And Speaking of Bishops

Jon Bruno stole the show at General Convention, and he wasn't even there.

Shedding Divestments

Mainline churches invest billions on behalf of their retired employees. Should they punish Israel for its occupation of the West Bank by selling stock in companies that do business in Israel or are accused of de facto support for the occupation? The Episcopal Church considers the question at its triennial General Convention this week and next in Indianapolis. Our bishop in Los Angeles, Jon Bruno, opposes divestment and boycotts, as does Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. From Indianapolis, Matthew Davies surveys all the pending proposals for the Episcopal News Service:

Jefferts Schori visited Israel and the West Bank in 2008. Asked about divestment, she told ENS in a recent interview that the Christian tradition “generally has not been to shun people. It has been to call people to greater engagement … and relationship, and I think that is especially needed in the land of the Holy One right now.”

During an Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles gathering in March, Jefferts Schori urged Episcopalians to “invest in legitimate development in Palestine’s West Bank and in Gaza” rather than focus on divestment or boycotts of Israel.

If people have particular concerns about corporations’ policies, she told ENS, “then positive engagement would mean to become a shareholder and go to a shareholders meeting and challenge the administration of the corporation. It’s a positive response rather than a negative one.”

By a narrow margin, our Presbyterian brothers and sisters said no to divestment yesterday at their biennial meeting in Pittsburgh.

The Greatest Man I Ever Met

In 1979, ultra-orthodox Jewish settlers (traitors to their faith no less notorious than Sept. 11 attacker Mohamed Atta was to his) raided a Greek Orthodox monastery in the West Bank town of Nablus and used an axe to murder the abbot, Archimandrite Philoumeno, who was especially beloved of the local Arab community.

The abbot, beatified in 2009, died while saying vespers. Another brother standing and praying nearby, Fr. Justinus, subdued St. Philoumeno's killer by smashing him with a chandelier and breaking both his legs, an especially remarkable accomplishment since Justinus is five feet tall and had been stabbed 16 times in the attack. The murderer and his accomplices were put on trial but acquitted by reason of insanity.

As outrageous as the verdict sounds, maybe the court got it right. Faithful people would have to be nuts to commit such an abomination at the site of Jacob's well, which, as disclosed by John's gospel, was where Jesus Christ asked a woman of Samaria (whom he should have judged unclean and unapproachable, according to the religious authorities of the day) to pour him a drink of water.

Yet creating new martyrs in a place remembered for the great patriarch as well as a supreme act of reconciliation is not as ironic as it might seem, according to Fr. Justinus. When we St. John's pilgrims visited him this afternoon, he told us that the attackers were motivated not by a reverence and preference for the site's Hebrew Testament antecedents but by their plan to twin it with nearby Joseph's Tomb as a money-making G ticket for Jewish and presumably Christian visitors and pilgrims.

Instead, Justinus picked up Philoumeno's mantle and spearheaded the construction of a magnificent Crusader-style church over the many-storied well, one of an elite category of Holy Land sites which are precisely what tradition purports. St. Photina's opened about 20 years after the settler attacks. Besides sheltering St. Philoumeno's remains, it's filled with Justinus's own exquisite paintings, murals, and icons, including one showing his colleague and friend's murder (above) and another depicting Jesus's encounter with the woman at at the well.

I've met presidents and their ministers and factotums but no one greater than Fr. Justinus -- near-martyr, brave wielder of the mighty sword of justice, church-builder, artist, and gentle and gracious pastor. He greeted us near the front door of his church with a friendliness and generosity of spirit you won't find in many rich, powerful people who can boast of nothing like his courage and character. He took time to pose with pilgrims Steven, who is 13 and about his height, and Brenna Hayden and stooped (though not very far) to kiss Brenna on the top of her head.

And yet after pilgrims Steven, Brenna, and Damian had lowered a bucket into the well, and we'd all drunk from the same ancient spring as Jesus, I was surprised to see Justinus step behind the gift counter and add master salesman to his repertoire. In three minutes he had deftly maneuvered me toward purchasing a hand-painted copy of his depiction of Jesus and the Samaritan woman.

Would you say no to Gandhi? Dr. King? He signed and anointed my purchase (a deep cruciform soaking that will mark this treasure forever) and the hands of everyone standing nearby, including the Rev. Lisa Rotchford, who's afraid she persuaded me to buy the icon. Not a chance. He had me at hello.

