In a recent webcast, [Presiding Bishop Katharine] Jefferts Schori was asked if she was trying to shore up support from other provinces before the meeting. “That was certainly not the intent,” she answered. “It may have been a byproduct.”

“We have partners all across the Anglican Communion,” Jefferts Schori continued. “These visits had been set up some time ago, well before the timing of the Standing Committee meeting was known, basically as a way of building relationships between our respective provinces.”

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The summer months have seen no break in the Episcopal Church’s legal wars, with new lawsuits, appeals and victories for both sides in the litigation over parish and diocesan property.

On July 6, the Episcopal Diocese of San Joaquin filed suit against the rector, vestry and parish of St Paul’s Anglican Church in Visalia, California. A congregation of the Anglican Diocese of San Joaquin, St. Paul’s along with a majority of the diocese withdrew from the Episcopal Church in 2007 and affiliated with the Province of the Southern Cone.

The St Paul’s litigation joins a growing list of parish lawsuits funded by the national Episcopal Church and initiated by loyalist faction in San Joaquin. Suits against lay leaders and parish corporations are pending against St Francis Anglican Church in Turlock; St Michael’s Anglican Church in Ridgecrest; St John’s Anglican Church in Porterville, James Anglican Church in Sonora; Holy Redeemer Anglican Church in Delano; and St Columba’s Anglican Church in Fresno.

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Now that the Court of Review for the Trial of a Bishop has overturned your sentence of deposition, and you may continue to be a Bishop in the Episcopal Church, you have the right to return as Bishop of Pennsylvania. But is it right to do so?

I urge you to give this question the deepest consideration with your best advisers before making your final decision on returning August 16.

Let me tell you my advice, so you know.

To be Bishop is to unify the Church, but your return would further divide our diocese. To be Bishop is to build up the Church, but your return would tear down the fragile foundations of trust and hope that have been built these past two years. My strong belief is that your return will do more harm than good, create more anger and less reconciliation, and hinder, not advance, the Church’s mission in our diocese. These realities may be unfair and unjust, but I believe them to be true.

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Advocates for victims of clergy sex abuse have blasted the Episcopal Church for reinstating the bishop of Philadelphia who had been charged with not investigating sex abuse allegations about his brother.

A church appeals court ruled July 28 that Bishop Charles Bennison committed conduct inappropriate for a member of the clergy, but said charges against him had to be dismissed because the statute of limitations had run out.

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Who is a minister? What is a bishop? From different ends of the career telescope, two Episcopalians, one a bishop-elect, the other a retiring bishop, see the answer to both questions in servanthood.

After six distinguished years as dean of Grace and Holy Trinity Cathedral, the Very Rev. Terry White was elected June 5 as bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Kentucky, where he will be consecrated Sept. 25.

White told me, “Jesus said that he came not to be served, but to serve. Servanthood is at the heart of our call as the baptized community.”

The Rt. Rev. Barry Howe, who retires in March as bishop of the Diocese of West Missouri, agreed that “all are ministers of the church. The laity are to represent Christ in their daily lives” and in the life of the church as servants.

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Members of a sex-abuse victim support group picketed the headquarters of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania Tuesday to protest the reinstatement of Bishop Charles E. Bennison Jr., who had been suspended nearly three years for concealing his brother’s sexual abuse of a minor.

“It’s heartbreaking that he has been returned on a technicality,” said Karen Polisir, president of the Philadelphia area chapter of the Survivors’ Network of Those Abused by Priests (SNAP). She was joined by two SNAP members from Lancaster County who were abused as youths by Roman Catholic priests.

In 2008, a church trial court ordered Bennison defrocked and removed as head of the five-county diocese for mishandling abuse by his brother about 35 years ago. However, an appeals court ruled last month that the church’s statute of limitations had expired on the matter, and ordered Bennison restored to his position.

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The Rev. Lang Lowrey, Interim President of the General Theological Seminary (GTS) announced today the appointment of the Rt. Rev. Peter James Lee, as Interim Dean of GTS, the Episcopal Church’s oldest theological seminary. The former Bishop of Virginia and one of the Church’s longest-serving bishops, Bishop Lee currently serves San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral as Interim Dean.

After the Seminary’s 12th Dean and President, the Very Rev. Ward B. Ewing, announced in December of 2009 his intention to retire, Trustees of the Seminary formed a search committee under the leadership of trustee Dr. Michael Gilligan. Upon recommendation from the committee and in light of serious financial challenges faced by the school, Trustees decided in June 2010 to divide the post of Dean and President into separate positions. On June 9, 2010 the Rev. Lang Lowrey was selected as Interim President and charged with financial and administrative oversight of the school and was vested with all the constitutional powers previously lodged with the Dean and President. Meanwhile the search continued for a new Interim Dean to be responsible for day-to-day operations of the Seminary including oversight of its academic programs.

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In a ceremony drawing from… [Episcopal] and Navajo traditions, the Rev. David Bailey was ordained as the Bishop of Navajoland Episcopalian Church.

The Navajoland missions have had interim bishops since the death of Steven Plummer, the Episcopal Church’s first Navajo priest and the first Navajo bishop of Navajoland, in 2005.

Bailey promised his reign as bishop will be similar to the ceremony in which he was ordained. He will infuse Navajo traditions into the church’s customs, work to get Navajos into the priesthood and select a Navajo to be his successor, said Leon Sampson, Plummer’s nephew who is entering the priesthood.

