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The Rt. Rev. Vincent W. Warner’s address
You will find your Servant Leadership cards on your table. Please take them with you and pray with them for I will talk about them a bit tomorrow as we celebrate the Eucharist. One of the things I am aware of in our life in the church is that we go from one thing to the next. We don’t stop to celebrate what we have done, who we are as people. It’s important to spend the time now, in this convention, celebrating who we are as the people of God. Since this is my last convention address I don’t have to come up with a number of charges for the future. Thanks be to God! If we all lived as if we really didn’t have much time, and some of us know how that is in life and in health, then each moment would be precious and we would stop to say our thanksgivings rather than moving on to what we need to accomplish. So I would like in this address to have you participate with me about your call, your call to reflect and remember, your call to be present with one another and to celebrate your call to live the Gospel and most all, your call to trust God. Reflect and Remember: When we’re called to reflect and remember that means we have to have time to do that. How many times do you go from a very busy weekend where you are excited as can be about what you saw in your church and what you saw in your ministry but you didn’t have a time to reflect? Jesus went from the busy villages up into the mountains and he took time. After his baptism he went into the desert. What I would like you to do, regardless of the noise in the hallway or any of the movement around, is stop for a moment and think of something that happened to you that was a part of your ministry where you were touched right in your heart and reflect on that. Reflect on a time when you felt God’s call to discipleship and you really stood for what you believed in regardless of what anybody else had to say. Just take a moment. I can think of many of those times. I remember when I was elected on the first ballot here. I had been at Barbara Harris’ consecration. What a wonderful time that was. She offered me her room in the hotel so I could wait there to see how the election was going. I said no, that I wanted to be part of her ordination and consecration. Then I was going to go home. I had friends who were going to get a couple of micro brewed beers and some cheese and crackers and we were going to wait through everything that was going to happen over all those ballots. And those friends were going to be with me in the good times or in the difficult times. Then I got home and found out that I already had been elected. It scared me to death because if you were elected on the first ballot they were going to expect something from you. And people were clamoring for a vision. They said, “Give us a vision, give us a strategy, and state the direction.” I traveled all around the diocese, I went everywhere and I asked questions. I found out that congregations saw the diocese as 1551 10th Ave. E, not as everyone who was part of the north, south, peninsula, everything - the diocese is us. I also found out that there was not necessarily a sense of interdependence. There was certainly a sense of individuality and independence. I remember saying to a man at breakfast in Vancouver that my vision is that we’ll become one people of God, interacting with one another for the common good and that somehow what is happening in the south will be important in the north and what is happening in the east will be important in the west and everybody will be a part of one another and they won’t see the diocese as the office where the bishop and staff work. He looked at me and said, “You know you’re going against the bedrock of who we are in the Northwest.” Well I started to learn, gosh I learned a lot, but I still I had that sense of the prayer from scripture, the priestly prayer of John that we all might be one. And I pray for that for the Anglican Communion, for the Episcopal Church, for the churches all over the world, and that God might unite us throughout all religions. I also came here with a sense of the Gospel of Luke, my favorite Gospel. It’s a lot more down to earth than John. I used to think John was my favorite, but Luke tells the stories and it deals with the outcasts and people on the margins and those without access to power. Our diocesan vision became “We are one people of God who proclaim boldly by word and action the reconciling gospel of Jesus Christ.” Bold, reconciliation, one, and the basis of our work, and this was only one of two non-negotiables that I have had during my time as your bishop, was the values of the servant leadership. They are simple enough. Collaboration instead of competition; not being over against, not being hierarchical, but circular like you saw in the total ministry. And I thought that would be something people would really love. Well it didn’t settle down the noise at all. In fact some said that’s no leadership at all if you’re a servant leader and you turn the triangle upside from hierarchy then that is not leadership. Over the years, I’ve learned to be part of the body of Christ, learned about teamwork, circular consultative leadership in the office and beyond. The values of servant leadership, which are what I have asked you to look at, call us out of our promise of our baptism, to walk with people not to walk over them, to share the resources and the power we possess in ways that will encourage and