Posted on 09/23/2007 1:53:20 PM PDT by monkapotamus
Bishop Steenson Will Become a Roman Catholic
09/23/07
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The Rt. Rev. Jeffrey N. Steenson, Bishop of the Rio Grande, will resign from his position and become a Roman Catholic, The Living Church has learned.
In a letter to the clergy of his diocese, Bishop Steenson said a pastoral letter to all the people of the diocese would follow in a few days. He said he had invited Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori to attend the Rio Grande clergy conference Sept. 26.
“I … have sensed how important it is for those of us in this position to model a gracious way to leave The Episcopal Church in a manner respectful of its laws,” he wrote.
Bishop Steenson was attending the House of Bishops’ meeting in New Orleans and plans to make an announcement concerning his decision on Monday.
In an interview with The Living Church to be published in a forthcoming issue, Bishop Steenson said the meeting of the House of Bishops at Camp Allen in the spring had a major effect on his decision.
“The spring meeting of the House of Bishops, when the majority said that The Episcopal Church was fundamentally autonomous and local,” he said. “This is not the Catholic doctrine of the Church, and it will lead to many unfortunate consequences.”
The bishop has been the diocesan in the Albuquerque-based diocese since 2005. He was canon to the ordinary under Bishop Terence Kelshaw for five years before being elected to the episcopate. Prior to that, he was rector of All Saints’ Church, Wynnewood, Pa., Good Shepherd, Rosemont, Pa., and St. Andrew’s, Fort Worth. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of Nashotah House and the Board of Directors of the Living Church Found
“My conscience is deeply troubled,” he said in a statement prepared for the House of Bishops, “because I sense that the obligations of my ministry in The Episcopal Church may lead me to a place apart from scripture and tradition. I am concerned that if I do not listen to and act in accordance with conscience now, it will become harder and harder to hear God’s voice.”
Bishop Steenson said he had spoken with the Presiding Bishop “for her counsel and prayers,” and said he would ask the House of Bishops for permission to resign as the ordinary of his diocese. He said he would do this by the end of the year, and added that he hoped then to be released from his ordination vows in The Episcopal Church.
He called the bishops’ meeting last March “a profoundly disturbing experience for me. I was more than a little surprised when such a substantial majority declared the polity of the Episcopal Church to be primarily that of an autonomous and independent local church relating to the wider Anglican Communion by voluntary association. This is not the Anglicanism in which I was formed, inspired by the Oxford Movement and the Catholic Revival in the Church of England … honestly, I did not recognize the church that this House described on that occasion.”
Regarding his move to the Roman Catholic Church, Bishop Steenson said, “I believe that the Lord now calls me in this direction. It amazes me, after all of these years, what a radical journey of faith this must necessarily be. To some it seems foolish; to others disloyal; to others an abandonment.”
Bishop Steenson will be the third bishop of The Episcopal Church to become a Roman Catholic this year. Bishop Dan Herzog of Albany moved shortly after his retirement in January. Bishop Clarence C. Pope, retired Bishop of Fort Worth, returned to Roman Catholicism in August.
Episcopalians, meet your new rulers. And they are not a very generous lot, despite the sham smiles.
Good luck to him. Everything I have seen of RC "Anglican Use" reeks at best of the modernist tin-eared ECUSA 1979 so-called "Book of Common Prayer" (which Steenson likely has been using). Allow me to be blunt: "Anglican Use" presents itself to this Anglican like a tagger-fouled Mona Lisa or worse; the bait presented is recognizably false and quite repellent.
Acknowledged, style is not synonymous with belief, but if you're going to troll using "style" you need to get it right and the RC falls way short on that. (Seriously, I'd volunteer to help them get it right, but I doubt they'd be interested in an Anglican layman's input.)
It’s gross if you think about how they’re likely to physically express their social and spiritual commitment to one another. “Gay Pride” doesn’t like to go into detail about what, exactly, they’re so proud of doing to one another.
You’re right - it does blow the “gays have good taste” stereotype out of the water!
I sincerely doubt our Lord is pleased when you call other Christians—particularly those faithful Anglicans who have left the apostate Episcopal Church, “cancer cells.”
Shame.
Actually, the more history I know the happier I am to be in Christ’ Church, not Rome’s.
Welcome home!
HE probably has had his doubts about the ability of Anglicanism to go its own way for a long time. The last Council of Bishops at Camp Allen (which is in my home diocese and at which I’ve spent several lovely and memorable choir retreats) must have been the last straw. Thus, if he’s leaving anglicanism because of schism and apostasy, why join one of the many even more schismatic elements within the so-called communion? They only exist because of deep seated protestant stubbornness about submitting to a higher temporal authority.
What they don’t realize is that the Pope is our friend and our Holy Father, not our master or our enemy. He needs our help to transform the moribund church, to reform the reform, or counterreform it, if you will. I welcome him in the name of Christ.
After going to church today for the first time as an Anglican, I rather enjoyed it. BTW, we closed on our purchase of Saint Clement’s in El Paso. Apparently, one of Bishop Steenson’s last acts as Bishop of the Rio Grande was to approve our buyout of our church. God Bless him!
Is it better that he stay and FEED his flock to the wolves? Let his people follow him. Piscopos, Let My People GOoooo!!!
I’m sorry to hear you attack like that. I can assure you that while we see our liturgical deficiencies, we are doing the best we can and we DO use the Roman Canon Eucharistic Prayer I, and that is NOT a modified BCP79 Rite II.
We are the Our Lady of Walsingham Catholic Church, and this being the eve of Her feast day, made a procession to the shrine and rededicated it after 10 years and several attacks of vandals. We said the Rosary in its entirety, and then did three pages of rededication, one for the souls of the vandals. Then we sang Salve Regina, and went home.
