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Two-thirds Or Not Two-thirds?

Abstract: Opinions on the margin of victory.

That is the question, but don't expect an answer before August. The ELCA News Service did eventually report on the Church Council's action regarding standing rules for this year's Churchwide Assembly in Chicago, and indeed, as our sources said, the Church Council deleted the paragraphs that had been added in 2005 to mandate a two-thirds requirement for approving the measures put forward by the Sexuality Task Force.
Deleting that mandate,however, does not guarantee that a simple majority will be sufficient for measures that come before the 2007 Assembly. Both Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson and Secretary Lowell Almen indicated that the margin required for passage would depend on the substance of the measure being voted on.
Secretary Almen told the ELCA News Service: "It's very difficult to provide adefinitive answer on a margin of vote on a theoretical issue, because the exact languageof a resolution and its implications can have an impact on that margin of vote. One can give a general response like 'it takes a majority vote to approve a response to a memorial of a synod.' But there might be certain circumstances in which the text of a response may elevate the matter to two-thirds. It's impossible to really give an answer definitively... and some questions seem to be seeking that kind of definitive response related to a theoretical issue."
Bishop Hanson commented: "We didn't expect in 2007 that we would be possibly be revisiting actions of the 2005 assembly."
Of course, one would be hard pressed to find any past ELCA churchwide Assembly that has not encountered the issue of gay and lesbian ordination in some form.

(Vol. I, xxvi, May 6, 2007 )

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