I almost knew how Mayor Bass must’ve felt, being out of the country during the wildfires. I’d planned to spend the first week of January in Jerusalem with fellow bishops but decided not to go because of other commitments.Being so far away from Kathy and all the people I love, and from my responsibilities, would’ve been a million kinds of awful. The mayor has had to answer questions about what she’d known about the extent of the danger and when she knew it. The same might well have been true for me. I’d decided against the trip months before. But the original plan was to fly around Jan. 2. Deadly winds had been forecast at least a week ahead of the worst of it on Jan. 7-8, as I recall. Here’s hoping I’d have done the right thing and stayed home.
I’m writing these words at LAX en route Camp McDowell, outside Birmingham, Alabama, where the House of Bishops meets through next Monday. The forecast looks fine, notwithstanding a 100% chance of Trump. But it feels a little funny to be leaving. This isn’t about thinking one is indispensable or that colleagues wouldn’t be fully up to an unexpected challenge. It’s a sense I’ve always had that my ministry was predominantly local. In 2016, when the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles bishop candidates were taking questions at town meetings around the diocese, I can’t recall a single one about House of Bishops meetings.
Make no mistake. They go with the episcopal vocation. Skipping them requires a really good excuse. Work outside the diocese, including our historic ministry in Israel and Palestine, isn’t merely justifiable. It’s part of leadership in a global church. And I do love a road trip. But please keep the light on for me. Be right back!