From the Bishop's Desk

My world rocked when my Mom died. It has now been more than 20 years, but the memories are crystal clear.

 I knew she was dying, and thanks to the popular book, “Tuesdays with Morrie” ( Mitch Albom, Doubleday, 1997) I had initiated Mondays with Mom.  Every Monday we talked. We sorted childhood photos of my three brothers and I. We divided up “stuff” that she wanted each of us to have.  Mom had Myasthenia Gravis and in the early days of this auto immune disease, the treatment was invasive and damaging. She was on oxygen and the compressor hose limited her distance and movement, so we usually met at her house.  One day she asked if I could be a pastor with her. My inner voice said NO, screamed NO, I don’t want to talk about death. Not with you.  But my outside voice said sure, what do you want to talk about. “Tell me about heaven” she asked through teary eyes. “Do you think your time is close to going there?” I asked. She nodded.

What did a pastor of less than ten years experience know about heaven?  I said she would be free of her oxygen hose!! She laughed. I said she would be free, at peace, held in love. 

Gaining courage, I said, she would be okay, it would be okay, she would not be alone and we, all her children and family, would miss her dearly and remember her and her legacy, but we would be ok. She was free to go and I thanked her for being a wonderful Mom, a loving Grandma and for teaching me about compassion.  It was a hard conversation, but I am SO grateful we had it.

She died that week.  Grief is hard, but this conversation was a beautiful bridge to the continuous bonds I have with my Mom.  I live compassion daily because of her.

Grief is a human emotion felt when we experience loss; human loss, health, employment, pets, relationships. Grief is a challenging topic.  We live in a death averse, grief illiterate society. We don’t want to talk about it.

Pauline Boss wrote, “The Myth of Closure: Ambiguous Loss in a Time of Pandemic and Change (W.W.. Norton 2021).  She poignantly wrote about unresolved grief, not associated with the death of a loved one. Ambiguous loss is grieving someone who is still with you but the circumstances have changed. For example, someone with Alzheimer’s or a traumatic brain injury, severe depression, divorce, missing people, climate change, racism.  Boss pointed out that we all grieved deep ambiguous losses during the pandemic.  The losses were immense, and largely unnamed.  Loss of security, freedom, family traditions, ability to travel, social connections, jobs, childcare, graduations, weddings, celebrations, church traditions and predictability.

I have been in a church every Sunday since being elected Bishop and I listen deeply.  I hear a church that is deeply grieving. The church is grieving many levels of ambiguous loss. Loss of certainty, loss of the clarity, loss of beloved Bishops, loss of what was, full churches, youth groups of the past, large choirs, big Sunday Schools.  Grief can often bubble up as anger. People feel like control is lost, but it really isn’t, things are changing. Change is okay. We are a resilient church.

I took an intensive course on grief and loss over Holy Week and I found myself writing grief papers intermingled with Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter sermons.

It was quite profound. The ambiguous grief the disciples did not understand, the trauma of the crucifixion and the lack of clarity and predictability, how to understand resurrection. It was frightening and chaotic.  And yet, Jesus was there, breathing peace, telling them to let go, to not be afraid and to be commissioned as God’s disciples, to go and share God’s love. And they did, and so will we.

The continued bonds of Love are far deeper than the last 50 years of baby boomers and post-World War II population and church growth in Canada. The continuous bonds of God’s love extends far back. Out of chaos, our story and God’s story unfolded and continues to unfold. We will not be alone, we will not be afraid, we will go out and be God’s people in a changing society. God’s church is not dying, it is rebirthing. Peace to new beginnings.

From June 20 to 22, 2024, the Eastern Synod gathered under the ELCIC’s triennial theme “Let there be greening!” It’s a beautiful theme, a prayer that speaks to me about many of the things we hope for, pray for, and yearn for in this season of our synod’s and our world’s life.

During Synod Assembly 2024 we reflected on the need for a greening of our environment. Care for Creation needs to be a top priority for all of us as congregations and individuals. Kudos to those congregations who have registered as being a Greening Faith Community or joining the Zero Emission Churches partnership, and to all who are working to identify annual stewardship of creation goals and to encouraging each other in seeking and working toward climate justice.

We reflected on the need for there to be a greening of peace within our world. The Geneva Academy of International Law and Human Rights reports that there are currently 110 armed conflicts happening in the world right now and that more countries are experiencing such conflict than at any time in the past 30 years. Our global mission companion, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land is experiencing horrific levels of distress as they seek to proclaim Christ amid the war in Gaza and associated acts of violence and oppression in the occupied West Bank. In a video address to the Synod Assembly, Bishop Ibrahim Sani Azar expressed deep thanks to those of you have supported our church’s appeal in support of the ELCJHL and to our Synod Council who have provided just over $50,000.00 to that appeal in the name of our synod.

We reflected on what the synod is doing to help encourage a greening of our congregational ministries. In the past three years, Eastern Synod congregations and related organizations have received $725, 000 and counting in grants to support new and innovative mission initiatives. Those grants have been made possible through the generosity of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada via the ELCIC Mission Fund and because of generous bequests provided to the synod by our forebears in the faith.

