North Carolina is my home state. I was born in High Point, where my Granddaddy Willard had a farm. I was raised in the Moravian Church at a country intersection known as Union Cross, where my great-grandparents are buried in God’s Acre. I became an Episcopalian in Winston-Salem while an undergraduate religion major at Wake Forest University. I went through discernment about my particular calling by God in the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina and was ordained a transitional deacon at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in downtown Winston-Salem.

My roots — familial, cultural, and religious — run deep in the Old North State. Even though I’ve never served a church there as a priest, I still feel connected to its land and its people. So I’m just as excited as Episcopalians there about the fact that the Rt. Rev. Michael Curry, Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina, will soon become the 27th Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church. That will happen on All Saints Day, which is tomorrow, November 1, during a beautiful liturgy of installation at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. Presiding Bishop-elect Curry loves the Lord and the Lord’s Church, and he invites all of us to join “The Jesus Movement.”

His last official act as the Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of North Carolina was to attend yesterday’s investiture ceremony for the newest President of St. Augustine’s University in Raleigh. Afterwards, he offered a farewell to his people near and far.