Fr. Justinus said he and the brothers had been praying for our bishop, Jon Bruno, and were delighted to learn that that his leukemia was in remission. "He is a big man, with a big heart," said the little priest. Takes one to know one.

A Message From Bishop Bruno

Jon Bruno, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and Rector of St. John's Episcopal Church and School, sent this letter to the Diocese on Thursday afternoon:

My dear friends,

As we move close to the 12th anniversary of my consecration on April 29, I am looking forward to the future, yet any time we make too many plans, we have to wait and listen for God.

Having had what I thought was a bout of pneumonia since the House of Bishops last met in March, I have gone back into the hospital to determine what this nagging problem has been. With the great assistance of Dr. David Cannom of Los Angeles Cardiology Associates, Dr. Glenn Hatfield of The Medical Group, Dr. Lasika Senevirante of the Los Angeles Cancer Network, and the staff of Good Samaritan Hospital, I have discovered that this nagging problem is more than I thought it was. But I have been convinced by Dr. Cannom and Dr. Senevirante that I am too stubborn to let this go by the wayside, so we will start immediately to begin aggressive treatment for Acute Monocytic Leukemia (AML M5).

I don't do anything lightly, and I am never surprised that when God calls me, it is to do more than I asked or thought. The doctors are of a mind that we can beat this, but I want to be honest with you: I am frightened. Not unlike the amputation, or the metabolic staph infection (MRSA) that I experienced, or the court cases, a few challenges have come across our path.

I want you folks to be as positive as you can be, and I need your prayers and support at this time. I want you to know that I have raised all of these concerns with my colleague Bishops, Diane Jardine Bruce and Mary Douglas Glasspool.

I will continue to serve as Bishop of the Diocese of Los Angeles with the able assistance of the Bishops Suffragan and the Executive Staff. I, together with Bishops Bruce and Glasspool, Canon David Tumilty, the Rev. Canon Joanna Satorius and Canon Robert Williams, will continue to be the management team of the Diocese.

This will require some changes for us to continue to serve you in the life of this Diocese, and we will remain faithful. We will not hold things back from you, and we will remain in regular communication.

If it should be that my health does take a turn for the worse, I will do what is needed to accomplish the election of the next Diocesan Bishop. I have notified Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, Bishop Stacy Sauls, and the Rev. Canon Chuck Robertson, and they have all assured me that they will do all they can to be of assistance.

I want to assure you all of the depth of love, respect and grace that I feel from this Diocese each day of my life. My love to you, my appreciation, and forever my dedication.

Yours in Christ,

+ J. Jon Bruno
Sixth Bishop of Los Angeles

Mrs. Patti's And Al Pacino's Birthday Sky

The heavens over St. John's Church and School this morning as we pray for healing for our bishop and rector, Jon Bruno, who is hospitalized with an infection, and in thanksgiving for the birthday of our chaplain and youth group leader, Patti Peebles

Prayers Sought For Bishop Jon Bruno

Bishop Suffragan Mary Douglas Glasspool wrote as follows on Tuesday afternoon to members of the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles:

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

Please keep Bishop Jon Bruno in your prayers.

Bishop Jon is undergoing medical treatment and testing in the hospital at this time to address an infection that has persisted after his diagnosis last month with pneumonia.

He is in good spirits and sends his love to all, and his appreciation for our ongoing prayers that he first requested at the March meeting of Diocesan Council.

Until further notice, Bishop Jon and Mary both ask for no visits, calls or flowers at this time as Bishop Jon must have complete rest in order to focus on his recovery. That said, cards addressed to home or office are most welcome.

Appointments and visitations in the coming weeks will, of necessity, be rescheduled by Ms. Gail Urquidi, executive assistant in the Bishop's Office. We will keep you informed of Bishop Jon's progress while asking that you respect his privacy.

Bishop Diane Jardine Bruce, who is traveling in China at the moment, joins me in thanking you for your prayers and support of Bishop Jon. Bishop Diane will return from her travels in early May, and both of us will be present at Clergy Conference May 7-9.

Heavenly Father, giver of life and health: Comfort and relieve your servant, Jon, and give your power of healing to those who minister to his needs, that he may be strengthened and have confidence in your loving care, through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God for ever. Amen.

