Our first full day

Took this photo of an entrance to the Salt Palace Convention Center on my way to start the day with a legislative hearing scheduled for 7 am. The day was still cool, a pleasant 70°.

Today we started by listening to welcome messages from the Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies as well as the President of Episcopal Church Women. We then had two hours of orientation about using the Virtual Binder. In years past General Convention would print and distribute thousands upon thousands of copies of resolutions and other materials. This year all the same materials are available, but only on a "Virtual Binder" which exists as an app on rented iPads given to over 1,000 deputies and bishops. This is supposed to cheaper (and more environmentally sensitive) than paper distribution.

The Convention also changed the systems for electronic voting and for queuing up to speak during debate of resolutions on the floor of the House of Deputies.

After a nice lunch break we spent nearly three hours hearing from and about -- well, mostly from -- the four nominees to become the next Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church. You can learn more about the four by clicking here.

While I appreciated the opportunity to learn from and about the four nominees, the House of Deputies won't be electing the Presiding Bishop. The House of Bishops will elect the PB, and the House of Deputies will then have the opportunity to confirm the election results. I can't imagine the Deputies saying "no" to the person the Bishops themselves have chosen as their own leader. My take is we have four strong candidates; it will be interesting to see whom the bishops choose. The early money seems to be on Bishop Michael Curry. If elected, he would be the first black PB in our history. Bishop Curry is arguably the most charismatic and effective preachers in The Episcopal Church today.

Another decent break and I was back in action for another hearing for Prayer Book, Music, and Liturgy which ended blessedly early. We were hearing testimony about changes to the "Holy Women, Holy Men" (a calendar marking those whose lives we remember and celebrate). We then began our discussion about how to handle changes to this list, from the criteria for selecting persons to remember to which persons from "Holy Women, Holy Men" will be omitted from the next iteration, to be called "A Great Cloud of Witnesses." This is a complicated topic with a lot of moving parts. We have a subcommittee that will work on this a bit more, and we'll take up resolutions on this area again tomorrow.

Tomorrow we begin our first official day as it's the first day of deliberations on the floor of the house. I'm not sure yet which resolutions will come up for debate (other than a suggested change of procedures). We shall see.

As I write this, the hour grows late. And the Gary grows drowsy. Good evening! I shall more to share tomorrow, I'm sure.