Explanation

The subcommittee on the calendar was given eleven separate resolutions from the last General Convention; nine of these proposed individual additions to the calendar, and two proposed authorizing collections of liturgical commemorations. In sorting through these resolutions, the Sub-committee on the Church Calendar discerned that the most appropriate way forward was to prepare a new edition of Lesser Feasts and Fasts, which would better reflect the diversity of the church, and which could work in conjunction with the resource A Great Cloud of Witnesses, which General Convention “made available” but did not authorize. The Sub-committee’s efforts at calendar revision have attempted to create a calendar that will better reflect the diversity of the church. It has long been recognized that the current calendar of commemorations does not come anywhere close to meeting this goal, and still skews overwhelmingly clerical, white, and male. General Convention has repeatedly asked for a more diverse calendar, and Resolution A065 fulfills this request. The Sub-committee asks General Convention to authorize Lesser Feasts and Fasts 2018 “for optional use throughout the church”. This language reflects the fact that the calendar is an optional document, and that individuals and congregations may choose to make use of all of it, some of it, or none of it. We have deliberately refrained from using the language of “trial use”, because the canons of the Episcopal Church only recognize trial use as pertaining to revisions of the Book of Common Prayer and not to other authorized liturgical resources. Still, the proposed text is very much “in trial.” In this regard, we ask that the next iteration of the SCLM be intentional about collecting feedback from the members of the church, and that they use that feedback to make suggested revisions to General Convention 2021. We trust that in the process of reception, those things that need to be restored will be restored, those things that should be deleted will be deleted, and those things that need to be revised will be revised.