God's Peace to All,

+ Mary D. Glasspool
Bishop Suffragan

Episcopal Equinimity

The presiding bishop of The Episcopal Church, along with the bishops of Los Angeles and Jerusalem, opposes anti-Israel divestment and boycotts.

Red, Black, And Flash

In a venerable Episcopal and Anglican tradition, on Holy Tuesday deacons, priests, and bishops hasten to a cathedral and renew their ordination vows. In the Diocese of Los Angeles, it's at the Pro-Cathedral of St. John in downtown Los Angeles, where the deans and rectors, The Very Revs. Daniel Ade and Mark Kowalewski, liturgical Jedi masters, put on one of the most beautiful services I've ever experienced.

This year, Bishop Diane celebrated, Bishop Mary preached a warmly pastoral sermon (trust God's abundant love and risk abundantly!), and Bishop Jon genially oversaw proceedings. Each deacon and priest got a personal episcopal blessing. Refreshed, renewed, and lunched, we came home with newly blessed vials of holy oil for our churches' healing and baptism services.

The picture at top shows my presbyteral buds the Revs. Kirby Smith, newly installed as vicar of Faith Episcopal Church in Laguna Niguel (red), Michael Bamberger, co-chair of the Commission on Ministry (black), and my fellow blogger Susan Russell (flash), who returned the favor.

Bless Me, But "Big Love" Ended Surprisingly

A regular visitor to St. John's is married to a bishop who retired several years from the Anglican church in Canada. When she was introduced in church Sunday morning, she said that she'd sometimes been called the "mama bishop." So I bent my head and asked for her blessing, which she graciously -- in the Christian sense of that adverb -- provided.

It wasn't an especially remarkable moment except for our denomination's adherence to the ancient tradition in which the act of sacramental blessing, along with the celebration of Holy Eucharist and the granting of absolution, is usually reserved to ordained people -- deacons, priests, and bishops. Even within the Holy Orders, the blessings usually flow from the top down. Deacons and priests in the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles are sometimes discomfited, if only briefly, when our bishop, J. Jon Bruno, asks us to reach up to his broad, 6'4"-tall forehead and bless him. The mama bishop on Sunday also looked a little surprised by my request, but she gave me a good one anyway. All of us baptized, after all, are priests of the most high God.

Something similar happened on Sunday evening, during the series-ending episode of HBO's "Big Love," the unlikely hit drama about a polygamist businessman and politician, Bill Henrickson (Bill Paxton). He's just taken three rounds in the chest from an angry monogamist neighbor in front of his house in Salt Lake City. His three wives hover over him in horror, watching him die. He looks at his first wife, Barb (Jeanne Tripplehorn), and says weakly, "I need your blessing." She hesitates, and then complies.

It was a moment of sheer beauty and the last thing I expected in this completely weirded-out show which started in 2006 as an broad parody of plural marriage and ended up witnessing for women's ordination and being a little squishy on polygamy.

Much of the tension in the fifth and final season resulted from Barb's discerning that she has the priesthood, which in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is reserved for men. Henrickson is following what he takes to be his destiny to advocate for "the principle," polygamy, by founding a polygamist LDS offshoot and getting himself elected to the Utah legislature to try to legalize plural marriage. Meanwhile Barb risks tearing her family apart by attending a Mormon-like church which, unlike her husband, recognizes the sacramental equality of women. Ultimately she doesn't join it, for the sake of the unity among her, Henrickson, and her two sister wives. By this time, we've been deftly manipulated into feeling relieved when she puts family about principle, even though it's a plural family, and we all know that polygamy is disgusting.

HBO also got us to root for Tony Soprano, the murdering narcissist. Appreciating the nobility "Big Love" drapes over Henrickson in its final reels doesn't mean viewers have been transformed into advocates of polygamy. But I did get the feeling that series creators Mark V. Olsen and Will Scheffer had on their agendas persuading us to be less judgmental about lifestyles we don't fully understand and more mindful of the way most denominations and faiths fail to empower women.

