With constantly shifting agendae, is a Sederunt by Sederunt approach helpful?

When I was planning this coverage of the 143rd General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, I thought I would simply recount each day on a linear basis. By last night I was wondering if that really was possible. Could I do that and make sense of things? By night I know that it is not the best way to make sense of what is happening.

As a result I am revising my approach. Tomorrow I will give more comprehensive summaries on aspects of the GA. I shall draw attention to themes, or reports or issues and attempt to link together all the various conversations that were held on those items. In addition I will provide comments on what I see as necessary to improve the conversations, streamline the time-frames, and generally make GA more efficient and more learned. At the moment there is a good deal of wasted time while there is precious little interactive dialogue.

Before I close though I do want to say that I think “due process” won out today on the very serious issue of human sexuality. Some very controversial recommendations have been deferred in order to give Presbyteries and Kirk Sessions time to give proper study to some reports that have been prepared as background to the issue. The vote was close but not close enough to require a counted ballot. The process adopted was very Presbyterian!!

g.w.