By Pamela Filbert
Many folks in the Diocese of Oregon are aware that Bishop Akiyama, eight delegates, and two alternate delegates journeyed to Baltimore, Maryland, this past summer to attend the 80th General Convention of the Episcopal Church. General Convention is held every three years, with the exception of the most recent one. It was postponed a year due to the pandemic, occurring a full century after one that was very special to our diocese.
Why was the 1922 General Convention special for Oregon? Because it was held in our fair state! The largest meetings were held in the Portland Auditorium (now called the Keller Auditorium), which was drastically remodeled in the late 1960s. With a seating capacity of 4,500, it could easily hold the 498 delegates representing 69 dioceses, plus the house of bishops and many visitors. Smaller events were held at Trinity Church, the downtown public library, the Unitarian Church, and various hotels.
Notable guests included several prelates of Eastern Orthodox and Old Catholic Churches, since the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople had just recognized Anglican/Episcopal orders as valid earlier in 1922. Their presence was part of a movement towards full intercommunion, and one resolution that passed (as General Convention worked to edit the Book of Common Prayer that would be authorized six years later) was designed to synchronize language for the hoped-for union. It changed the title of the Communion rite to “The Devine Liturgy, being the order for the Lord’s Supper, or Holy Eucharist, commonly called the Holy Communion.”
Another important revision to the prayer book was in making marriage vows identical for each party; no more would women vow “to obey and serve” their husbands, or men recite “with all my worldly goods I thee endow.” (Incidentally, Bishop Sumner of Oregon voted against changing the marriage vows.) This convention also strengthened the penalties against the remarriage of divorced persons with living spouses. While this had always been disallowed, only the clergy officiating at such marriages could be sanctioned; now, anyone entering into such a marriage would be excommunicated unless they were the “innocent party” in a marriage ended by adultery. Convention also approved a resolution supporting federal control of marriage to prevent the unions of those deemed mentally or physically defective (part of the eugenics movement popular at the time).
One of the first orders of business was the proposed resignation of Robert Lewis Paddock, the first Bishop of Eastern Oregon, due to ill health. His resignation was accepted after two hours of private debate, with the Bishop of Olympia appointed as his interim successor. The Rev. Thomas Jenkins, Rector of St. David’s, Portland, was one of six nominated to become the second Bishop of Eastern Oregon. The Diocese of Eastern Oregon was only fifteen years old at the time and struggling. However, the Presiding Bishop spoke against a proposal to unite it with any neighboring diocese. “Look around at Oregon, and see the fertility of its soil, its timber, its orchards, and the prosperity of her people, and you will see what a great future there is in store for this country. Eastern Oregon should have a bishop of its own.”
In another piece of local business, the Presiding Bishop laid the cornerstone for St. Michael and All Angels Church in northeast Portland. Here is a PDF of the news clipping of that event. A loan for the final $800 necessary to begin construction was approved the same week.
In September 2022 honoring the bicentennial of the St. Michael and All Angels’ cornerstone being laid, Presiding Bishop Michael Curry offered this message to the congregation, and the diocese.
American women had just been granted the ability to vote in all civil elections two years earlier, so it seemed likely they would now be given the chance to perform various official roles in the church, such as serving as lay readers and voting at General Convention. None were approved. Proposals for a non-alcoholic chalice and for dispensing with the common cup altogether were both given thumbs down. A resolution to allow suffragan (assistant) bishops to vote at General Convention also did not pass.
Two of the suffragan bishops attending the convention were Black: Edward Thomas Denby of Little Rock, Arkansas, and Henry Baird Delaney of Raleigh, North Carolina. The latter also served as vice-principal of St. Augustine’s School (now St. Augustine’s University) and was the first African-American to serve as bishop. Two of Bp. Delaney’s daughters would later become centenarians and have their life stories documented in Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters’ First 100 Years. One can only imagine how they would all feel to know that the General Convention one hundred years later would be presided over by a Black bishop, who had even preached at an English royal wedding four years earlier!
On the other hand, many contemporary events sadly mirror those described in the coverage of 1922’s convention. Mob violence was denounced by one resolution, inspired in part by the tarring and feathering of Archdeacon Irwin in Miami, Florida, a year earlier after he preached at a Black congregation. “There appears to be a very close and intimate connection between these increasing acts of mob violence and the recent rapid growth of religious prejudices and racial antipathy, fostered by certain elements in our country, which, sometimes in the name of patriotic Americanism, have capitalized bigotry, hatred, and intolerance.”
Something else that seems sadly familiar appeared in The Oregon Daily Journal’s section of “hometown news,” run especially for visiting delegates. Californians could read on September 19th that eight big forest fires in various sections of their state had already burned more than 50,000 acres.
Californians, and everyone else, could also read about the splendid banquet that occurred the previous Saturday evening. Oregon’s governor and Portland’s mayor had officially welcomed delegates in an Auditorium filled with thousands of roses. Two bishops and seven lay delegates had been knighted as honorary Royal Rosarians, and each had been presented with his own rose bush to tend carefully back home. In addition, an award-winning rose variety had been officially named for the mother of its cultivator, whose father had served as treasurer of the Episcopal Church.
Other diversions from official business included trips to Seaside, the Columbia River Gorge, and even the Pendleton Round-Up. The Bishop of Southwestern Virginia was so impressed by the splendor of Oregon’s natural wonders that he proposed adding a new prayer to the BCP, calling attention to the many beauties of nature.
Read the 1922 Journal of Convention here.
In the days leading up to General Convention’s conclusion, word arrived that Courtland Whitehead, the Bishop of Pittsburgh, had died in Niagara Falls en route to his home from the Massachusetts island of Nantucket.[1] He had been a member of both the Prayer Book and Hymnal Revision Committees, which were considered two of the most important roles one could have. Just short of his 80th birthday, it appears that Bp. Whitehead had never planned to journey across the country to Portland. However, his death had a profound effect on General Convention: Pittsburgh and New Orleans were the top two contenders to host the next convention in 1925. When news arrived of their bishop’s death, the Diocese of Pittsburgh withdrew their bid, allowing New Orleans a clear path to the honor.
As business wrapped up, one innovation in The Episcopal Church has been approved: prayers for healing complete with holy unction (anointing with oils). While this was an ancient practice in the universal church, it had fallen out of favor during the Reformation. A special resolution was also passed calling upon all Episcopalians to support the erection of a national cathedral in Washington, DC. At the final banquet on Friday, September 23rd, the Auditorium was spectacularly decorated with 3000 gladioli and 1000 asters, all given by Mrs. Hugh Graham of Portland. Many bishops and delegates had already departed by the time “sine die” was declared at 12:30 p.m. Saturday afternoon, concluding two weeks of activity called “quite incomparable in the annals of the church.”
[1] This caught the author’s eye in particular because the Episcopal Church on Nantucket grew out of a wedding held in her ancestors’ parlor in 1838.