By now, word has gone forth that NWIM has a new bishop! Many of you in the days since synod assembly have been reaching out with words of thanks for my six years of ministry with you as bishop & voicing concern about how I’m doing with the outcome of the election.

First of all: thank you for your kind words. It means a lot of hear how the ministry I oversaw was helpful for you & that I will be missed.

Secondly: what happened at the Red Lion in Pasco was not so much an election as it was a call process. The Spirit was invoked, and the Spirit moved, and the Spirit indicated that Bishop-elect Manlove is the one to lead the synod into the future. And while her election was not the outcome I had hoped for going into the assembly weekend: it absolutely is the necessary outcome. If the synod needs her leadership gifts & style to move into the future, it concretely doesn’t need mine!

Every Lent, I have a tradition of reading the book “Lamb” by Christopher Moore…

The reason I read this book every Lent is because Moore’s depiction of the events of Holy Week abandons all the chaos, high-jinks, and crudity of the previous chapters and instead focuses in on the very real, honest, searing moments of Biff realizing his best friend is going to die, and there is nothing that Biff can do to stop it.

Yesterday marked our 4th Sunday of Advent, and as any child who can count to four can tell you: Christmas is almost here! Our sanctuaries are probably all decked out for the holiday, the Advent wreath front and center, altar guilds are preparing to swap out the Advent blue paraments for the white & gold of Christmas, poinsettias will be gathered, the tiny candles we use when we sing “Silent Night” will be unearthed and examined to see if they have another service left in them. If we have Sunday school, our Sunday school has presented their Christmas program. We are ready.

A Thanksgiving Message from Bishop Kristen

May God bless you with the richness of life in this interconnected web where we are just beginning to listen for all the ways God the Creator has knit us together in this world and in this life.

My sabbatical allowed me to process what I learned about the work of a bishop—what is truly important, and what was just done because it had been done for 35 years. It allowed me to take time to deliberately reflect on how I want to embody the role of bishop—given the abrupt bifurcation I experienced in the role with the onset of the pandemic, I had a unique point of view to take advantage of.

At the end of this month (May 23rd, to be precise) I will be taking a 3-month sabbatical as is provided for by the synod sabbatical policy. To the best of my knowledge, I am the first bishop of the synod to take advantage of this policy, so it naturally brings along with it some level of anxiety for everyone.

Please read further to learn more…