tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post5976109461790293540..comments2024-03-22T15:15:09.943-04:00Comments on Lionel Deimel’s Web Log: Additional Thoughts on the Plan to Select the Next Bishop of PittsburghLionel Deimelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08363018512775944659noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-28766684877795268272010-10-11T16:47:32.586-04:002010-10-11T16:47:32.586-04:00Thanks, David. Our prayers will be the same.
By t...Thanks, David. Our prayers will be the same.<br /><br />By the way, the proposed procedures for electing our next bishop have been tweaked a bit by the Standing Committee. You can read about the revised Resolution 2 in my latest post, “<a href="http://blog.deimel.org/2010/10/pittsburgh-standing-committee-responds.html" rel="nofollow">Pittsburgh Standing Committee Responds to Concerns</a>.”Lionel Deimelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08363018512775944659noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-18423607197271149342010-10-11T16:42:59.866-04:002010-10-11T16:42:59.866-04:00I pray it all goes on without a hitch and the one ...I pray it all goes on without a hitch and the one whom God has intended for you is raised up and made your first elected bishop following the realignment.The Rev Canon Dr David Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09878281384587956210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-56014668045359062582010-10-11T14:56:46.641-04:002010-10-11T14:56:46.641-04:00Thanks, David. I agree that had the Nominating Ct...Thanks, David. I agree that had the Nominating Ctte included Bishop Duncan on the final ballot, things might have been different. Or maybe not. Goodness. He was well liked and respected throughout the diocese and had shown real giftedness in pastoral oversight and administration. We all may have had "favorites" or some kind of hierarchy of preferences for the other three nomineets, but he was the only one large numbers of us knew "in real life." <br /><br />Per "surprises" in the coming election in our Pittsburgh-TEC diocese, I think the critical thing will be a commitment of those in leadership to use what will inevitably be an imperfect process to serve the best interests of the whole Body, with real spiritual integrity. There will always be opportunities to misuse any process to promote personal agendas. <br /><br />What we of the Pgh-TEC diocese have in common is that we are members of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh who chose not to "realign." Beyond that, there are manifold diversities, and the dust from the time of division has not settled yet sufficiently to allow us really to have a clear view of our identity. What that means--as I think you can see in Lionel's piece on the Resolution coming forward to Convention--is that anxieties continue to be fairly acute, trust levels not very high. We need to move very slowly and maintain a high degree of transparency.<br /><br />Bruce RobisonBruce Robisonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00193701138386039942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-40686110064324534132010-10-11T09:02:38.435-04:002010-10-11T09:02:38.435-04:00Bruce IMHO (and in perfect hindsight) I beleive ha...Bruce IMHO (and in perfect hindsight) I beleive had Bob been kept as a finalist on the slate proposed by the Nom Cmte, it would have been a much closer election and maybe even a different result. <br /><br />I also have a sense that you don't have to be concerned with any surprise moves in your selection of your next bishop.The Rev Canon Dr David Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09878281384587956210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-73945635729155425902010-10-10T22:41:35.732-04:002010-10-10T22:41:35.732-04:00Thanks, David. I can't remember exactly the p...Thanks, David. I can't remember exactly the parliamentary form of Bishop Duncan's nomination. I do remember some kind of action on the day of convention to add the name formally to the ballot, but that part is all a little hazy. I do entirely agree that the process was in accord with the rules of the election and--quite obviously--widely supported. I think the main reason the '95 election is worth remembering now for us on the TEC side of the stream, as we prepare for an election, is to recall the stresses that resulted from the Search Committee's decision not to include Bishop Duncan on the original slate of nominees. <br /><br />BruceRBruce Robisonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00193701138386039942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-14222535093616827832010-10-09T16:17:47.829-04:002010-10-09T16:17:47.829-04:00Just so we are clear, Bob Duncan's name was no...Just so we are clear, Bob Duncan's name was not placed in nomination "from the floor" of the convention. It came with the requisite number of convention deputies signing a petition (As BMR+ correctly reports: both Liberals and conservatives) and with background checks completed by Oxford Document Corporation. It was also promulgated thoughout the diocese weeks before the special electing convention in early December 1995. The final slate of three was announced on the second Saturday of November at the regularly scheduled Diocesan Convention. So sometime in the four weeks between conventions Bob's nomination by petition was publicly announced.The Rev Canon Dr David Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09878281384587956210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-50560329751643076062010-10-08T19:15:53.510-04:002010-10-08T19:15:53.510-04:00Well thought out, Lionel. I'm in favor of the ...Well thought out, Lionel. I'm in favor of the sequential arrangement of publication of nomination committee candidates followed by a call for petition candidates, if there are any. After the call for petition candidates is closed, there should be at least a month's vetting time so that all candidates are known prior to the election. I brlieve this is what Bishop Price suggested at the first preconvention hearing.Betsyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05679480944866739828noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-5670117690454568232010-10-08T14:29:34.671-04:002010-10-08T14:29:34.671-04:00It seems a long time ago--it was a long time ago, ...It seems a long time ago--it <i>was</i> a long time ago, and I know memories fade and can be shaped by subsequent events. <br /><br />Gary and Heather Nicolosi were old friends from the time of my service in the Central Pennsylvania diocese. He was and is a fine priest and general good guy, and I was glad to support and say good words about him through the run-up to the election and on the day. <br /><br />Once the laity had come to such a clear decision on the second