Clergy Retreat
September 26, 2010 - September 28, 2010
Camp Mokule`ia
The annual retreat of the clergy of the Diocese will be held, as usual, on the last weekend of September, beginning on Sunday afternoon, September 26, and ending after lunch on Tuesday, September 28.
Registration will begin at 4:00 p.m. Sunday.
Eucharist will be held at 5:00 p.m., and dinner at 6:00 p.m.
The program will consist of the following:
- Discussion of Regional Confirmations
- Discussion the Anglican Covenant
- Learning about the new deployment database in The Episcopal Church.
There are two ways to register:
- Download and complete the Registration Form in either of the forms below and mail it to the Office of the Bishop with your registration fee.
- Register online, print the confirmation email you will receive, and mail it with your registration fee to the Office of the Bishop.
More information about the program:
Regional Confirmations have been the practice since Bishop Bob Fitzpatrick became the Diocesan Bishop in March 2007. He said then that he would review it with the clergy after three years.
The former Church Deployment Office in the Episcopal Church is now the Office of Transition Ministry. A new database of clergy and searching congregations, with a new format and structure, is in its final stages of construction. It will become "live" to the Diocese of Hawai‘i on September 28. Canon Liz Beasley will demonstrate the new database.
The primary focus will be the Anglican Covenant. Bishop Fitzpatrick wrote to the clergy in an email in July announcing this focus for the retreat:
"I would like us to prayerfully consider the Anglican Covenant.... I do want us to ponder the deep theological and historic differences in the various branches of and national experiences within Anglicanism. In many ways the Broad (liberal) Church has come to dominate the theological perspective of our Episcopal Church while at the same time we have become most 'catholic' in liturgical practice (admittedly this is generalization); our perspective is likely a minority voice within the total Communion. Anglican Evangelicalism has been an active part of most of the Communion since the Reformation with significant revivals through the centuries. It is certainly the dominant voice of the Church in much of Africa [when I taught in Nigeria fresh from General Seminary (early 1980's), it was a shock to experience such 'low' worship and such 'evangelical' theology (one Oxford trained Nigerian theology lecturer — now a bishop — thought that John R.W. Stott was a bit too 'liberal' — especially on the subject of the ordination of women)]. Much of the Communion addresses the faith in light of a significant colonial experience — both British and American. I would like you to study and pray through the Covenant looking for the truth in that with which one might disagree and trying to understand the 'why' behind the document. Are parts with which you do agree and can own? I also want to avoid an immediate rush to conclude something is not 'Anglican.' In our own time, Anglicanism has given us J.I. Packer and J.S. Spong. In the end, the questions behind all this may well be: 'Is there room for the Episcopal Church in the Anglican Communion in the 21st century?'; 'Is any "Covenant" even possible?'; and 'How do we truly discern the "indifferent" from the "essential" in the Christian faith and within an international community?' I hope all clergy will [devote] some study and prayer to the Anglican Covenant before we meet."
Page with information about the Anglican Covenant
Download the Anglican Communion Covenant document (in English)
Page with other downloads and documentation