empower those we are called to minister to, not impose power on others. Some questioned if one could be a servant and a leader. That’s the faithful way to lead, I believe, it’s Gospel stuff. It’s from these values that the only other non-negotiable charge came to the diocese from me and that is the call to have anti-racism training for all congregations, diocesan institutions and leaders in the diocese. As you heard from Constance Moorehead, to date 681 people from 63 churches and 13 organizations have participated in anti-racism training offered by our diocesan team. We must understand the reality of racism, both individual and institutional and work to change the reality. It was just yesterday afternoon when I was hoping to work on my sermon for tomorrow that my son said, “Father you have to come sit in my little chair and have a teacher’s conference.” Then I said, “But I have to go to convention.” He said “Father I want you at the teacher’s conference.” And so I went and for an hour I sat with his teacher. He’s doing well. He’s number two in reading and number three in math and he has read over 1,000 words in a number of books and he is way up on the speed of his reading, and he has only been in the country for three years. But one piece came out that he told his teacher because I asked him to, and that was the fact that he is told over and over again on the bus and at recess and other times that he is dumb because he is Chinese. That he is inferior because he is Chinese. He was asked what a Twinkie was, and he said “I don’t know, is it some kind of food?” and they said “You must be awfully dumb if you don’t know what a Twinkie is.” Now this is not isolated, this happens with all of us and he is not bitter about it, but he knows the reality of it. It’s not something that is way out there, that’s all I’m simply trying to say. What I dream of is that the work that we are doing will change the reality and I’d like everyone who has taken part, and have been involved in anti-racism or some kind of diversity training to stand, if you are able. Look at that. That is wonderful. As Desmond Tutu says, let’s clap for ourselves. You know we are called to reflect and remember during the 18 years the institution of the church has spent huge amounts of time, energy, and resources on issues of human sexuality. You may not talk about it in your place, but some places have. We’ve had resolutions: the Koinonia resolution, first presented to our convention in 1995, then referred to study, then passed at our convention of 1997. We’ve had discussions about whether white privilege was real or not real, we’ve had efforts to have congregations work with curriculums on these things and the publication from the House of Bishops on continuing the dialogue. The General Conventions of 2000, 2003 and 2006 were times when the whole Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion were focused on issues of human sexuality and yet we know that the issue is not human sexuality. It’s not been about sex. It’s really been about our understanding of the Biblical authority that we have as Episcopalians as we live into the world of the Anglican understanding of the three primary bases for our theology: Scripture, Tradition and Reason. My basis for my understanding of the Gospel as expressed in our baptismal covenant is based on the fact that we respect the dignity of every human being and work for justice and peace for all of God’s people. When we look at the budget of the national church in which over $624,000 is the part that we offer from the Diocese of Olympia, the order of importance is: justice and peace – supporting the Millennium Development Goals; Young adults, Youth and Children; Reconciliation and Evangelism; Congregational transformation; and Partnerships with the Anglican Communion, Ecumenical and Interfaith bodies. That’s the kind of General Convention work that moves the Gospel into the world. That’s not what the people hear in the news. The mission imperatives were exciting and a lot of the things we do do not get the kind of publication and knowledge that really need to be there to affirm the good news. I have a picture of me boarding the bus on the way to the election of a new presiding bishop - thumbs up and big smile. Everybody thinks that it’s a picture after the election. It could be. We elected Katharine Jefferts Schori as the presiding bishop. I think that’s exciting. I’ve worked with Katharine on the Pastoral Development Committee. Bishop Rivera was her shepherd through the election process. What an honor. And then there’s the fact that not everything is institutional. I spend a number of mornings on my way to the office going to Tent City at various locations. Recently I’ve been going to St. George’s in Seattle. A ministry has come out of those visits. Some of you know about it and have become involved in it as well. The ministry is to rebuild bicycles and make them available for folks in Tent City and other places where people are impoverished and need transportation. And so nine or ten o’clock at night I go down to the garage and start working on bicycles. Then I load three or four into my truck and take them to Tent City. They are so grateful for those bicycles. They take them and give them to the people. They’ve worked out a way to make them fairly distributed. The women started to complain that there are too many men’s bicycles. These are good bicycles. They’ve come from some of you. I met a young woman, about 27, who wanted so much for me to find