From the NT lessons for Monday in the week of Proper 7B (Pentecost 4, 2015)
Acts 5
12 Now many signs and wonders were done among the people through the apostles.

I will be spending most of this day on airplanes and in airports traveling from Cleveland, Ohio, to Salt Lake City, Ohio (via Atlanta, Georgia, for some reason) for the 78th General Convention of the Episcopal Church. I am an elected alternate deputy of the Diocese of Ohio and have also been appointed a Legislative Aide to Legislative Committee No. 11, a committee of bishops, clergy, and lay deputies who will conduct hearings about, consider, possibly amend, and make recommendations to the two Houses with regard to the Prayer Book, Liturgy, and Church Music. ~ There are a number of things that will be done at this meeting of the General Convention: decisions will be made about the church’s response to marriage equality; about the commemoration of saints; about the structure of the church (whether to make the General Convention smaller, whether to do away with Provinces, how to constitute the Executive Council, what authority to give the Presiding Bishop, and so forth); a budget will be adopted; and a new Presiding Bishop will be elected. And a lot of other things will be dealt with, as well. ~ Will “many signs and wonders [be] done among the people”? I sort of doubt it. We like to believe that our General Conventions, our diocesan conventions, our deliberative assemblies and church synods continue the tradition of the apostles, but we seldom accomplish anything that has the impact the Book of Acts ascribes to their actions. Nonetheless, these decisions are and will be important to the Episcopal Church and its members, episcopal, presbyteral, diaconal, and lay. ~ So, all of us who will be there, bishops, deputies, staff, and volunteers, will very much appreciate the prayers of the people among whom, and on whose behalf, all of our “signs and wonders” will be done.