You can’t make this stuff up.

The Executive Council of the Episcopal Church reached an impasse over plans to meet in Salt Lake City because of objections to Utah’s “one-man, one-woman” definition of marriage.

Utah, like 43 other states, has not changed the traditional definition of marriage. Like two dozen or so other states (including California and Oregon) one-man, one-woman marriage is carved into Utah’s constitution.

I am not arguing for or against gay marriage. But if the church embraces this quasi-boycott, they’ll be holding a lot of winter meetings in Iowa and New England — the only places where gay marriages are legally performed.

And the folks in Utah just can’t win. First they were persecuted for their polygamy laws. Now they’re being attacked for their monogamy laws.

The Episcopal Church has compiled its membership and average Sunday attendance (ASA) figures for 2008, but is declining to release them.

Membership and attendance figures have dropped every year since the consecration of the church’s first openly-gay bishop, the Rev. Gene Robinson, as bishop of New Hampshire, in 2003.

Church spokesmen originally said the 2008 figures would be released in September. But that date came and went.

In a conference call with the media this afternoon from Memphis, Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori confirmed that she has the information, but wouldn’t say whether the numbers look good or bad for the 2.1 million-member denomination.

Bonnie Anderson, president of the church’s House of Deputies, also declined to reveal the details.

The church trumpets its transparent governance and its openness on its home page but it wasn’t very open this week about its numbers.

Having been tipped that the numbers were being shared with the Executive Council during its Oct. 5-8 meeting, I e-mailed church public affairs officer Neva Rae Fox late Wednesday, Oct. 7, and asked for a “copy of the new ASA and membership figures that were passed out to the Executive Council at this week’s meeting.”

She e-mailed me back that “ASA and membership figures have not been passed out to Exec Council.”

So I e-mailed back: “Perhaps passed out is the wrong word. It’s my understanding that the figures are finished and were shared with the Executive Council this week.”

This morning, she responded: “if so, not yet. nothing has been shared yet.”

That didn’t match what I’d been led to believe by a very reliable source. So I asked Anderson and the Presiding Bishop about the numbers during the press conference. Here’s what they said:

BIBLE BELT BLOGGER: The ASA and membership figures for 2008 have been compiled. I’m wondering if those were shared with the Executive Council this week and what the ASA and membership figures show for 2008 for the domestic dioceses.

PRESIDENT ANDERSON: Yes. (Clears throat). Excuse me, yes, they’ve been, um, circulated to the Executive Council via electronic means but we’re not going to be talking about those per se. Our agenda’s pretty full and we’ll probably be taking those up in the future at our next meeting.

BIBLE BELT BLOGGER: Can you share, though, what the results are?

PRESIDENT ANDERSON: We don’t know. I mean we have it written out but we’ll be posting it I’m sure as soon as we’re, they’re, approved and available. But yes, you’ll be able to get them.

LOCKWOOD: But presiding bishop, can you tell us what they show?

PRESIDING BISHOP JEFFERTS SCHORI: I, I’m sorry. I’m not able to comment on that at the moment. I don’t have it in my head.

BIBLE BELT BLOGGER: Do you know approximately? Can you give an approximation? Are they up or down?

CHURCH PUBLIC AFFAIRS OFFICER NEVA RAE FOX: Frank, we need to move on now. Um, I believe the presiding officers have indicated that the figures will be available at a later time, but not right now. Thank you.

So there you have it. The numbers have been circulated, not passed out. The figures have been shared with the Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, but the theologian/scientist can’t comment on them because “I don’t have it in my head.”

Based on the above, do you think the statistics — if they were in the presiding bishop’s head — would be good news or bad news for this badly divided denomination?

The New York Times has an extraordinary story about Michelle Obama’s ancestors, tracing one of them all the way back to slavery. The earliest ancestors are shrouded in the mist of time, nearly vanished. But with the help of census records and other tools, the paper has done some amazing detective work.

The piece is somewhat voyeuristic and uncomfortable to read, but also compellingly written and impossible to put down. And, of course, it has a happy ending, which helps.

The article alludes to faith a few times in a matter-of-fact way, acknowledging the role it played in part of Michelle Obama’s family tree.

But the story really reaches its peak toward the end. The paper managed to track down some really elderly folks who could remember some of Michelle Obama’s long-dead ancestors — including one who had been dead nearly six decades.

And this quote really grabbed me:

Today, [Michelle Obama's great-great-grandfather] Dolphus Shields lies in a neglected black cemetery, where patches of grass grow knee-high and many tombstones have toppled.