Ministry Interrupted

My bishop, Jon Bruno, outlines the consequences of Israel's refusal to approval the application of the Bishop of Jerusalem and his family for residency permits:

The seizure of Bishop [Suheil] Dawani’s travel documents means not only that he cannot visit the Christian communities of Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. It also means he cannot minister to the Christian communities located minutes from St. George’s Cathedral: the brewmasters of Taybeh, the schoolchildren of Bethlehem, the unemployed and elderly of Jericho. And it means he cannot bring essential medical supplies and alms — as well as hope — to the patients at Ah Ahli hospital in Gaza. That’s right: One of the few hospitals ministering to 1.5 million residents of the Gaza strip — one of the poorest and saddest parts of the Middle East — is owned and supported by Episcopalians around the world.

Sunday Sermon: "Bring A Friend"

John the Baptist was Christ's messenger; he was also Jesus's companion. At our annual convention last weekend, Bishop J. Jon Bruno (left) called on everyone in our Diocese to follow the Baptist's example of prophecy and companionship by inviting a friend to church. From +Jon's ailing friend and colleague, Bishop Bob Anderson, we heard a teaching we'll never forget about the companionship of the Spirit. My Sunday sermon is here (and apologies, Bishop Bob, for misstating the name of your beloved wife, Mary.)

Unconventional About Gender

In his talk to LA Episcopalians on Saturday morning during our annual convention, progressive evangelical leader Jim Wallis described "playing the Sam Harris role" in a conversation with Muslim women on the subject of interfaith conflict. "I said, 'Wouldn't it be better if we just got rid of religion? Isn't religion the problem?'"

Wallis said one of the women replied, "Religion isn't the problem. It's males' interpretation of religion."

Wallis said the most important book he'd read in years was Half The Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, who argue that a significant percentage of the world's worst problems could be ameliorated by the education and economic empowerment of women in the developing world. Be that as it may, the developed world still needs to empower them in the church, as well as in mosques and synagogues. Roger Ebert has an apt post about how most religious institutions devalue women by barring them from ordination, segregating them from men, or excluding them from leadership positions.

Among the few denominational exceptions is the Episcopal Church, and the Diocese of Los Angeles is a standout in TEC. This time last year, we elected two women as suffragan, or assistant, bishops, Diane Jardine Bruce and Mary Douglas Glasspool. They concelebrated our Holy Eucharist service Saturday morning, an unthinkable event in the vast majority of the churches where mass is said.

Not that our church or diocese is a paradise of gender equity. We heard a report that even in LA, male priests are paid more than women for comparable work. Nor has our stance on controversial questions earned universe acclaim. Bishop Glasspool is shown (top left) moderating a conversation about the proposed Anglican Covenant, which would impose unprecedented disciplinary procedures on the loosely federated family of churches know as the Anglican Communion. Punishment would be meted out when dioceses or provinces took actions that were offensive to other dioceses or provinces -- such as the ordination of women as bishops (which divides the Church of England) and TEC's continued insistence on the full sacramental stature of gay and lesbian people.

As usual, our two-day convention wasn't all speeches, budgets, resolutions, and elections. We heard a stemwinding sermon from our Diocesan bishop, J. Jon Bruno, urging everyone to bring a friend to church over Advent and Christmas (which I essentially repeated at church this morning). Calling in from Minneapolis, our beloved retired assisting bishop, Bob Anderson, who is in the late stages of pancreatic cancer, gave us a five-minute lesson on how to die in peace and faith (which I also repeated).

We prowled Riverside's historic, festooned Mission Inn. There was plenty of time for fellowship within our deputations (that's most of the crew from St. John's, above right) and with friends from around our far-flung, five-county diocese. Our worship was organized by Canon Randy Kimmler, a gifted liturgist. For the first time in my ten or so conventions, we didn't have an organ, just Fran McKendree and his Martin*. His voice, fingerpicking, and spirit filled the vast space as he led us in singing hymns, praise songs for thinking people, and Taize numbers.

A noted '70s folkie and an Episcopalian since youth, McKendree's become a welcome fixture at LA conventions and clergy conferences. For about two years after I saw his band, McKendree Spring, in high school, his composition "Got No Place To Fall" was my favorite song. Finding an mp3 would be the promised land.

***
*Fran writes that he was playing a 34-year-old Larrivee. Pretty embarrassing, since I'm a Larrivee guy myself.

Bring A Friend To Church

Advent initiative of the Rt. Rev. J. Jon Bruno of the Diocese of Los Angeles

Sadness For A Sacred Place

The 129-year- old chapel on the grounds of Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria was destroyed by fire yesterday. VTS has helped train thousands of Episcopal deacons, priests, and bishops, including our own Bishop Jon Bruno in the Diocese of Los Angeles.

