Dozens of papers want to know--what exactly happened at the New Orleans meeting?

Lots of coverage today of the statement coming out of the Episcopal bishops' meeting in New Orleans. The language is careful and complicated, leading to widely varying angles in the dailies. (Over at dotCommonweal, Robert Imbelli points out the significant distance between the Times and Globe pieces.) The AP story also portrays this as mostly a conservative victory. The Times-Picayune has one of the better, more balanced pieces.

A summary, from the statement itself:

• We reconfirm that resolution B033 of General Convention 2006 (The Election Of Bishops) calls upon bishops with jurisdiction and Standing Committees "to exercise restraint by not consenting to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate whose manner of life presents a challenge to the wider church and will lead to further strains on communion."
• We pledge as a body not to authorize public rites for the blessing of same-sex unions.
• We commend our Presiding Bishop's plan for episcopal visitors.
• We deplore incursions into our jurisdictions by uninvited bishops and call for them to end.
• We support the Presiding Bishop in seeking communion-wide consultation in a manner that is in accord with our Constitution and Canons.
• We call for increasing implementation of the listening process across the Communion and for a report on its progress to Lambeth 2008.
• We support the Archbishop of Canterbury in his expressed desire to explore ways for the Bishop of New Hampshire to participate in the Lambeth Conference.
• We call for unequivocal and active commitment to the civil rights, safety, and dignity of gay and lesbian persons.

This is presented as a consensus statement, not that of a narrow majority. (Only one "nay" vote was audible, though several conservatives were absent at the time of the vote.) Given this, I'm particularly interested in the strong language about "incursions into our jurisdictions,"as it seems to echo my own sentiment that the practice of U.S. congregations forming relationships with overseas bishops is at least as troubling as the actual differences regarding the authority/interpretation of scripture or regarding homosexuality itself.

Actually, I think it's far more troubling, for two reasons. First, I believe that if a hierarchical polity is good for anything, it's for functioning as a church of churches, with bishops beings pastors of pastors and so on. This implies several things--the value of community for its own sake, not as a reflection of like-mindedness; the importance of working out conflict within the context of a commitment to ongoing fellowship; and especially the importance of a sense of place, of literal/geographical closeness. While I'm well aware that neither side has behaved consistently well in this conflict, I feel especially distant from the conservatives who have left TEC--because their vision of the purpose of a church structure seems to be quite different from mine.

Second, this sort of globalized, post-local affiliation can also lead to troubling situations, conflicts that motivate church leaders to say things like, "I've never been to Rwanda, but we're Rwandans now." It may be a well-intentioned and deferential statement, but it's also complete nonsense: No, you're not. Rwanda is a place, and place matters.