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WASHINGTON (Catholic Online) - Many believe the battle for the soul of the Episcopal Church is now over. Frontline parishes are leaving and the continuing battle for buildings is just a part of what lies ahead. (snip) About that same time another major upheaval hit the church; this time with an impact that caused many traditional Episcopalians to say, “enough is enough.” With the ordination of women a new classification of Anglicans in America came into existence – the Continuing Church movement. These Anglicans were split into various groups such as the Diocese of Christ the King, the United Episcopal...

LONDON - Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori says her church has been unfairly singled out for criticism because it is honest about consecrating gay bishops. Jefferts Schori told BBC Radio 4's "PM" program that the New York-based church, which is the Anglican body in the U.S., is far from the only Anglican province that has a bishop with a same-sex partner. In 2003, Episcopalians elected the first openly gay bishop, V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, causing an uproar that has pushed the Anglican family toward a split. "He is certainly not alone in being a gay bishop; he's...

Bordered by loose stone walls and rolling woodland, the Melrose Convent is a picture postcard of peace and seclusion just 60 miles from Manhattan on a lazy, winding country road. Episcopal nuns have called it home the past 50 years, tending to two farmhouses and the gardens on a few bucolic acres near the village of Brewster, N.Y. They also run a retreat, offering sanctuary to church groups and others looking to pull back from the world. One calm November day seven years ago, a smiling, well-dressed man with glittering references and a gift for gab came knocking on the...

The head of the Episcopal Church has warned Pittsburgh Bishop Robert W. Duncan Jr. that he will face civil suits and possible expulsion as bishop if a proposed resolution enabling the diocese to leave the denomination passes during today's diocesan convention. A diocesan spokesman said the letter from Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, sent by fax to the Pittsburgh Diocese office late Wednesday, was "intended, honestly, to intimidate the convention." The 142nd annual convention is being held today and tomorrow in Johnstown. The presiding bishop's letter said she was aware of Bishop Duncan's "statements and actions in recent months" that demonstrated...

Maine Episcopalians passed a resolution at their annual convention Friday that calls for England to rescind a charter issued more than 500 years ago. The resolution calls for the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Queen of England to disavow the 1496 royal charter issued to John Cabot and his sons, according to information on the Web site for the Episcopal Diocese of Maine. It passed by a vote of 175 to 135. The Maine diocese is the first in the nation to pass such a resolution, according to John Dieffenbacker-Krall, a member of St. James’ Episcopal Church in Old Town...

A week before the grand opening of Plainfield's first hip-hop house of worship, Church 'N' the Hood, the Rev. LaDana Clark -- also known as "Lady Jam" -- sat in the basement of the Grace Episcopal Church, the place that would soon welcome her future parishioners. She was calm despite the obvious excitement of others in the room, members of the community dedicated to helping with the church's debut. She smiled and listened as they talked about their hopes for the mission. Then she started to talk. "God does not discriminate -- no matter if you're Jewish, Muslim, black, white,...

he Rev. Don Armstrong, former Episcopal rector of Grace and St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Colorado Springs, was found guilty on all counts of financial misconduct presented to an Ecclesiastical Court of the Diocese of Colorado. It is now in the hands of Bishop Rob O'Neill as to his punishment. Armstrong expects the bishop to depose him. "This was no surprise to us and frankly of no interest either--this is just all the Episcopal Church has left, with no theology to debate those of us who have made a case for tradition, they have to resort to kangaroo courts ginned...

SEATTLE – A veteran Episcopal priest says she became a Muslim just over a year ago and now worships at a mosque Fridays – but that hasn't stopped her from donning her white collar Sunday mornings. "I am both Muslim and Christian, just like I'm both an American of African descent and a woman. I'm 100 percent both," Rev. Ann Holmes Redding told the Seattle Times. Redding, a priest for more than 20 years, until recently was director of faith formation at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral in Seattle, the paper reported. Now, she's telling the world about her adherence to...

This week, Dina Matos McGreevey filed court papers accusing former Gov. Jim "I am a gay American" McGreevey of extreme cruelty, fraud and libel, for concealing his homosexuality in order to marry her. And so the McGreevey saga continues. I'd say "only in America," but I suspect this is a story that could happen only in New Jersey. Imagine: You are the governor of New Jersey and (by your own account) you're having sex with a young man behind your wife's back. The young man in question describes it as nonconsensual sexual harassment, but never mind. The feds are closing...

Yahoo picked up a fluff AP article that distorted Democratic NJ Governor Jim McGreevey’s 2004 resignation. It perpetuated the success of what should have been a politician’s attempt to cover allegations of corruption by using his closeted sexuality to distract an incurious and complicit media. This puff piece kept alive McGreevey’s pattern of announcing something socially startling to draw attention away from the incredible graft, scandal and alleged sexual harassment that would have otherwise defined his administration. When threats to McGreevey's reputation arise, he uses his status as a gay man to deflect unwanted attention, and the AP went along...

