While munching a bagel in my hotel...

Last night I was in my legislative committee until midnight, so I'm taking the morning off. Marti Swords-Horrell (there's a familiar name!) is our reserve delegate, so she will sit in for me this morning with full voice and vote. Among other things, this gives me a chance to update you on what's been happening here.

First, though, an apology about the lack of pictures in this blog. I've been taking them and trying to upload them, but with no success. I'll keep trying, so keep checking back.

Since Friday most of my time has been in legislative committee (subcommittee). Mine is the Ministry and Higher Education committee, a group of about 100 from all over the world. Our committee was assigned over 230 petitions to review and make recommendations to the large body. Every petition must be reviewed and a decided upon! That's why we were at it until 12 midnight and will return to it over lunch.

The issues before us include:

• whether a pastor has the authority to deny a person membership in the church (we recommend rejection of this one),
• whether a local pastor (unordained but licensed persons pastoring churches) can vote for General conference delegates (this one we recommend approval),
• changes in the process of ordination to make it more streamlined (some petitions approved, some referred for further study)

For the most part there's been a pretty broad consensus on the issues. Most of us want to make the path to ordination more inviting to young people, less burdensome and more understandable, while not watering down the requirements.

Even around an issue with significant disagreement such as whether a UMC clergyperson could preside at the union ceremony of a same-sex couple, the debate was civil and respectful. I think all the work done to set the tone in our first couple of days here has made a difference. Our bishops emphasized the need to engage in "holy conferencing," listening to each other, speaking the truth in love and trusting God to speak in our midst, sometimes in challenging ways.

Our subcommittee voted not to change the current language in the Book of Discipline barring clergy from presiding at same-sex unions by a vote of 49-34. I can't say I was surprised by the vote. I think those numbers accurately describe our divide on issues related to the full inclusion of gay and lesbian persons. But I was encouraged by the spirit of our debate.

The rest of the week will be spent in plenary or "big group session" with all 992 delegates meeting together to officially vote on the petitions processed in the legislative committees. Those with overwhelming support of the legislative committees will most likely be accepted with little debate, but some will, no doubt, be dealt with by the whole body.

I'll check in with you later. Hope you are well!