Thinking About Education

I was invited to a conference this week -- the Canadian House of Bishops, representatives of educational institutions, and Diocesan representatives gathered at the Manior d'Youville to talk about standards of theological education.

There were some brilliant moments at the gathering: Mark Macdonald (Canadian bishop for indigenous persons) characterized the plight of theological schools as "forming the people of Babylon after a couple of years in Jerusalem." There were some tedious moments, especially when some participants didn't trust the process (we used "Indaba," which was presented as a distilled discussion). And then there were the idiots -- one bishop confronted me about baptismal ecclesiology, stating that it hadn't worked in his diocese -- it turned out that there was no staffing for parishes that had opted out of the traditional rector-centric ministry, and that they had devolved into a quasi-incumbent model. I suggested that not hiring ministry developers whose gifts were to enable others in ministry was the reason that he had perceived failure, and to blame a model of ministry that was scriptural and innately integral to the dignity of the community was to misplace the responsibility. I suspect that I won't be working in his diocese any time soon.

And so I come home to a place where everything seems to revolve around me. It's time to get back to transcribing the Annual Reports.

Today's weigh-in: 238 lbs. Perhaps I should have weighed in earlier in the day.