"Now you are called . . . to take your share in the councils of the Church."

John Maclauchlan Milne, Iona Shore


(As is so often the case on this blog, the painting has nothing to do with the post. It's just a piece of Scottish art that I love.)

I have a fairly easy gig right now in my day job. Because I'm teaching a 300-student lecture, I am just teaching one course this semester. That means only 100 minutes of classroom time a week. Now obviously there's preparation, supervising teaching assistants, wrestling with USF's reliably unreliable IT, and so forth, but still, it's an easy gig. And I just sent off a ton of research around the beginning of the month, so I can take a breather in that aspect of the job as well. (There are only so many times you can copyedit your own translation of Anselm's On the Procession of the Holy Spirit before you feel like giving up on the whole enterprise and turning Unitarian.)

So the Church's timing in claiming more of my attention is excellent. I am now on the Diocese of Southwest Florida's bishop coadjutor search committee. I was originally the clergy alternate for the Saint Petersburg deanery, but the varsity priest has been called away to a rectorate and I have been called up to the majors. (Massively mixed sports metaphors there.) I'm really excited about this, not least because all the tedious work has been done--its fruit is here, and if you're discerning a call to the episcopacy, this is a great diocese--and so I've come on at just the point where the work that makes people want to be on a bishop search committee actually starts happening.

Now I love the bishop I have. But to everything (turn, turn, turn) there is a season (turn, turn, turn), and I'm delighted and honored that I get to participate in the discernment of our next bishop. To whoever that might be: I'm already praying for you every day.

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