a bicycle for her friend, who is homeless yet going to school and going to work. I was able to do it. I met a 76 year old woman, while having a cup of coffee sitting in the midst of the tents last week, who said she couldn’t believe that at her age she might be able to ride a bike again. She took it out and showed me and she moved along. It’s wonderful and it is better than $3 a gallon. In my conversations with these people in Tent City I learn their stories. And the interesting thing is that the common thread is that they live in community, a community on the move and well organized. Whenever I ask how folks are, you know what they say to me? “I have nothing to complain about.” I don’t know where I am going to live in three weeks, but I have nothing to complain about. To which I responded, “You know it’s going to be raining, it’s difficult,” and they say: “Oh no, it’s not so bad to live in tent city. I’m really grateful.” Now on the other hand, I sometimes find people who have abundance, who don’t quite respond with such gratitude to life. It’s interesting, isn’t it? We are a church that has boundless resources. Why do we expend resources of energy, money, good will and time on so many issues and meetings, or who is OK and who is not OK to be ordained, or elected or consecrated instead of putting our matchless gifts and energies and skills to work with the people who move in and out of our church, who need homes and health and just simply need to make their lives work. Many of you and numbers of our congregations are passionately involved with issues of homelessness and economic justice. We will share later the stories out of “We Will Stand With You” for the people at St. Paul’s school and church in New Orleans. If you or your congregation have been, or are, involved in these areas of ministry that reach out to the community, taking action to care for our neighbors and to see that justice is brought to some conclusion for those in need – basic needs like housing, employment, health care – stand up. Let me see how many of you are involved in that. WOW! That’s a witness. Be present and celebrate: Moving from one thing to another doesn’t work. We need to stop and celebrate the ministries we share. The staff positions that I have encouraged since I’ve been here, and the people I have called to work on the bishop’s staff have focused on providing resources and people to engage us all in the challenges that we face better together rather than as individual congregations. This convention is hosted by seven congregations who are Total Common Ministry congregations. These are the places where teams have formed and discerned the varieties of gifts for ministry, some teachers, some preachers, and some pastoral care leaders. For 10 years the Missioner for Total Ministry was the Rev. Robin Moore; her husband spoke a little earlier. Robin was, and is, a pioneer. She pioneered the team based model and translated it from something that had started with the Rev. Skip Reeves. More recently the Rev. Canon Joan Anthony has moved into the role of Congregational Development, including the ongoing work with the Total Common Ministry congregations. Will all those who are part of Total Common Ministry please stand. This model of ministry, based in baptismal understanding, is an icon for us all. Faith develops and grows with understanding, experience and education. Faith formation has always been a strong part of the ministry in the diocese. We struggle with how much funding to give the Diocesan School of Ministry and Theology, the Resource Center, one of the best resource centers. Other traditions come to our resource center; even those who broke away from the Episcopal Church come to our Resource Center. The combination of the work of Diocesan School of Ministry and Theology, the Resource Center, the ministry with children and the youth programs are resources that support and encourage the formation of faith of every age, which is from cradle to grave. Sue Tait, Kathy Hamilton and Shannon Jergenson direct and manage this work at this time. How many of you have attended a Diocesan School for Ministry and Theology course, taught a course, borrowed a resource from the Resource Center, had young people in your congregation attending HYC or JYC in some way been involved in education in your own congregation. Raise your green cards. Look at that, it’s almost unanimous, and people say, “Where’s the program for the youth?” It’s you, it’s here. Carl Knirk. Every time I go on a visitation, they say thank you for Carl Knirk. He’s known throughout the diocese and the whole church. We established the Bishop’s Society in 1992. Carl has helped to lead that work. The Diocese of Olympia Bishop’s Society has one thousand fifty six members, the largest in the whole Episcopal Church. The two people we are going to honor on Nov. 30 at a reception and performance of the Black Nativity at Intiman Theatre in Seattle, the Rev. Richard and Edith Younge, are the newest members of the Bishop’s society. These things along with the Living Tree witness to a future generation. Will all who are members of the Bishop’s Society or a Legacy Society in your congregation please stand. As Carl would say, we have an abundance; it is important to consider how that abundance will live on. We had a conference recently with the pension fund for active and retired clergy. We had the largest group they had ever had; they had to send an extra group on a red-eye to be with us. One of the retired clergy, who I think