ballot, though, I, like many, shifted to +Bob on the third ballot, and I was glad to stop in at the Duncan's home over on N. Linden later that evening, with a great crowd of others, for a word of congratulations and a celebratory glass of wine. <br /><br />My memory is that +Bob was not perceived as a "party" nominee. His supporters, and those who didn't support him seemed mostly to be motivated by more personal aspects of relationship. I certainly knew several folks over the the "progressive" side (I think we called them "liberals" in those days) who strongly supported him in the election. As David notes, these were mostly folks from smaller parishes who had been very impressed with the way +Bob would roll up his sleeves and work with them on the challenging concerns of small church ministry. And I knew several more conservative folks who were clear in their opposition to his election from the very beginning. <br /><br />I do agree with you, Lionel and with David that the decision of the Search Committee not to include +Bob on the ballot, for whatever reasons, and by whatever "count" (I've heard a few stories, and they all differ) established a sympathetic dynamic which fueled support for the from-the-floor nomination and for the election. <br /><br />Some have said that without that "sympathy" factor--the sense that an injustice had been done to a person who had demonstrated strong local support--Bishop Duncan would not have been elected. I'm skeptical of that, though it's the kind of thing we'll never know. <br /><br />Probably the strongest factor in +Bob's favor was the fact that the three nominated candidates each attracted <i>support</i>, but really none motivated much <i>enthusiasm</i>.<br /><br />One thing I do think, though, is that the language about "betrayal" that emerged from this election (spoken by some members of the Search Committee, when they felt the Convention had inappropriately overruled their judgment, and by many supporters of +Bob when the Committee originally announced their slate of three nominees) colored the tone of the beginnings of Bishop Duncan's episcopate and in some ways encouraged the later trends of polarization.<br /><br /> There were, though, many stresses and divisions through Bishop Hathaway's tenure as well, not to speak of tensions already rising in the wider ecclesial contexts, and I'm not sure we can say that the 1995 election was really "the beginning" of anything. It's been a rough and tumble generation, as Jeremy Bonner describes very effectively in his history.<br /><br />Bruce RobisonBruce Robisonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00193701138386039942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-83651387913846120452010-10-07T07:44:33.277-04:002010-10-07T07:44:33.277-04:00David,
Thanks for your helpful comments. Members ...David,<br /><br />Thanks for your helpful comments. Members of the nominating committee have been, as a group, very reticent about telling what happened in committee, so your information is very welcome.<br /><br />Of course, I did not mean to suggest that anything improper happened during the last search for a bishop.Lionel Deimelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08363018512775944659noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-75958754095371534882010-10-07T01:03:33.773-04:002010-10-07T01:03:33.773-04:00Lionel
All and all an accurate accounting of the ...Lionel<br /><br />All and all an accurate accounting of the election of Bishop Duncan in the fall of 1995, I was there as well. I was told by a member of the Nominating Committee that an internal rule operating during the process was that at every paring of the candidates at least ¾ of the 15 person committee had to approve of each and every candidate going forward. The final four were Dennis Fotinos former rector of Trinity Cathedral and the preferred candidate of most progressives, Gary Nicolosi preferred candidate of many evangelicals especially the large church rectors, David Anderson preferred candidate of the charismatics and Bob Duncan the only “local” candidate. Bob received 11 of 15 votes ---one shy of the needed 12 and was off the final list. A member of the Nominating Committee commented to me some years later, “I knew then and there (after the committee voted him off) that we had just assured that Bob Duncan was going to be elected to be the next bishop”. <br /><br />The strategy of the conservatives was to vote for whomever they supported on the first ballot and then come behind the strongest among Duncan, Nicolosi or Anderson. Duncan had a plurality after ballot one in both orders. On the second ballot he had a majority in the lay order and was one vote shy in the clerical order. Ballot three it was made unanimous. <br /><br />Why was Duncan elected? As you alluded primarily it was his work with the medium and small parishes (75% of the diocese) in discovering their mission. This was the first time in a long time that anybody from Oliver Avenue had showed them any support or encouragement and worked with them. And each small or medium parish had three votes –one clergy and two lay and they added up to more than the larger parishes totals. <br /><br />I realize that you perceive Bob Duncan to have been a terrible choice for bishop. But he really was the people’s choice and his election was made unanimous by conservatives and progressives alike. It is only with 20-20 hindsight that you might perceive it all as terrible. But the process and the results were fair and honestly achieved.The Rev Canon Dr David Wilsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09878281384587956210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-43042388251238729682010-10-06T08:04:24.848-04:002010-10-06T08:04:24.848-04:00As you indicate, Lionel, the SC is meeting later t...As you indicate, Lionel, the SC is meeting later this week to assess the conversations about Resolution #2 at preconvention meetings and elsewhere. The concerns you are raising here are all significant and are a good contribution to the forward trajectory. Our hope of course is to offer a plan for the election of a new bishop that will have the confidence and support of the diocesan family, that will promote healthful common life. We're all in this together, and it's a learning curve.<br /><br />Again, many thanks,<br /><br />Bruce RobisonBruce Robisonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00193701138386039942noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3320087.post-92025638465664737362010-10-06T07:48:24.453-04:002010-10-06T07:48:24.453-04:00But the question still remains - Will a candidate ...But the question still remains - Will a candidate nominated by petition, be vetted as thoroughly as one presented by the Nominating Committee?jmhjr4https://www.blogger.com/profile/02008217145611619494noreply@blogger.com