I also want to thank our diocesan Christian Educators Committee for their on-going ministry to our children and young people. They are a wonderful group of volunteers who are working to serve all of us. My hope is that this statement, which is still being written, and accompanying materials that will go out with it will build upon conversations and decisions which we have already made, but will also add a note of clarity about where we have come on our journey together. I believe that it should offer our congregations more freedom to exercise ministries of welcome and hospitality and regard for all people a personal commitment which I made long ago. It will reflect the fact that within our diocese and its many congregations thoughtful people have come to different conclusions.
Faithful people feel called in different ways.
It will be cast in such a way that no one will be compelled to choose against the dictates of conscience. Just as there should be freedom for all to be welcome, there will also be freedom for those to disagree. It opens the door for such freedom. It allows us the freedom to follow a vocation of hospitality and welcome that some may not understand and some may not choose to follow. In the end the challenge which we face today is really no different than the challenge which Jesus laid before his disciples so long ago on a hillside in Galilee.