Visiting VTS in September for an Episcopal schools meeting, I attended Holy Eucharist and Evening prayer services in the chapel that were largely conducted by seminarians. I could tell how much they loved the space and can only imagine how they and their faculty and alumni colleagues will miss it. Let us pray for a quick rebuilding, if that's possible.

During my visit, I posted this exterior photo on Facebook, which prompted a friendly dialog between two colleagues about the relationship between the seminary chapel and Immanuel Church on the Hill. Wrote the Rev. Peter Ackerman, Immanuel's associate rector:

[W]hat is more commonly known as Seminary Chapel is in fact called Immanual Chapel or Immanuel Church on the Hill. ICOH began as an outreach of the seminary in that very space and since it was on a hill, thereby came the name. When the parish was allowed to run on its own, the seminary donated property down and across the street where they built their office, rectory, parish hall and what is known as Zabriske Chapel. So ICOH the organization is across the street, but the Immanuel Chapel, where we still worship for two service on Sundays, is on the Seminary grounds.

And so we pray for a local congregation in mourning as well.

From Dead Into Life

When I arrived on Capitol Hill from Dulles early Wednesday evening, my dinner companion, who has a fascinating international portfolio that need not concern us further, slipped me a small shopping bag containing 12 CDs (actually, more than that; most are double albums). They ranged from 1967, when Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia and bassist Phil Lesh spun and talked about their favorite records on a radio show in San Francisco (it's astonishing the tape of the show exists) to a concert Garcia and mandolinist David Grisman performed at San Francisco's Warfield Theater in February 1991. My friend said the recording of the second set would be one of his ten desert island discs. You know the concept: If you were stranded on a desert island forever, what albums would you take (in case you couldn't take your iPod)?

Garcia's first instrument was the banjo, which my friend said he took up during what he called "the Great Folk Scare" of the early 1960s. For several years he and Grisman tailed Bill Monroe, the father of bluegrass music, and taped his concerts (the way people would later tape Dead shows). The 1991 set in question, which my friend played in the car, begins with "The Thrill is Gone," a 195os blues song popularized by B. B. King and belted out by Garcia in a husky but sonorous voice I'd never heard from him before. It continues with some country standards ("Old Rocking Chair"), a few Dead songs, and Irving Berlin's "Russian Lullaby."

So I have a feast of several weeks' music to listen to, including a Dead concert my buddy and I attended on Sept. 15, 1987 at Madison Square Garden. It includes "China Cat Sunflower">"I Know You Rider" (ask your local Deadhead what ">" means), which also appears on the Dead's commercially-released three-disc "Europe '72." My friend winces when I proclaim that the album captures them at the height of their powers. They played about 2,000 concerts, and he knows far better than I when the high points occurred. Indulgently, he also gave me a complete recording of a London show from May 1972 that comprises part of "Europe '72."

With the Dead dispatched, over a long dinner at a French restaurant about ten minutes' walk from the Capitol, we talked about friends, love, politics, Nixon, and synchronicity. Earlier in the week, I'd listened to a radio interview in which mandolinist Ricky Skaggs talked about performing with Bill Monroe, and here was my friend talking about Garcia's Monroe tapes. On my flight from Long Beach, I'd just read Terry McDermott's New Yorker profile of the enigmatic sociopath Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who dreamed up the Sept. 11 atrocity and marketed it to Osama bin Laden. In the original plan, he was going to hijack ten planes, use nine as bombs, and land the tenth safely, climb out, wave, and hold a press conference. McDermott writes that KSM also conferred with and helped fund the Jersey City-based architect of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. When I mentioned all this, my friend said that his and his wife's favorite picture was taken in Jersey City, with the World Trade Center in the background, and that while they'd been friends for years, their affection had deepened in the traumatic aftermath of the attacks, resulting in their marriage.

Once we'd turned to matters of faith, I learned that these little non-coincidence coincidences mean a little more to me than to my friend. When they occur I usually experience a frission of alertness, as if something has locked into place. I find, for instance, that if I think of someone and then call him, it was usually the right thing to do at just that time. That doesn't mean it's magic, since these days calling someone is probably always the right thing to do (instead of e-mailing or Facebooking or, worst of all, doing nothing). And yet I do see them as little evidences of the sovereignty of God. No less spiritual but perhaps somewhat more democratic, my friend is inclined to think that noticing any coherence amid the universe's seeming chaos and prevailing cruelty means that one has learned to observe creation "with the third eye open."

