Update from the CANA Council Day 2

From BabyBlue Online (blog):

Friday, July 31, 2009


I'm here at the 2009 CANA (Convocation of Anglicans in North America) Council meeting at the Church of the Epiphany in Herndon, VA. We've had meetings and gatherings and teachings as well as the Bishop of CANA's pastoral address today. There is a wide-variety of folks here (talk about full inclusion!) - from low church evangelicals to high church Anglo Catholics, women who are nuns and women who are ordained clergy, lots of military chaplains (that's a ministry that is just exploding in CANA), midwesterners and southerners and westerners and every thing in between - church planters looking at architecture plans at the Scott-Long Booth to delegates hovering over the book table, seminars on healing and seminars on art, Trinity School for Ministry is here as well as many others who have ministry booths lining the halls going into the main church nave. The parking lot is packed with cars with plates from all over the country - there's far more blending in rather than staying in comfortable huddles as relationships continue to be built and expanded. It really does feel like a family now - and the family is growing!

One of the most interesting things to watch is how CANA will be folded in to ACNA. I've been doing a lot of thinking about that. For us in Virginia, we've seen CANA as a lifeboat - but not the Love Boat. The question is - when will we hit land? Is land far off - or will it come in sight soon? This is one of the major questions. There seems a lot of energy to move into the Anglican Church of North America (CANA is not a church, but is it a diocese?). But if it's a diocese then what are the districts that are springing up, following the Anglican District of Virginia (ADV) model? Are those future dioceses in ACNA or are they more like regions or deaneries you'd find in a diocese? This is a time to ask questions - and realize that answers aren't going to be discovered by someone else. The answers are nearer than that - in fact, they may be as close as the person sitting next to you.