Communion (priests, deacons or lay readers) should wash their hands thoroughly before the service and use a hand sanitizer prior to handling the elements.  

-          Receiving in one kind:  Those who are sick with the flu, cold or cold sores should be asked to not receive from the cup.  Receiving in one kind only (the consecrated bread) is neither ideal or normal but it is still full participation in the Holy Communion and is the best practice for those who are sick or who have compromised immune systems. 

-          Intinction (dipping the consecrated bread into the wine):   Intinction, by either the communicant or minister, is to be strongly discouraged.  This is a high risk activity. 

-          In the case of a flu pandemic in our Province, Diocese or Communities, certain steps may have to be taken with the advice of Health Officials.  If the flu season is as serious as many anticipate, I will issue a total and permanent ban on the practice of intinction.  If there are outbreaks of the flu in our area, I will, after consultation with the local priest and Health Officials, direct that Communion be administered in one kind only on a temporary basis.  If there is a full blown emergency in our area, we will need to provide alternatives for public worship which may include the use of the local radio, the internet and mailings.  We will also need to respond to heightened pastoral and liturgical needs in the case of greater sickness and mortality in our communities.  It will be important for the Church to respond to any pandemic first of all in prayer and that we are a responsible member of our communities in providing leadership and in passing on accurate information and proper advice. 

I commend to all of you an article by Dr. David Gould on the safety of the common cup which is available at http://www.anglican.ca/faith/ministry/euc-practice-infection.htm and copies of which are available at this Synod. 

Thanks to You

I want to publicly offer my personal thanks to the Chancellor, the Treasurer, the Finance Officer and my Secretary as well as the Synod Office volunteers and those who have so generously shared their time and talents to help organize this meeting of Synod.  The greatest blessing of serving God as your Bishop is visiting in the Parishes and seeing what God is doing in your hearts and lives and congregations.  I am blessed to work with you and your faithfulness and ministry are a great encouragement to me. 

                                                                                                                                    +Michael