After dinner he dropped me at the Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, where I was due this morning for a meeting of the governing board of the National Association of Episcopal Schools. I'd never been here before and tried to find someone to guide me, but by 11 all the gentle seminarians appeared to have said their prayers and gone to sleep. I soon found my way across a broad, dark lawn to the snug campus guest house.

This afternoon, during a conversation about the challenges facing Episcopal schools and parishes, I remembered something else my friend had said at dinner. Once a daily-mass Roman Catholic, he's taking a break from Rome because of its handling of the sexual abuse scandals. He praised the Episcopal Church for facing up to issues of gender and sexuality that most of Christendom ignores. Since Episcopalians are sometimes more inclined to wring our hands than ring our own bell, I repeated to my colleagues what my friend had said as evidence that our beloved, sometimes beleaguered church may yet end up as the most logical safe haven for the west's substantial cohort of enlightened orthodox. "And the thing about my friend," I added, "is that he's a Republican!"

The seminary playing host to our two-day meeting has been training Episcopal priests, deacons, and laypeople for nearly 200 years. These eminences include my bishop diocesan and our St. John's rector, Jon Bruno, and second-year seminarian Shivaun Wilkinson, a postulant for Holy Orders in the Diocese of San Diego. She's shown here with her classmate Laura, a postulant from Nebraska. Shivaun's parents and sister attend St. John's, so I thought I'd better check up. Plus she and her husband, Chris, are expecting their first child in February, and I wanted to get caught up on all all the news.

We made arrangements to meet at the daily Evening Prayer service in the campus chapel. Those who planned the liturgy combined the beautiful service in The Book Of Common Prayer with folk-style songs led by a four-member combo featuring guitars, bass, and mandolin (could've been Garcia, Lesh, and Grisman about 40 years ago; coincidence? I don't think so). We were 25 worshipers in all. As we sang the verses from Ecclesiastes first set to music by Pete Seeger in his song "Turn Turn Turn" and made famous by the Byrds, my eyes met those of a four-year-old girl who'd come to church with her mother, and I felt that frission again, this time the grace of knowing as a matter of absolute certainty that I'm doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing, and, this evening, doing it with the brave, talented, faithful young people who will lead our church far into this century. And what a church it is! Before we walked out of the beautiful old chapel into a warm September drizzle, we heard this old, beautiful prayer:

Keep watch, dear Lord, with those who work, or watch, or weep this night, and give your angels charge over those who sleep. Tend the sick, Lord Christ; give rest to the weary, bless the dying, soothe the suffering, pity the afflicted, shield the joyous; and all for your love's sake. Amen.

Holy Family First

Writing last month at the "Huffington Post," Robert Ross, president and CEO of the California Endowment, praised LA's Episcopal bishop (and our St. John's rector), Jon Bruno, for having the moxie to form a partnership with Holy Family Services, a venerable local adoption agency, after it refused to buckle to the demands of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles that it not place children with same-gender couples.

St. John's is proud to be a Holy Family "parish partner." In June, we celebrated Holy Family Sunday, welcoming Mary Bruno (left), who has devoted countless volunteer hours to the agency as a board member and advisor, and its executive director, Debra Richardson. With Mary is my wife, Kathy O'Connor, recently named to the agency's board. Thanks to the leadership of a dedicated, media-savvy layperson, Dot Leach, we're studying all the ways we can support and supplement the agency's mission of encouraging adoption and protecting children and mothers at risk.

Physician, Thy Healing Is Needed

Bishop Bruno prepares to receive the keys to St. Luke's in La Crescenta after a three-year legal battle.

"Why I Love My Bishop": Sermon for 14 Pentecost

The first time I preached at St. John's, five years ago last weekend, I talked about a Pittsburgh man who had given away most of his fortune and decided it was wrong for him to keep his spare kidney as well -- a cautionary tale, perhaps, for a community being asked to entrust itself to a new pastor (and vice versa). But when our Bishop, J. Jon Bruno, decided that St. John's and I were right for each other, I obeyed cheerfully. A few years earlier, when I felt I'd done nothing right and had nothing left to give, he promised that he knew better. His graciousness was a lifesaver and a life teacher. Often we learn more from such moments than the happier ones. Proclaiming a ministry of civility, community, generosity, moderation, and peace is considerably easier when we have experienced (and promoted) the opposite. My Sunday sermon is here.

