I spent last week serving as an assessor for the Advisory Committee on Postulants for Ordination (ACPO), an institution of the Anglican Church of Canada for over 35 years. Over a weekend, teams of clergy and laypeople interview prospective ordinands, to advise their bishops about their preparation for ordination. It's a high-pressure task, but a privileged one. The system that has been developed over the years seems for the most part to work, although errors are made from time to time.

This was my fourth direct encounter with ACPO, the second as an assessor. That means, of course, that I was a candidate twice. The first time was 24 years ago. That conference told me "not at this time, but come back when you're ready," a recommendation that angered and confused both me and my bishop. It took several months of in-depth counseling to understand the correctness of their recommendation and what it really meant. When I went back the next year, I was ready, and ACPO gave me the green light.

I returned to the system as an assessor in 2003, and learned what a high-pressure job it is on that side of the desk. This time my panel had only two candidates to assess (the normal is three), so the work was less onerous. Nonetheless, the challenge is huge—to try to hear each candidate through written submissions and interviews, to discern God's call for each one, and to mirror it back to him or her in a helpful manner. We gave a strong recommendation to one candidate, but told the other to come back when he could more clearly articulate his vocation to the priesthood. In the latter case, one of his diocesan discernment committee members, a member of another assessor panel, was almost shocked: "We didn't see that."

I pray that we made the right recommendation, and that we haven't completely messed up a young man's life, but the real decision about where to go from here rests with his bishop. And bishops will do what bishops will do.

There's a theological question here. If people are called by God into special ministries, how does the Holy Spirit exercise that guidance? How do we hear the call? Some have challenged the ACPO process and others like it for attempting to structure God's untameable wildness. But what option do we have? As I said before, the system mostly works, even at times when some people can't see it, as in my first run at candidacy. If I hadn't been slowed down, I would never have done what ensued in the following year, and I would be much the poorer priest (and person) for it.

At the end of the weekend, I was tired but grateful. Grateful to have been part of a process that helps individuals see just a little more clearly what God wills for them. Grateful to be part of the God's renewal of the church, as more men and women are called into the ordained ministry.

Send forth your Spirit, O Lord,
and renew the face of the earth.