Deacon Eric Bergman will become one of the rarest of Roman Catholic priests today — a married one. The former rector of Good Shepherd Episcopal Church will be ordained for the second time at St. Clare’s Roman Catholic Church today, nearly 10 years after his ordination in the Church of England. After he takes his vows, he will be the first married priest in the history of the Diocese of Scranton, joining the 100 or so other married Roman Catholic priests in the United States. The St. Thomas More Society, of which Deacon Bergman has been serving as executive director,...

April 13, 2007 — Sanctuaries are designed to make us feel safe. They provide us peace and a place to pray. Bells call the good to worship and warn the evil to stay away. This is the kind of American church that a young Christa Brown was drawn to. As a teenager in the 1960s, Brown learned to love music and her God. She grew up in the church, sang in the choir and played the piano. But as Brown would find out, churches don't always protect the innocent. Sometimes these sanctuaries shield the guilty and even lure predators to...

Primates push U.S. on sexuality http://www.anglicanjournal.com/issues/2007/133/apr/04/article/primates-push-us-on-sexuality/ http://tinyurl.com/3auuwb Americans given deadline to comply Marites N. Sison, staff writer Apr 1, 2007 Primates of the Anglican Communion have given the U.S. Episcopal Church until Sept. 30 to “make an unequivocal common covenant” that its bishops will bar same-sex blessings in their churches and that it would not consecrate another gay bishop “unless some new consensus on this matter emerges” across the Anglican world. Failure to comply would mean that “the relationship between the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion as a whole remain damaged at best, and this has consequences for the...

As a "conservative" Episcopalian, I have a real problem with the church that may be difficult for others to understand. For those on the outside, the Episcopal Church's problems may seem like a mishmash of issues that society largely has moved beyond. From within, however, there is something more important going on. Contrary to what the more liberal elements of the church's leadership (and unfortunately much of the media coverage) would have you believe, what is happening within the Episcopal Church has nothing to do with sexual preference, same-sex marriage, female clerics or a host of other accusations hurled at...

In the order we’ve come across it. Please post any links you come across in the comments Anglican Mainstream (also posted below)Peter Ould Jim Naughton (posted below)Ruth Gledhill (posted below)Inclusive ChurchSusan RussellKendall’s commentary is below and at Stand FirmMark HarrisFather Jake Posted in Dar es Salaam 2007 | 5 Comments »

Facing a possible churchwide schism, the Anglican Communion yesterday gave its Episcopal branch in the United States less than eight months to ban blessings of same-sex unions or risk a reduced role in the world’s third-largest Christian denomination. Anglican leaders also established a separate council and a vicar to help address the concerns of conservative American dioceses that have been alienated by the Episcopal Church’s support of gay clergy and blessings of same-sex unions. Although the presiding American bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori, agreed to the arrangement, some conservatives described it as an extraordinary check on her authority. The directive, issued...

The first thing I want to say is that people have no idea of how much sacrifice it took by those involved for the document to reach this point. This really was a contract negotiation (look at the appendix/Foundations section). I have said a number of times that I thought the most important piece written in the Episcopal Church in the last year was by Michael Smith, Bishop of North Dakota. He basically said this: When I got home from General Convention 2006, I thought even though TEC had not satisfied the letter of the Windsor Report, we had satisfied...

A split within the Episcopal Church has begun and is on its way to court -- something akin to "divorce court," it seems. More than 100 Episcopal parishes -- and some dioceses -- have either left the denomination or requested alternative oversight within the worldwide Anglican Communion. One of them is St. Stephen's Church in Heathsville, Va. "We left the Episcopal Church because we could no longer be under the leadership of people who have the attitude that they did about the authority of Scripture," said the Rev. Jeffrey Cerar, rector of St. Stephen's. "Starting several years ago, the Episcopal...

As expected, the Episcopal Women's Caucus is bent about the Panel of Reference's Fort Worth decision: The Episcopal Women’s Caucus receives with deep distress and dismay the decision of the Panel of Reference that, "while the Communion is in a process of reception, no diocese or parish should be compelled to accept the ministry of word or sacrament from an ordained woman." This decision provides a basis for the reason that a "foreign curia" is antithetical to the Spirit of Anglicanism in general and the Episcopal Church in particular. Again with the anti-Rome blast.  What that means, of course, is...

I mentioned some time back that my church-- The Falls Church in Falls Church, Va.-- was breaking away from other Episcopal Churches in what amounts to a pretty big shake-up for the Anglican Church. I'm not a member, but I attend regularly, along with about 2,500 other worshippers, including Alberto Gonzales, Fred Barnes, and Porter Goss. It's a conservative, Bible-based church that thinks Jesus is "the way, the truth, and the life," and doesn't cotton to the "evolving" teachings of the Episcopal Church that aren't so sure about that whole Jesus thing, which is the entire basis of our faith....