hasn’t figured out retirement yet, was Bishop Assisting Sandy Hampton. He joined us in 1996. Among the many gifts he brought was that he reinvigorated work with our ethnic congregations. We called the Rev. Jerry Shigaki to join the staff in 2000 as the Missioner for Ethnic Ministry. I don’t know that there are many missioners for ethnic ministry anywhere in the church. With Jerry’s leadership, his vision to invite people of color into discernment, his encouragement for ethnic ministries in congregations and his endless ability to get me and others buy tickets for events, we have 13 ethnic congregations and 14 people of color in the ordination process. The Commission on Ethnic ministries, the work with the Sudanese communities, the work with the Spanish-speaking congregations, the work of Jo Beecher and the Iglesia Resurreccíon, the support many of you to give to the Christmas drive for children’s gifts there, the First Nations committee, the work at Holy Family of Jesus, Holy Apostles, the African-American committee, all will help us realize the rich diversity of Christ. I have the same vision that many of you have that we will have a rainbow of people more and more both in leadership and throughout this diocese. All of you involved in ethnic ministry or having ethnic ministry happening in your congregations or who have ever bought a ticket from Jerry please stand. The Diocese of Olympia is on the move. That was the image we tried to capture in the new emblem, showing the Episcopal shield was moving, not static. I remember the day in the council room when we came up with the idea of Share your Story, Live your Faith. Remember the years we had those huge banners on the front of the church, delivered to each congregation, and the bumper stickers and the coffee mugs. How do we help the world know that we care, welcome the stranger, know that we serve? One way is to have each talking with the people we meet. And so, in 2003 I invited the Rev. Dr. Pete Strimer to be the Missioner for Communications. And he filled that role with energy, impish vitality, creative ideas and an endless supply of tootsie roll lollipops! Pete and the team of Norah Joslyn, Julie Tarter and David Manes created an entirely new look for the Episcopal Voice, wrapped us around the Episcopal Life and developed the diocesan website to provide information and resources at the click of a mouse. Pete also provided on-site consultation to congregations. This fall, the good people of St. Andrews, Seattle, had the wisdom to call Pete to be their rector – which meant that he left his diocesan level work in October. Norah, Julie and Dave are providing their particular skills and will move communications to the next step. Will all who receive the Episcopal Voice, the FYI or have logged onto the diocesan website or read the weekly Across the Diocese, please raise your green cards. We are evangelists – we are story tellers of good news. Keep communicating! Here are two statements that are obvious: 1) The Diocese of Olympia is a large and complex diocese, and yet it wants to act like it’s a small, one-to-one diocese. 2) The word “Episcopal” comes from the word meaning “Bishop.” The work of the Bishop Diocesan and the Bishop Suffragan are quite different, but the real key is that Barbara says that it hasn’t helped to make her work less. So it is really important for me, that I acknowledge the one that keeps me in line, at least she tries. Barbara Brower. Be Present and Celebrate: Last night, I did what I’ve done for 18 years. I met at 10 o’clock or 11 o’clock at night with Don Mullins and with Betsy to go over the Roberts Rules of Order. My task has been to try to bring down and narrow the number of resolutions which have grown year by year. Don has helped us walk through 30 cases of misconduct and 35 congregational conflicts. None of these has ended in an ecclesiastical trial. Sometimes the measure of success is what we have not had to get into. He has brought the combination of his legal expertise, his specific skills as a mediator, and his caring heart solidly grounded in his baptismal ministry. No detail is too small for his attention. He has patience beyond patience and treats everyone with respect and dignity. There is no way I could express my heartfelt appreciation, I just simply give thanks for his ministry and his friendship. Please help me acknowledge Don’s ministry with a standing round of applause. Be present and celebrate: Be present and celebrate: We are together as we gather around the table in the Eucharist and when we say our prayers. You have probably seen the vestments that were made for me with all the people of God represented on them; on the front all different colors and on the back, depending upon where I am in the diocese, the Cascades or the Olympics. I have been asked to have my portrait painted over and over again...I’m not ready to be hung. But I think about how I would want to be represented and the only way I can think of it is to have a portrait that represents the people, the diversity of the diocese. I don’t want to be in a painting alone. I really want to have something that has me with men, women, and children who represent the ministry we share together-it’s not mine, it’s ours. We are together in ministry based in baptism. I offer the sacrament as a servant of God in the role of bishop. I am in relationship with you and you have a relationship with God. Bishop Hampton, Bishop Rivera, Bishop Cochrane, Bishop Tennis and Bishop Ed Little have provided Episcopal