Betwixon And Between

During the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in Anaheim in July, Bishop J. Jon and Mary Bruno (shown at left) chose the Nixon Library's East Room for their gala dinner in honor of Anglican Communion primates from around the world. In briefly welcoming them and the Brunos' other guests, I took the opportunity to enunciate the Episconixonian Creed. I just caught up with dinner coverage provided by my colleague and fellow Michigander, Pulitzer Prize winner the Rev. Pat McCaughan. Thanks, Pat!:

The Rev. Canon John Taylor, vicar of St. John Chrysostom Church in Rancho Santa Margarita and former director of the Nixon library, said the facility, which opened in 1990, was a wonderful setting for the gathering because like Anglicans, Nixon, the 37th U.S. President, was "a centrist. He was betwixt and between … what Nixon called enlightened realism or pragmatic idealism" is possibly a way forward for the church as well, with our polarized politics."

Taylor noted that Nixon was between two poles in American politics. "He was not welcomed by the far right of the Republican Party" because of his opening to China, improving relations with the Soviet Union and establishment of the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as relatively enlightened views on civil rights in the 1950s and forward, Taylor said.

Nor was he welcome "on the left in American politics because of the Vietnam War and his especially aggressive anti-communism early in his career."

Adopting The Rooster Took Real Guts

When Debra Richardson (show at left), executive director of Holy Family Adoption & Foster Care, welcomed Kathy and me to the 60-year-old agency's annual garden party in Pasadena on Saturday, she cheerfully noted that Holy Family doesn't get as many referrals (which is to say, adoptable children) from south Orange County as it once did. She offered to come down to St. John's one Sunday and drum up some business.

That's how this dedicated professional promotes life -- one precious starfish at a time. The keynote speaker, a poised, plain-spoken single mother named Michelle, told us she'd already decided to abort her second pregnancy when she found her way back to church and then to Holy Family, which let her study the background of a number of prospective adoptive families. Having briefly worked in a California Highway Patrol office, she know she'd found a home for her child the moment she saw the photo of a young CHP officer and his wife. She had us with that story. Then she said both she and her father had independently fixed on Hope as the baby girl's birth name. Holy Family, Holy Spirit stuff indeed.

As Michelle spoke, J. Jon Bruno, Episcopal Bishop of Los Angeles, stood beaming. Holy Family's fundraising tea was taking place in his and Mary Bruno's back yard. Our diocese became the non-profit agency's ecclesiastical partner three years ago after it ran afoul of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese over whether gay and lesbian parents should be permitted to adopt children. Rome said no; and so Bishop Bruno invited Holy Family to join our diocesan family. Both he and Mary serve on the board, along with several of his priests and deacons, alongside other dedicated volunteers, some of whom have served for 25 years or more. Board chairman is Kathy's and my old friend from his days at Whittier College, Joe Zanetta.

Above right are Bishop and Mary Bruno with Kathy (left) and the Rev. Cn. Ed Sniecienski, the bishop's chaplain and a Holy Family trustee, who says Kathy and I are his favorite Republicans. He keeps equivocating about who's first. Typical Episcopalian.

In visiting the Brunos' gracious home for the first time, Kathy and I hoped to encounter a certain feathered friend. Almost four years ago, Roy Wojahn, husband of my former St. John's colleague the Rev. Karen Ann Wojahn, bought her a ceramic rooster, festively garlanded with hay and a red and white ribbon, at a fundraising rummage sale. He hid it in her office. She hid it in mine. I put it under the altar at St. John's when she was celebrating Holy Eucharist. She put it in my car. I arranged for Roy to wrap it and put it under the Wojahn Christmas tree in 2006. She brought it to a dinner party Kathy and I threw for the first federal director of the Nixon Library, Tim Naftali, and hid it in the guest bathroom.

Before I could think of my next move, Mary Bruno, also among our honored dinner guests, learned of the escalating rooster ruckus and put it to an end by offering to give it a happy home. Typical Episcopalian! She also collects roosters. And on Saturday in Pasadena, there it was, hay, ribbon, and all, in an honored spot in her kitchen.