Mrs. Holt, a retired nursing assistant, said he came to her in a dream last month. She dug up his photograph, never guessing that she would soon learn that Dolphus Shields was a great-great-grandfather of the first lady.

“Oh, my God,” said Mrs. Holt, gasping at the news. “I always looked up to him, but I would never have imagined something like this. Praise God, we’ve come a long way.”

The Executive Council of the Episcopal Church, meeting in Memphis this week, is slated to receive the 2008 attendance and membership figures for the denomination.

The Episcopal Church, which was growing slightly in the 1990s, has seen sharp drops in both categories since the election of openly-gay bishop Gene Robinson in 2003.

Since then, attendance and membership has dropped each year. Within days we’ll know whether the losses are shrinking or accelerating. The figures will likely be posted on the church’s Web site by sometime next week.

Jay Blossom has written a fascinating article for In Trust magazine about Oral Roberts University’s near-death experience and it’s renaissance.

Basically, prosperity gospel preachers pretty much ran the place into the ground, letting the property go to seed and running up millions in debt. But one of America’s richest families came to ORU’s rescue.

There was a condition attached to the $62 million donation — the folks who had nearly destroyed the school would have to resign before the money would start flowing.

ORU is a damaged brand name, the story notes. One way to solve that would be to dump the O and the R from the acronym. Apparently, though, the board of trustees would have to vote unanimously to change the name at three consecutive annual meetings before that could take place.

and Satan with a journalist…

The artist is named Jon McNaughton and he’s pretty good with a brush. He wouldn’t be the first to try to link the media to the prince of darkness…

Back in 1994, when I was a brand new journalist, I lived in Eden, Idaho (population roughly 300) and went to church in Hazelton (population also roughly 300). The first Sunday that I showed up, the preacher stood in front of roughly 50 worshippers and prayed. His prayer went something like this: “Lord, You know we’re losing our piano player after this Sunday. And Lord, you know that nobody else in our congregation knows how to play the piano player. And Lord, if you can see fit to send us another piano player, we’d sure be grateful.”

Well, I knew how to play the piano (sort-of) and I knew how to play all the old hymns, and after the service I said so. At that moment, I was transformed from a first-time visitor into An Answer To Prayer. For the rest of my time in southern Idaho, I played the piano every Sunday.

The pastor, David Long, was a really nice guy and became a good friend. He was fairly conservative theologically and politically. He believed in sin and he’d denounce it fairly regularly from the pulpit, warning worshippers to be wary of the devil and his minions, including the evil Mainstream Media.

Brother Long had been denouncing reporters and editors and other troublemakers for so long that he had difficulty breaking the habit. He’d tear into them with relish and then he’d pause, look a little sheepish, smile, and say “Of course Frank, here, is an exception.”

I thought of that story when I saw John McNaughton’s painting. If you get a chance, it’s worth checking out.

The bomb was concealed somewhere inside the terrorist. Perhaps in his stomach. Perhaps further down the digestive tract. Apparently, it was activated via cell phone — and there’s a tape recording of the phone call. The prince was reportedly only slightly wounded.

This is one of the spookier stories you’ll see this week.

The Rev. Tom Ray, retired bishop of the Diocese of Northern Michigan, has been named assisting bishop by the Diocesan Standing Committee, according to the Church in Hiawathaland, the diocesan newspaper.
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It’s been ugly, sometimes, in the Anglican wars — lawsuits, depositions, denunciations.

But the folks in Pittsburgh are apparently trying to handle things with a bit more civility. Ann Rodgers of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has the details.

This is one of the neatest stories I’ve seen lately. A space shuttle astronaut brought a sliver of a martyred missionary’s plane into the heavens. The missionary, Nate Saint, and four other Christians were killed while attempting to befriend an indigenous tribe in Ecuador in the 1950s.
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Some public school students in rural Virginia wanted to protest against the ACLU. But skittish school administrators tried to block the effort. Now, the ACLU is encouraging the school to allow the protest to go forward — on first amendment grounds.

For more, click here.

People Magazine has a cover story Sunday, Oct. 4, on religion in America, complete with an insightful poll about the spiritual views of Americans.

One question, in particular, was interesting:

4. Which statement do you most agree with?

Mine is the only true religion 12%
Many religions are valuable but mine comes closest to the truth 17%
All religions have validity 59%
No religion has validity 12%
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