And, finally, we made electoral decisions that will translate into a greening of our synod’s leadership. I am heartened and very pleased with the election of Bishop-elect Carla Blakley, Vice-Chairperson Sara Whynot, Secretary Chris Hulan and Treasurer Frederick Mertz! These newly identified leaders bring new vision and new skills that will bless our synod immeasurably in the coming years! Please do everything you can to support them and encourage them so that the greening they represent might flourish and grow in rich abundance! I know that I will be!

In June 2024, the Eastern Synod will be electing a new bishop. As we engage in this time of discernment, Bishop Pryse continues his reflections on where and how the bishop’s ministry is exercised.

By the time you read these words, you will have been presented with a slate of names identifying those persons who have been nominated for election as our synod’s next bishop and vice-chairperson. Allowing one’s name to stand in nomination is not easy and all the nominees are to be commended for engaging this process of discernment with us. It takes a lot of courage.

A few months after I was installed as bishop of this synod in 1998, I attended an event where the then primate of the Episcopal Church USA was discussing episcopal ministry. He began by telling us a story about how he had responded to his own nomination to allow his name to stand for election to that particular office. Upon receiving notice of the nomination he went to his spiritual director saying he was at a loss as to how to respond. His spiritual director – very pastorally – said to him, “Face it, Frank – you’re a coward!” “You’re afraid because either way – if you participate in this process – you will have to deal with your own poverty – the poverty of not being chosen, or the poverty of “being” chosen.”

Most of us can probably understand the poverty of not being chosen. But few of us experience the poverty of having been chosen, of being pulled from a place of vocational confidence and competency to a place of vocational questioning and uncertainty.

Now retired Bishop Michael Ingham from the Diocese of New Westminster put it this way in an Anglican Journal article. “I remember a day early in my episcopate when I entered a room full of friends and colleagues. I was astonished when they all stood up! In the next few weeks, my jokes became funnier, my casual observations strangely more profound, and great interest was taken in my well-being in a way never shown before! The process of distancing and elevating had begun.”

“I was overwhelmed with demands. Every organization wanted me to articulate my “vision” for the church. Every priest and deacon wanted time with me. Every lingering conflict turned up fresh at my door. I was asked to make decisions about matters of which I had no understanding.” That is part of the poverty of having been chosen.

When I was elected, Bishop Huras told me that no one would sit beside me when gathered in a circle with colleagues. “No one wants to look like they’re sucking up!” I was stunned by his words and sadly surprised to learn that he was right! I was startled by how quickly the process of distancing had begun! Sadly, that, too, is part of the poverty of having been chosen.

As we prepare to elect new leaders in the life of our synod, I urge you to be urgent in prayer, generous in spirit and compassionate of heart. All of those who we will consider, whether identified in the nomination process or in the ecclesiastical ballot, are precious and beloved human beings; whether elected or not.  In their offering to serve they will, indeed, experience a poverty. We owe them our deep respect and most generous gratitude.

In June 2024, the Eastern Synod will be electing a new bishop. As we engage in this time of discernment, Bishop Pryse offers some reflections on where and how the bishop’s ministry is exercised.

It’s not uncommon for the bishop to become an object lesson for the Sunday morning children’s message. In a laudable effort to introduce the visitor at the front of the church who wears a big cape and carries a big stick, the bishop gets trotted out for a visit with the kids. And invariably, the pastor asks, “Who knows what a bishop does?”  

One Sunday morning an all-too-clever pre-teen shouted out, “They move diagonally!” We all laughed, but there was more than a little truth contained in that youngster’s answer!

The bishop is always moving, sometimes diagonally, sometime forward and sometime backward; always moving between different expressions of the church. One Sunday in a rural congregation in Lunenburg County, Nova Scotia and the next to an urban ministry in the heart of downtown Toronto.  Then off to a meeting of the National Church Council or a solidarity visit in support of one of our Global Mission Companions. The bishop is always moving back and forth between the church’s most local and widest expressions. And in that movement, the bishop can become a means of connection that strengthens the bonds that unite us as fellow members of the body of Christ.

All human beings and human institutions are vulnerable to the dangers of parochialism. We are all tempted to value only our own very particular perspectives, experiences, and aspirations. As someone whose ministry engages a wide variety of local and wider expressions of church, the bishop can help broaden perspectives and make connections that can enhance the functioning of the whole body.

When the bishop sits at meetings of the National Church Council or the Conference of Bishops, they must carry their synod’s congregations and rostered leaders with them. Likewise, when the bishop engages with congregations and rostered leaders at the most local level, they must always carry with them the experiences, perspectives, and aspirations of our wider church partners.

St. Paul, writes, “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many.”

No single expression of the church can live in isolation. Bishops are called to help make connections and broaden perspectives.  They move diagonally. They must listen carefully, reflect prayerfully, and share generously. And in that sharing our experience of discipleship can be made richer and the health of the whole body made stronger.