Financial Strain Evident at New York Diocesan Convention

The Living Church reports on the Diocese of New York Convention-

None of the approved resolutions produced extended debate, but approval of the $13.3 million budget as presented was approved only after the Rt. Rev. Mark Sisk, Bishop of New York, spoke in favor of it. The budget, which represented an increase of more than $880,000 over the previous year, was prepared last summer, before the severe financial downturn affected Wall Street.

Some convention delegates were prepared to go through the budget line-by-line on the convention floor, but Bishop Sisk urged against a floor fight. Instead, he promised that the trustees would carefully monitor expenses in light of the new financial situation facing most parishes. Bishop Sisk also promised that the diocese would not take excessively punitive measures against congregations which are unable to meet their assessment due to financial hardship.

In 2006 the 75th General Convention directed that the Revised Common Lectionary (RCL) become the official lectionary of the church effective on the First Sunday of Advent, 2007. General Convention also made a provision that year for continued use of the prayer book lectionary “for purposes of orderly transition, with the permission of the ecclesiastical authority until the first Sunday of Advent, 2010.”

However, the explanation approved by convention notes that “there is not a broadly-based consensus in the Diocese of New York that favors the Revised Common Lectionary over the lectionary found in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. Rather, since the adoption of the Revised Common Lectionary in 2007, it has become clear that well-reasoned preferences for both lectionaries are found among the church and clergy of the diocese.”

http://www.livingchurch.org/news/news-updates/2008/11/21/financial-strain-evident-at-new-york-diocesan-convention