"What's is all about?" Or what matters? Or what is the mission? This may be a bit of a rant. Bear with me.

        Our days here are each focused on a topic which connects to the Bible Study and is developed in the indaba group. We discuss the ministry of the bishop in connection with the daily topic.

        Our first topic was general: what is a bishop supposed to do in the Church?. Then we turned to Evangelism -- how we proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. This included new ways of connecting people with Jesus in the 21st Century -- "fresh expressions," "emergent church," etc. In short: looking for the best ways of connecting people with Jesus.

       Then we turned to social justice and Millenium Development Goals. We didn't just haul off and march. We had a time of education and sharing before we started tallking to the world. MDG's: people suffering and dying. Seemed like important stuff. Today, we dealt with Ecumenism -- our efforts to build bridges across the divides in Christianity so we can work together for justice and mercy as we do in Nevada through R.A.I.N and share sacramental and pastoral ministry across denominational lines as we do each week in Lovelock and Winnemucca. "That they may be one," Jesus prayed. Tonight we had our first plenary educational session on the Church and the Environment, with specific emphasis on climate change.

        Well, some of my indaba group (not Africans -- Australians and one American) keep pressing to scrap the agenda so we can spend the rest of our time talking about "the real issue "-- gays in the Church. Citing an article from the secular press, they called our public adviocacy for the Millenium Development Goals a "distraction" from our real issue -- sexuality. Bishop Roskam and I rather emphatically stated we, not the world or the press, should define what is the mission and what is the distraction. I am amazed some folks are so obsessed with sexuality issues they would set aside the proclamation of the gospel, the alleviation of massive suffering, and the threat to our eco-system. Just amazed. Fortunately the majority of the group is staying with the agenda. The agenda does have time built in for dealing with issues of human sexuality -- which are real issues, and important ones -- just not to the exclusion of evangelism and justice.

        On a more positive note: some of us have talked with the Sudanese bishops and things are much better there than they sounded. There was a lot of misunderstanding. For example, the Sudanese primate called for a halt to American litigation -- but he thought we were the ones getting sued. He, himself, has litigated the same property issues some of our dioceses are litigating in order to preserve the Anglican Church in his Province. And, while, he opposes the episcopacy of the bishop of New Hampshire, the Sudanese bishops all value their communion with us in the American Church. He will be issuing a clarifying statement soon and we are having a reception for the Sudanese tomorrow.

       Some justice issues we Americans had not fully understood are coming up. The East Indians have told us shocking stories about the caste system there and asked us to take a stand such as we did on apartheid in South Africa. The issue of human trafficing has also come up as something we need to take a hard look at in terms of American participation in exploitation of poor people in developing nations. The Church may be able to make some important difference here. We need to learn more.