presence for you. Will all of you who have been confirmed, received, ordained, reaffirmed in the past 18 years please stand. We are one people of God who boldly proclaim by word and action the reconciling Gospel of Jesus Christ. Live the Gospel: It is the Gospel call that touches you when you are asked to participate in the We Will Stand With You partnership. It is the Gospel call out of which you respond to Episcopal Relief and Development with over $800,000, in one year, for tsunami and other disaster relief. It is the Gospel call that has two members from this diocese in the Young Adult Service Corps; it is the Gospel call that inspired Erin and Jered, and now Drew, to be missionaries to Taiwan. Week after week one year I had one person after another doctors, lay people come to me and say “I want to go be a missionary. I want go and help those who are in need” and many others who come to my office because they want to reach out. I hear all the time when I am with national church staff folks and they are asking for something, as Bishop Packard in the midst of what had happened with Katrina. He said to Nedi and to me, “I know we can always call on the Dioceses of Olympia to be part of meeting the needs that we have to provide people and money.” We’re also a destination for many national conferences. In the past couple of years and coming next year these groups have or will be holding their national meetings in our diocese: Urban Caucus, Episcopal Asia Ministries; the Episcopal Network for Stewardship (TENS); the Church Pension Fund Planning for Tomorrow conference; the North American Association for the Diaconate; and the National Deployment Officers and the conference of Diocesan Executives. These groups always remark about the hospitality that you have given them is the best they ever receive. If you have given to ERD or We Will Stand With You, or if you have been involved in attending or hosting any national conference in our diocese, please raise your red or green card and respond to the Gospel of hospitality. We may not know how to change water into wine but we do know how to have a good party! Live the Gospel: There was a time when gay and lesbian clergy could not be open about themselves or their partners with whom they spend their lives. That’s changing! Thanks be to God. I stand with people who decide to make life choices to be themselves. Christ calls us to be who we are. Trust God: Trusting God means letting go all the time. The servant leadership value of letting go of control is what this is about. If we try to stay in control of everything, we limit the breath of the Holy Spirit to blow through in ways we could never have imagined. This means that we do our work, we engage with each other, we acknowledge when we don’t know it all, and we take time to be present and celebrate and we give it over to God. It’s God’s world, it’s Christ’s church! It’s not ours. Do I have some thoughts about what might be good for the Diocese of Olympia in the years ahead? You bet I do! Will I share them? No. Whoever is elected will be both fortunate and challenged. I know that through you and the help of God they will be given the wisdom to be themselves. I have some dreams. I do dream of a church ruled by the Gospel, not by committees; a church that is ruled by forgiveness and grace. I dream of not only diversity and race, but diversity and theology because we need everybody’s point of view-not one view or another. We need each other. And I pray for a time when we might be able to have a Jubilee year and forgive all the debts that anybody owes in this diocese and have a fresh beginning. I’m clear that’s not my work. I’ve given the leadership I knew how to do. I’ve left undone those things I ought to have done, and I certainly have done those things I ought not to have done. I’ve loved and cared for you, the people of this diocese, even more than you can imagine. This year is a year in which the staff and you and I complete some of the work we’ve begun. We need to see things through. We need to have a healthy place for somebody new to be in this role. We don’t need to start new projects! We need to be present and celebrate, to give thanks for everyone here and those beyond. The future will be God’s to guide, and is in God’s hands. I think of the people who are not here, and I’ll say more about that tomorrow. I think of Moe Poirier. I think of John Metzler. I think of so many people. I was so aware of people who were no longer part of the Total Ministry team but were pioneers in it, like Bill Mutchler. I think of Maggie Erskine, the first woman I ordained and the first ordination that I did. I remember sitting with the Metropolitan of Leningrad who asked me if I ordained women and I said, “Every chance I get.” And this wonderful man whose grave I’ve since visited a number of times said, “Dear Bishop, we’ll still be friends.” So we have work to do. I trust God. I try to live the Gospel and I am reflecting and remembering the people and the relationships- it’s all about relationships! I pray God will give us energy, laughter and joy in the months ahead to see clearly the Gospel call in ministry. I wrote some words and with the help of Betsy and Dent, you’re going to be able to sing it with me. I see them bloom for me and you I know Christ is alive in the people I see I see eyes of faith, I listen to the music, it lifts me to the sky. I see Jesus walking around the center aisle Grace, forgiveness and love,
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