Reflections from the President of Standing Committee

Dear Sisters and Brothers,

It has been three years since we began our journey of discerning who we are as a diocese, reflecting on our past relationships, and the root causes of our problems. This phase is concluded.

We have taken our time to work hard together and are now ready to move forward. With the announcement of our nominees for Third Bishop of El Camino Real, we enter the final phase – the transition time before the election and installation in June and November, respectively.   It has been an exciting ride filled with many opportunities for healing, growth, and enrichment for ourselves as individuals as well as for the diocese.  I am so very proud of all that has been done by both laity and clergy, as we have walked together on the path towards our future. 

I believe the beginning of our journey began in May of 2004 when we held the first Lay Conference at St. Stephens in San Jose.  It was a spirit-filled and exciting time that set the tone for what was to come. Since then we have met together as clergy and laity discerning who we are, where we were going, and who we want to be. It has not always been easy, but through those times we have come to know each other better, to trust each other, and to learn together.

This also has been a time of sharing with Sylvestre Romero, our Assisting Bishop.  What a role model he has been for all of us. His humility, strong faith, wisdom, and compassion have taught us much.  We have learned more about what shared ministry means and how that can contribute to a stronger diocese. I believe we are learning that we need a better understanding of multi-cultural ministry, a greater sense of what evangelism truly means, and that church growth is crucial to our survival. These are the ways in which we reach out to the world. We still have much to learn in these areas, but we are developing the tools to do this effectively.

Good working relationships are developing between the Bishop, Standing Committee, Council, Corporation, COM, the clergy, laity, and other committees and diocesan bodies. Communication has improved among these bodies with the liaisons between the groups being a key factor. Communication has also improved within the diocese thanks to Donna Ross’s vision of how important effective communication is to our understandings of each other. We continue to work on ensuring that we make our communication as effective as we can to ensure that we are reaching everyone within our diocesan family.

Through the efforts of Brian Nordwick, Susan Altig, and Jo Ann McClain we have put our diocesan house in order to the point that our last financial Audit took only two days. As a result, Finance will be receiving the final report in April. Our five year Strategic Plan was completed on time through the efforts of many dedicated people. The work of the Diocesan Funding Review Committee (DFRC) and the Diocesan Evaluation and Structure Committee (DESC) set the tone for working together to achieve a common goal and the Collaborative Implementation Advisory Team (CIA-T) is carrying that work forward.

When we started this process three years ago the Standing Committee developed a document called Together We Can.  That gave us our road map and helped to identify those things we, as a diocese, needed to do. The Strategic Planning Committee used that document, along with several others, to prepare its report. Now we can say Together We Have.  I would like to add one more – Together We Are. What an accomplishment! What a journey!

There is one more step to take – the transition leading to the calling of our new bishop.   The Clergy Conference in April and the Lay Conference in May will give us information about that process. We will have the opportunity at these times to hear more about the nominees and to share in discussions about how we will effectively make that transition. It is very important that the transition is carried out with wisdom, understanding, and faith. We will need to remember that we are still discerning who we will call to be our next bishop. This is not just an election, it is a discernment process both for the diocese and the nominees. The Search Committee has modeled a prayerful and spirit-filled process for us, one that I am confident we will emulate as we move forward together.

Much progress has been made. I believe we have reached that time when we can say, through our process of discovery, we have attained the unity of spirit we were looking for - the unity that allows us to carry out our mission of spreading the good news to those within and without our diocese – to bring the good news to a broken world. We have spent three years looking inward, now it is time for us to reach out.  Is this not what God is calling us to do? This is what we are inviting our new bishop to do – to join us in our mission to spread that good news.

You have my gratitude and thanks for your patience and understanding, for who you are, and for what you have done. I feel very privileged to be sharing this journey with you. May God’s blessings be on all of us.

Ann