Parish Dialogue, by Rob Field

Mosaic from Montecassino Abbey

When I came to St. Philip’s 10 years ago as rector, I quickly learned that we are a microcosm of the Episcopal Church as a whole. As I’m quick to remind folks here, the full spectrum of viewpoints is represented under our one roof.

This means that, after General Convention 2003 and the controversy over The Right Rev. Gene Robinson’s confirmation as Bishop of New Hampshire, we had a fairly urgent need for dialogue about “the issues.” My conviction was that we needed a structured forum of some sort, a safe place for self-described “traditionalists,” “progressives” and “centrists” to share with each other their beliefs about human sexuality and – perhaps – how they acquired them. After some anxious hand-wringing, I decided to organize a six-week event to promote this kind of dialogue.

Looking back, I can name a few things which I would do again under similar circumstances. I identified two men and two women in the parish I considered “bridge people” – folks with a track record of being slow to take sides or grind axes. They became the facilitators of the small groups, which were a central component of the dialogue. Then, I began to assemble articles, audio programs and videos which represented different sides of the issue. For every good argument made by a traditionalist, I looked for a counter-argument by a progressive and, if possible, a centrist. One of the best resources was a video curriculum produced by the Diocese of Atlanta. I don’t remember the title, but I do recall that it featured John Westerhoff. Of course, we had the usual ground rules for the small group discussions: speak only for yourself from personal experience, respect all members of the group, etc.

I was gratified that, at the end of the forum, the evaluations were uniformly positive. They indicated that a significant number of people had grown in their understanding of other people’s perspectives as well as their own. And, in the end, that’s exactly what I’d hoped our dialogue would accomplish. --The Rev. Rob Field