There has been so much written about the investiture and installation of our new Presiding Bishop that I almost feel that I have nothing to add. If you have not already visited that National Cathedral website, you are missing some great pictures. To those images, I can only add my own very personal impressions as one who was there.

First, when it comes to liturgical celebration, we Episcopalians do things right. I don't believe I have ever been part of a more glorious worship service, one which combined both the ancient beauties of our Anglican liturgy with the full spectrum of our American diversity. There were dancers, Native American drummers, and Gospel choirs. Somehow it all fit together into a lively joyful celebration. An Englishman I spoke with remarked that we ought to send a mission to his country to show the English church how to do it right!

Secondly, although it was a moving occasion for me, I became aware that it was even more so for the women who were present. One woman priest recently recounted how it was not that long ago that she as a postulant was interviewed by a panel of 18 men, and then had to sit with their wives at lunch who told her never to forget that it was God's plan for her to be subservient to her husband. In just thirty years as a church, we have gone from allowing women to be priests, to making one the Presiding Bishop. Another woman wrote on a blog, "When I heard the knock at the cathedral door, I thought, ‘move over old men, there is a woman coming to set things right!'"

Finally, it became clearer to me that somehow the Holy Spirit is at work in all of this. By her own admission, Bp. Jefferts Schori never expected to be elected. I have shared with you before how I had felt as late as March of this year that she was only a "token" candidate. From a political standpoint, it was certainly the absolute worst time to elect a woman and perhaps further antagonize some in the wider Communion. But we did it anyway, not because we were making a statement, but because Katherine was someone we felt excited about. In her first few days in office, and by her demeanor in Washington, it is clear to me that she is living up to our expectations.

Now comes the hard part. Any new leader carries the hopes and dreams of those he or she leads. Some of those projections are unrealistic. But I am optimistic. If the Holy Spirit was truly at work in Katherine, then I am certain we have a bright future ahead.

A Final Thought . . .

Bishop Jefferts Schori may have only been Presiding Bishop for a few days, but already some of her remarks have caused a stir. Some conservatives have faulted her for not taking an exclusive view of salvation in which only those who believe in Jesus are allowed into heaven. There is good scriptural evidence for this view, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me." But what does Christian tradition have to say about this matter? Here is one view that comes to us from The Daily Episcopalian (Note: What follows is meant to be thought provoking and does not necessary reflect the views of your Bishop!):

In the days leading up to Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori's investiture, the Anglican right made a great deal of noise about interviews she gave to Time magazine, and to Robin Young of NPR's show Here and Now.
Time:
Q. Is belief in Jesus the only way to get to heaven?
Bishop Jefferts Schori: We who practice the Christian tradition understand him as our vehicle to the divine. But for us to assume that God could not act in other ways is, I think, to put God in an awfully small box.
NPR:
Robin Young: So you're saying there are other ways to God.
Bishop Jefferts Schori: Human communities have always searched for relationship that which is beyond them...with the ultimate... with the divine. For Christians, we say that our route to God is through Jesus. That doesn't mean that a Hindu doesn't experience God except through Jesus. It says that Hindus and people of other faith traditions approach God through their own cultural contexts; they relate to God, they experience God in human relationships, as well as ones that transcend human relationships
* * *
I am not going to transcribe the voluminous and frequently vitriolic responses that these interviews prompted in the usual quarters. Nor am I going to dispute that many evangelical Christians believe, in good faith, that salvation requires an explicit embrace of Jesus Christ as your personal savior. But that view is not normative outside evangelical precincts, and I think many of those shooting spitballs at our new presiding bishop know that.
For instance, The Catechism of the Catholic Church, says as follows:
"The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day."
"Those who no fault of their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience-those too may achieve eternal salvation."
Pope John Paul II said something similar in Dominus Iesus (2000):
"Nevertheless, God, who desires to call all peoples to himself in Christ and to communicate to them the fullness of his revelation and love, "does not fail to make himself present in many ways, not only to individuals, but also to entire peoples through their spiritual riches, of which their religions are the main and essential expression even when they contain ‘gaps, insufficiencies and errors'". Therefore, the sacred books of other religions, which in actual fact direct and nourish the existence of their followers, receive from the mystery of Christ the elements of goodness and grace which they contain."
"With respect to the way in which the salvific grace of God - which is always given by means of Christ in the Spirit and has a mysterious relationship to the Church - comes to individual non-Christians, the Second Vatican Council limited itself to the statement that God bestows it "in ways known to himself"."
Some of the most interesting thinking on the issue of "salvation outside the church" was done by the late Jesuit theologian Karl Rahner, who developed the notion of the "anonymous Christian," which he described as follows:
"Anonymous Christianity means that a person lives in the grace of God and attains salvation outside of explicitly constituted Christianity... Let us say, a Buddhist monk... who, because he follows his conscience, attains salvation and lives in the grace of God; of him I must say that he is an anonymous Christian; if not, I would have to presuppose that there is a genuine path to salvation that really attains that goal, but that simply has nothing to do with Jesus Christ. But I cannot do that. And so, if I hold if everyone depends upon Jesus Christ for salvation, and if at the same time I hold that many live in the world who have not expressly recognized Jesus Christ, then there remains in my opinion nothing else but to take up this postulate of an anonymous Christianity."
I am not suggesting that Rahner's view is beyond dispute, but it is not "unorthodox" and neither is Bishop Jefferts Schori.
I have no quarrel with people who want to believe that accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior is the only way to heaven. But it simply is not the case that those who disagree with you are in rebellion against some long-settled and universally accepted issue of Christian doctrine.