For the complete collection of GA Scribbles, click HERE. This does provide an overview of the whole experience!
Saturday, July 7, wrapped up with another 2 hours of discussion, some of which was arrested Friday night, before we could get to the final business of budgets, thank yous, honors, and worship. There were many vacant seats in the assembly hall Saturday morning, as some ministers had to leave to conduct services on Sunday, some commissioners were asleep (many YAADs), and others left early to catch flights. The concluding worship, while the preacher issued many great challenges that would have been easier to handle if the vote on divestment and marriage had gone differently, felt a little anti-climatic. The music was slower paced, much to my chagrin. I left the plenary floor and went back to the observer area to worship with Luke and the rest of the interns.
Flights home were smooth sailing for Linda and I. Learned later that Roger, Hannah, and Pete missed a connecting flight in San Francisco and spent the night in hotels there. Roger will definitely remember this Assembly as the one of "Missed and Cancelled Flights"! Linda and I enjoyed good conversation, not much sleep, and some amazing cloud formations in the sky as we flew west. In Boise, greeted by both our husbands! Time to go home!
I am simply going to paste my notes and reflections from Thursday and Friday as I was keeping a running blog in plenary hall during short breaks. (I just didn't have internet access to post them!) Not much editing here, so excuse now the typos....
THURSDAY, July 5
I awoke today
with the buzzing of the cell phone at 7am .
Good thing I set the alarm. I
knew I probably wouldn’t wake up naturally, although I did waken at 5:45 and
turned right over!
Quick shower,
grab a bite at Subway, and then off for DLCC to set up and catch up on some
blogging, etc.
Plenary
highlights: worship at the end with a
solo hand-bell player who was AWESOME.
Offering of prayers written on cutout paper doves that were all dropped
into the baptismal font, along with one very visible dollar bill at the
bottom! Committee reports from the
Theological Institution people, the Mid-Council Report (which had less debate
than I anticipated), The Comm. on Social Justice (should we spank? Voted NO! ), The Board of Pensions,
Foundation and Publishing report, which was going fine until a heated debate on
where to TALK ABOUT extending the plan to the denominations which are mostly
receiving the withdrawing churches. It was
a needless discussion in my book….it doesn’t hurt to TALK, that doesn’t mean
agreement or eventual connection.
By far the
major debate of the day was in the evening with the report of the Middle East
Peacemaking group: A major question
before the assembly was if we should divest from those companies (specifically Caterpillar,
Motorola Solutions, and Hewlett Packard) who are selling products to Israel
that are used in the occupation and humi9liation of the Palestinians. This debate, amidst a minority report which
served as a substitute motion, and amendments, was debated until past 10:30
pm. We had to debate on how long to
debate, we had to stop for a moment of prayer several times. Emotions run high. I can’t believe what tomorrow will be when we
get to “SEX” issues!
Ultimately, the
issue for me was killed (after our extensive review of the Kairos Palestine
materials this spring I was in favor of divestment) when the minority report
was accepted by TWO VOTES! It was a huge
blow, because the rest of the discussion was somewhat mute by then. I was rapidly texting to Luke for advice, and
he said to wait for Rick Ufford Chase to speak.
I was afraid the mikes were going to close before his turn, but former
GA Moderators tend to get called upon!
Our only other recourse was to vote NO on the minority report and ask
for reconsideration tomorrow. But the
minority report was received. So….no
divestment, only more talk and more attempts to invest positively. I guess maybe what I can do individually is
to go home and see if there is a Palestinian listed on KIVA that I can
support! (Later: DONE!)
I did have lunch
with Luke and the Covenant Network, which was interesting. They had a strong advocacy program for social
justice, equal rights for all. It was
basically a briefing for how to treat some of the overtures and things to look
for.
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| Luke, Karen, Rob, and Ginger at Mahoney's Sports Bar |
Dinner was again
at Mahoneys, but this time with Rob and Karen.(Rick’s brother and
sister-in-law) I had been texting Karen
all morning to try and set something up.
