CONCLUDING THOUGHTS.
I really do think that the national Church has to rethink how it does Synods. The model is very British parliamentary, which is supposedly that style so we can accomplish a lot. We sat in sessions from about 9 till 12, then 2 till 4 or 5, then 7 till 9 or 9:30 almost every day. Even the Americans don't do that. A bishop told me at one point that the Americans think the way we overwork people is "nuts."
Another problem is that the formal parliamentary system is very, very foreign to First Nations people at the General Synod, who are a very important part of it. While we can't pretend we're a small village and simply gather in a circle until we come to consensus, I do think things can be done to gone more in the direction of a consensus rather than a parliamentary model, complete with endless procedural wrangles and people making speech after speech without saying anything new.
I don't want to appear smug, but we do things a lot more humanely at Diocesan Synod. For instance, why couldn't we here have occasionally sat in table groups that mix people of varying opinions and theology and had table discussions, as we do in New Westminster (and I suspect at other diocesan synods)? Why didn't we have more social time just to get together and get to know each other.
What about panels, forums, other opportunities for real participation? We did have short (half hour) Bible study in small groups most mornings with a variety of people, and that was good, but that was talking about Scripture, important in iteself, not directly about the issues of governance and the same sex blessing. And so many other things were going on at the same time, that often only a few of the eight or nine people who were supposed to be in the study groups showed up.
There were a lot of presentations to Synod, informing us about various programs of the Church-but always it was a presentation. We were being talked to, not with.
We do have to spend some time in the parliamentary mode ("Mr. Chairman I move... Point of order... The Chancellor must rule... etc.) by our Constitution, but we should do this after we experience each other, and have come of a mind that we want to get on with real business. Once most people are in that state, and feel they have been paid attention to and really listened to, and have developed some trust with each other, they don't engage in filibusters and procedural wrangles - they want to get on with things.
I had the beginnings of real discussion with some conservative people one from Newfoundland and one from Alberta - on the next to last and last days of Synod. Why weren't the opportunities opened up earlier? Yes, it was partly my fault-I should have personally been more outgoing. But I was hardly encouraged to be.
Despite this "efficient" parliamentary model we didn't accomplish all that much. We did two things - elect a new Primate, and talk about the same sex blessing. A few other things were accomplished, but I feel what we did could have been done in two or three days rather than seven, if the process were decent. And we would have saved a lot of money-one estimate I heard was that all this cost the church at least half a million dollars.
A parishioner of Kevin's at St. Mary's in Kerrisdale took me to task for the picture of Kevin and Susan Brown dozing off. But they were exhausted-and not by late night partying, I don't think, but by the crazy process. Apologies for possibly embarrassing you, Kevin and Susan. But that picture summed up a lot of this meeting for me. Can we do better next time? We have three years to set it up and do it right in Halifax.