Episcopal Press and News
Pittsburgh Challenged to '1:1:3' Discipleship
Episcopal News Service. November 16, 2000 [2000-204]
Beth Bogard Vander Wel, Director of Communications for the Diocese of Pittsburgh
The banner outside the ballroom read "1:1:3 -- Each One brings One other to Christ every Three years." That was Bishop Robert Duncan's call to the Diocese of Pittsburgh at its 135th annual convention, held November 3-4 at the Radisson Hotel Green Tree and at Trinity Cathedral.
"Making Disciples" was the convention theme, the third of five goal areas (Building Congregations, Establishing Partnerships, Making Disciples, Gathering Resources and Recruiting Youth) around the vision of "One Church of Miraculous Expectation and Missionary Grace."
"If congregations are the principal way we do what we do, disciples are, in fact, what we do. The chief work we have as Christians is to be disciples (The Great Commandment) and to make disciples (The Great Commission)," said Duncan in his convention address.
"I am convinced that nothing will do more to raise our maturity as disciples, to transform us into disciples who make disciples, and to alter the face, direction, and future of our diocese," he added.
The "1:1:3" strategy was created by Bishop Yong Ping Chung some ten years ago during his episcopate in the Diocese of Sabah. "Bishop Yong reasoned that bringing each disciple to the point of such maturity, and expecting each disciple to bring someone else to discipleship every three years, would change his diocese forever," Bishop Duncan remarked. "It did. Sabah became a diocese of 'disciples making disciples'...in ten years' time, Ping Chung's diocese quadrupled."
Duncan's goal is to grow the Diocese of Pittsburgh from 20,000 to 40,000 baptized members and from 72 to 85 parishes by 2010.
Workshops on practical evangelism were held on Friday morning before convention and offered training in friendship and workplace evangelism as well as evangelism to the elderly and youth. The Rt. Rev. Harold Miller, Bishop of Down and Dromore, Church of Ireland, and the Rt. Rev. Daniel Herzog, Bishop of Albany, led workshops and also participated in the convention program. Miller was keynote speaker at the Convention banquet and Herzog preached at the closing Eucharist.
Deputies voted overwhelmingly in favor of a resolution supporting "the concept of building a Common Life Center in Donegal Township" and that "the Board of Trustees of the Diocese of Pittsburgh be charged with oversight of this project including but not limited to decisions which need to be made regarding the amount of funds to be raised, the cost of the facility, and whether or not to proceed or terminate the project based on the information available to them." The resolution also included an amendment that, should the Board of Trustees decide to proceed, the bishop will call a special convention for a final decision.
Deputies also carried a resolution allowing Bishop Duncan to appoint an episcopal assistant as funds become available.
Miraculous expectation abounded as deputies celebrated the healing of the Rev. John Fierro from pancreatic cancer just weeks before. Fierro is Deacon-in-Charge at St. Paul's in Monongahela, that church's first full-time leader in a decade. He will be ordained priest on December 10.
Canon Mary Hays, whose responsibilities include deployment, described Pittsburgh's robust health in this arena: there are just three openings for rectors, and several openings for assistants exist because churches have grown. At a recent conference she attended with representatives of 37 diocesan deployment officers, 253 full-time positions were presented, but only 52 clergy candidates.
Pittsburgh's enviable condition is "a result of miraculous expectation and missionary grace on the part of the clergy and lay leaders of this diocese," Canon Hays said. "We are not finding it impossible to fill our congregations, even our 'handyman specials.'"
Clergy in Pittsburgh average 46 years of age, significantly lower than the national average of 58. Presently, 21 postulants for priesthood and nine candidates are in the ordination process, with an average age of 38. The diocese also celebrated the successful completion of its first Young Priests Initiative program, 20 being the average age of the five participants, in the summer of 2000.
An exuberant closing Eucharist continued a tradition begun last year of welcoming diocesan youth who participated in a concurrent event as well as the ECW Fall United Thank Offering.
One young woman who had attended the morning's youth gathering announced to the congregation that she had decided that day to follow Christ.
Herzog reiterated the challenge to make disciples in his sermon. If any diocese is going to be fruitful, he said, then we need to let Christ convert our whole lives, he said. "We all leak. We all need to be renewed and replenished."
"I invite anyone here who would like to renew their commitment to Christ to come to the rail and we can pray for that," he added. Nearly two-thirds of the congregation went forward for prayer.