The joy I receieved from our worship was immense, because the last prayer was one that a dearly beloved anglican priest had said to me on the occasion that I was going to turn off my mothers life support, but she died before I got there, probably while we were praying. But the best part, to this sinners heart, was thinking about how what we were doing would make the protestant’s eyes bleed.
“O LORD, support us all the day long, until the shadows lengthen and the evening comes, and the busy world is hushed, and the fever of life is over, and our work is done. Then in thy mercy grant us a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last. Amen.
“ BCP 1928
I might not be understanding what your trying to communicate. Is it a RC joy to see pain inflicted on those that do not believe as you do?
Let me understand you; you take issue with him because he “attacks” your “liturgical deficiencies” and then you turn around and quote from the very Prayer Book his Church uses, a document that many consider to be one of the most beautiful works of theological prose, or any prose for that matter that has ever been written and on top of that you manifest considerable pride in the process. My, “let he who is without sin cast the first stone”.
“In case you haven’t been paying attention, while various divisions continue the predominant element of Anglicanism today is coalescence, exemplified by the APA/REC merger and and the increased cooperation between the APCK/UECNA/ACA, to the point of opening the APCK seminary to UECNA & ACA postulants.”
Okay. That’s great talk, but you are missing almost all the facts. Anyone looking at Anglicans Online can find a partial list so long it wont fit in just one comment box.
Here is the first part of the list:
American Anglican Church
American Anglican Convocation
Anglican Catholic Church
Anglican Catholic Church in Australia
Anglican Catholic Church of Canada
Anglican Catholic Communion, Diocese of Southern Africa
Anglican Catholic Communion USA
The Anglican Catholic Diocese of New Orleans
Anglican Church IN America
The Anglican Church International
Anglican Church International Communion
Anglican Church Of America
The Anglican Church of Virginia
Anglican Church Worldwide
Anglican Diocese of the Great Lakes
The Anglican Episcopal Church
The Anglican Independent Communion in the British Isles and Europe
Anglican Independent Communion Original Province
Anglican Mission in America
Anglican Orthodox Church
The Anglican Province of America
Anglican Province of Christ the King
Anglican Province of Saint Jude
Anglican Rite Catholic Church
Anglican Rite Old Catholic Church
Apostolic Anglican Church
The Catholic Anglican Church
The Charismatic Episcopal Church
The Christian Episcopal Church
The Church of England (Continuing)
Church of England in South Africa
Now please dont tell me that there are large number of anglican churches outside the communion!!
Here is the rest of the list:
The Church of Torres Strait
The Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches
Diocese of the Holy Cross
Diocese of St Paul the Apostle
Diocesis Misionara Hispana
Ecumenical Anglican Catholic Church
The Episcopal Missionary Church
The Episcopal Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of America
Episcopal Orthodox Mission in Italy
Evangelical Anglican Church OF America
Evangelical Anglican Church IN America
Evangelical Episcopal Church
FCE (Evangelical Connexion)/A Connexion of Covenanting Churches
Federation of Anglican Churches in the Americas
Filipino Communion of Evangelical Episcopal Churches
The Free Church of England
The Free Episcopal Church
Free Protestant Episcopal Church
Free Protestant Episcopal Church (Saskatchewan)
Hawaiian Reformed Catholic Church
Holy Catholic Church (Anglican Rite)
Holy Cross Anglican Communion
Iglesia Catolica Anglicana Sagrado Corazon de Jesus
The International Free Protestant Episcopal Church
La Iglesia Episcopal de Chile
Igreja Episcopal Anglicana Livre no Brasil
Independent Anglican Church (Canada Synod)
Mariners Church of Detroit
The National Anglican Catholic Church
The Orthodox Anglican Church
Orthodox Anglican Communion
Province of Christ the Good Shepherd
Province of the Transfiguration - Anglican Rite
Reformed Anglican Catholic Church
Reformed Episcopal Church
Reformierte Episkopalkirche in Deutschland
Saints Cyril and Methodius Church
Southern Episcopal Church
The Traditional Anglican Church
The Traditional Anglican Communion
The Traditional Church of England
The Traditional Protestant Episcopal Church
The United Anglican Church
The United Episcopal Church of North America
Good luck to him. Everything I have seen of RC “Anglican Use” reeks at best of the modernist tin-eared ECUSA 1979 so-called “Book of Common Prayer” (which Steenson likely has been using). Allow me to be blunt: “Anglican Use” presents itself to this Anglican like a tagger-fouled Mona Lisa or worse; the bait presented is recognizably false and quite repellent.
Acknowledged, style is not synonymous with belief, but if you’re going to troll using “style” you need to get it right and the RC falls way short on that. (Seriously, I’d volunteer to help them get it right, but I doubt they’d be interested in an Anglican layman’s input.)
A frivolous post if ever there were one. Trying to keep TEC defectors on the farm by whining like Christopher Lowell over a fabric swatch wont get you very far. These folks are coming home for substance—which you may well have difficulty appreciating.
Ping.
Ping
Perhaps a cancer cell is not the best metaphor, but the notion of a perpetually dividing church should be food for thought for all of us.
Funny - I found Church history to be the gateway to my eventual conversion to the Catholic Church. I’ve since earned a graduate degree in history and have yet to have this statement be anything other than strengthened. It’s difficult (impossible?) to reconcile any sense of historical continuity with any modern-day Church except for the Catholic Church, Orthodox Churches, Oriental Orthodox Communion or the Assyrian Church of the East. These are the (only) four modern-day branches of the historic, undivided Church founded by Christ and his Apostles.
I guess you and I cancel each other out ;-). But, don’t believe the myths about Church history. The truth may lead you Rome-ward bound...
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