Was glad when Luke said he DIDN’T have tickets to the ball game so he
would be able to join us – and glad that Karen had returned from her mom’s in
time to come also. Although it was only
an hour and 45 minutes, it was good to reconnect with them. I tried the “Burgh” Burger, which was great –
stuffed with onion, mushroom, and pepper!
Back to the room
directly tonight to try and get a little more sleep! Partially successful – we only talked until
shortly after midnight! Rick thought it
was late when I called, until I told him I had JUST gotten back to the
room.
FRIDAY, July 6, 2012
Here we go again! It
is still VERY muggy out and probably will be in the high 90’s again today. I will probably only go outside, however, this morning (I am writing at the Subway shop where I have bought my
breakfast for 5 out of the past 6 days!)
and MAYBE coming home late this evening.
Rick said it will be 100 in Baker on Sunday when we return, but at least
it will be a DRY heat!
I have been
rapidly drawing images, collages, etc. of scribbles all during the week. I have over 20 illustrations – at times I am
able to color them while plenary is in action.
I can color while I listen, but at other times the action is so fast, you
are constantly grabbing your papers to check an item, vote, etc. Our table is covered with papers, wrappers,
drinks, and of course, power cords, cables, etc.
One aspect of
each session has been to start with the reading of the Isaiah text responsively,
led by one of the assembly commissioners or advisory delegate. Then we join in Small Group Prayer – we are
linked with the three commissioners in front of us from Detroit: TEC Jim, REC
Diane, and YAAD Tim. Very nice
people! I led the prayer once
yesterday. (I learned on Saturday
morning that Tim was a YAAD from the ‘non-geographical’ Korean Presbytery. And
here we thought all the time he was with the other two in front of us!)
I am listening to
the buzz around me at the Subway. There
is a great deal of talk about last night’s decision on divestment, but also
frustration with our Moderator and his ability to maintain control of the
group. I personally think Tom has done a
better job moderating than Neal has, but maybe that’s because I didn’t vote for
Neal for Moderator! There is far too
much “consensus” or “what do you think about this?” which is allowing certain
groups to control the pace, etc. He
could have used a better refresher course in Parliamentary Procedures!
I wish I had been
able to post these updates regularly, but at some point, I just HAVE to go to
bed instead. Perhaps I can get
Wednesday’s posted this morning.
I found a spot by
the river to post for Wednesday before coming into Plenary Hall to the singing
of How Great Thou Art. Linda has left
chocolate bars on our tables! It will be
a good day….not for my weight, but….
As I write on Saturday morning…. After 4 hours of sleep and
packing to leave, yesterday is a blur… a long day of sitting, reports,
discussion, voting, at times frustration, and other times celebration with and
in the Spirit (usually during the singing of songs.) Other thoughts and clips from Friday include:
 |
| Presbyter Jam Session - check out the bow ties! |
- · Moments of laughter (the YAADS are great at providing for this...and gifts they give to our moderator to keep him ‘loose’.)
- · Our closing prayer at 1:35 am was delivered by a TSAD who announced “I am finally a member of the Presbyterian Bowtie Society!” sporting a plaid bow tie! Several of the “mucky mucks up front wear bow ties! There was an inside joke on the bow ties that spurred this as well – actually something on the Twitter feed.
- · The vice moderator playing the drums after dinner during Friday evening opening music. Basically it was an executive staff jam session!
- · The YAAD sitting behind us who called on the whole assembly to take a moment of silence to calm down during the discussion on Civil Unions and Marriage.
- · The wonderful job as Vice Mod TomTrinidad did to guide us through everything after dinner (including the Orders and Ministry report.)
- · The passing back and forth of the proverbial football between the moderator, clerk, and ACC advisor until a real football appeared
- · Lunch and dinner in the assembly hall as we only had 1.5 hour breaks for each.
- · Luke and two girls who went to the ballgame and the massive number of texts back and forth as I updated Luke on the events of Comm. 7.
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