It is appearing more and more likely a female Bishop will emerge from the 46th General Conference currently being held at the Convention Center in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Friday, a special resolution was suggested that would mandate a female being made Bishop this year. Most contention was it would happen anyway just by the nature of this year's vote.
What is far less certain is who the female Bishop will be. There are two prime candidates being considered, both have impeccable qualifications. Consensus says either would make a good Bishop.
The two above mentioned candidates are Rev. Vashti Murphy McKenzie and Presiding Elder Carolyn Tyler-Guidry.
One of these two talented and annointed ladies probably will leave Cincinnati bearing the title of Bishop.
A major question still lingering is how many Bishops will be elected this time around? Observers have set the figure as low as two and as high as seven. The safest bet would probably be somewhere between those two extremes. The number of Bishop slots available will probably influence the nature of the vote and who will, and who won't be elected.
The Episcopal Committee is scheduled to report Saturday so perhaps there will be a clarification as to how many Bishops will be elected.
A major flap occurred yesterday when the budget was presented to the General Conference.
Bishop Ming chaired this session.
As soon as the figures were announced, the new budget was set for nearly 12 million dollars, the emotions started to flow. The Second Episcopal District seemed most distressed over the new budget. A spokesperson said their contribution to the budget had grown to an unmanageable level.
A substitute motion was put on the floor that mandated the upcoming budget show a 22 per cent increase over the budget adoped for the 1996-2000 budget. This increase then would be allocated to the Episcopal Districts using the same formula that was used to construct the budget that was rejected. Four Episcopal Districts, the Third, the Fourth, the Nineth and the Twelth, were to be exempt from any increase in both the old as well as the new budget.
As the discussion got more heated and intense, Bishop Ming who has just returned from a najor sickness, passed the presiding role on to Bishop Vinton Anderson.
It took Bishop Anderson a few minutes to regain control, but once he did, the going was smooth for the remainder of the afternoon. The budget essentially was the only piece of business discussed for that session.
Church Treasurer, Richard Allen Lewis, was asked to recalculate the budget using the newly passed 22 per cent figure. The new budget will be brought back to the delegates, placed side-by-side with the budget they rejected for final approval.
In the evening, Bishop Harold B. Senaltle was presiding and the going got rough again with the presentation of the Revisions Committee report.
There were two piecces of proposed legislation that sparked some controrversy. One piece suggested the mandatory retirement of ministers when they hit age 75.
Another controversial bill was drafed to ensure the quality of ministers being ordained. It called for a college degree before ordination as a deao nd a degree from an accredited seminary in order to be ordained as an elder.
Members of the African delegations called for a modification of that bill saying Africa does not have the institutions necessary to make such education available. They added this would mean a large number of South Africans would not be ordained.
The original call was to modify the bill, but after some heated debate another motion was put on the floor and passed, to delete the bill.
Many in attendence claimed Bishop Senaltle had improperly conduct several of the votes. They said the mandatory retirement vote was improper since he never asked for the disssenting votes before passing the motion.
This dispute started almost at the stroke of 10 p.m. Some one reminded the Conference that the church would have to pay $10,000 if the Conference went five minutes beyond 10 p.m.
The words of warning had barely ceased to echo through the mammoth Center then streams of people began to exit. That effectively ended Friday's business and the introduction of a visiting CME Bishop was delivered to the backs of those departing.
