Synod is over…

Synod 2007 June 13th, 2007

I hope you’ve been able to keep up with some of the business at synod through my posts. It has been a real joy! Synod is now over (ended yesterday morning with the installation of John Ornee as president and Carol Bechtel as Vice President). The week was capped off with worship and the celebration of Communion.

JJ and I (and, of course, Sophia) are home. The trip went well.

I’d like to publicly thank Ethan Ketelaar who house-sat and took care of our dear dog Carina. He is a great guy and did and awesome job.

So, back to normal blogging…

Grace and Peace,

`tim

2 Responses to “Synod is over…”

  1. T.Billings Says:
    June 13th, 2007 at 10:57 pm

    Tim,
    Thanks for your super-helpful account of General Synod! One query though that I haven’t heard anything about the outcome on - what happened with the Church Herald question? Was a decision made?

    TB

  2. teejtc Says:
    June 14th, 2007 at 10:28 am

    Thanks for the note.

    Regarding the Church Herald. R-23 was bundled with R-24 & R-27 — which goes to show how tired people where (since, although all three were about bylaw changes, they were for different groups!) In any case, they were passed (which, in the case of R-23, changed the Herald’s bylaws.)

    The other pertinent question was whether to keep assessing for every-household delivery. Although that’s a huge change, he presented budget was approved which automatically ceased the Herald assessments. It will now be a subscription-only publication.

    For the record. The base assessments were approved at $32.34 (R-7). R-8 and R-9 added $1.50 for Retired pastors (this has been the case for years to overcome poor denominational planning in the past) and $4.49 for theological education. The total per-member General Synod assessment for 2008 is then set (according to R-10) at $38.37. (That’s down from $39.32 this year.)

    I’m afraid, for a lot of people, a 97-cent reduction in assessments is going to look pretty tiny when they recognize that estimates on the cost of purchasing a subscription to the Church Herald, are over $20 (if bought individually) or somewhere around $15 (if purchased in bulk by a local congregation).

    Hope that answers a little…

    Grace and Peace,
    `tim

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