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…one can know this: the charges to ECUSA for getting its counsel specially admitted, and then drafting, filing and arguing this bogus motion were on the order of thousands and thousands of dollars. If the three ECUSA counsel were on the telephone together, the “argument” alone was costing ECUSA at least over $1000 per hour. (And what would be the point of being admitted pro hac vice just in time to file the motion to quash, if one were not also going to take part in the argument of the motion?)

The point here is not that New York and Pennsylvania attorneys are expensive; we all know that. The point instead is that no one is minding the store, or overseeing what legal work is being done for ECUSA and in its name, on an impartial basis. (Mary Kostel used to work under David Booth Beers at Goodwin Procter — so how much objective oversight on legal strategies and expenses could she provide? If she is even performing some of that function, she would be overseeing someone who used to be her boss — and who still, as the Presiding Bishop’s Chancellor, has quite a lot of unchecked authority.)

In their response to the query made by the bishops to the Executive Council, two members of that Council (who are both attorneys) claimed that “We give you our professional opinion that the church is receiving extraordinary value for the funds it does spend.” That claim is very much open to dispute, as this little incident in Pittsburgh demonstrates.

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Read it all (a 39 page pdf).

After nearly nine hours and eight rounds of casting ballots Saturday, a nominating synod charged with choosing four finalists for bishop of the Springfield Episcopal Diocese could decide on only three.

In the next round of voting in November, the bishop will be chosen from among the Rev. Matthew Gunter, 52, rector, St. Barnabas Church, Glen Ellyn; the Rev. Canon E. Mark Stevenson, 45, Canon to the Ordinary, Diocese of Louisiana, Baton Rouge, La.; and the Rev. Daniel Martins, 58, rector, St. Anne’s, Warsaw, Ind.

Clergy and lay delegates numbering 130 from around the diocese gathered at the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, 815 S. Second St., to pare down the 14 nominees for bishop.

Read it all and you can find more material via the diocese here (make sure to follow the link to the ballot results).

Update: You may also find a lengthy communication from the Standing Committee about the process here.

Summer is a time many people plan their vacation, or at least a few leisurely evenings for friendly conversation over barbecues,beside a pool, on a boat or skiff, or along a mountain brook. This is nothing akin to laziness. It is in many cases the real work and stuff of life. Every human being has a need for a Sabbath rest. It is part of what God meant for us when he created us. The Jewish theologian, Abraham Joshua Heschel, writes of rest in the Sabbath tradition: “The meaning of the Sabbath is to celebrate time, rather than space. Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to the holiness of time. It is a day on which we are called upon to share what is eternal in time, to turn from the results of creation to the mystery of creation; from the world of creation to the creation of the world.”

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“The sexual abuse exception to the statute of limitations, if improperly applied, can wrongfully label a Respondent a sexual abuser,” eight bishops of the court wrote in their unanimous ruling. A ninth member of the court, the Rt. Rev. Wayne P. Wright, Bishop of Delaware, recused himself for personal reasons.

“Title IV courts must guard against allowing that exception to be used without proof of actual sexual abuse,” the ruling added. “This is especially true under circumstances where the exception is invoked not so much to deal with sexual abuse but, rather, as an effort to use events in the distant past when the Respondent was a priest to remove a bishop during current times of strife within the diocese. To allow Title IV and the sexual abuse exception to the statute of limitations to be used in this manner diminishes the monumental efforts of the Church to address, punish and remove incidents of actual clergy sexual abuse.”

Pabarue said in a conference call Thursday that he was disappointed the review court considered his client guilty of conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy, but he was thankful for its ultimate decision.

Bishop Bennison joined his attorney in discussing the case.

“I’m very gratified by the decision of the court. I’ve always believed that the charges were without merit,” he said.

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[Springfield Bishop Peter] Beckwith, disappointed by [Katharine] Jefferts Schori’s election, threatened to seek alternative oversight for the Springfield Diocese ”” possibly from a bishop in Africa, as other dioceses had done ”” rather than submit to her authority. He wrote in a pastoral letter that the Episcopal Church was “in meltdown,” and called the moment “the lowest ebb of our beloved but beleaguered Church since perhaps the Civil War if not the American Revolution.”

At the same time, some liberals in the diocese complained about Beckwith’s pastoral leadership and threatened to defect themselves from his authority to a more friendly bishop in another diocese.

In the end, no one in Springfield decamped for foreign shores, but in 2008, some conservatives in other parts of the country left the Episcopal Church and founded their own province, called the Anglican Church in North America.

“Not only our diocese but the whole Episcopal Church has been rocky and unsettling,” Holder said. “The diocese needs someone who can be a reconciler and a healer; someone who will be open to hearing the views of all people.”

Chuck Evans, moderator of the 50-member Concerned Laity of the Springfield Diocese, said the church in Springfield “is pretty fractured at this point.”

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Although [Charles] Bennison badly mishandled his brother’s prolonged sexual abuse of a teenager in his California parish during the 1970s, the appeals court concluded, the church’s statute of limitations on such wrongdoing had expired after 10 years.

“We find that [Bennison] committed conduct unbecoming a member of the clergy,” the eight-member panel of bishops wrote. But “because the statute of limitations has run out . . . we have no choice under the canons of the church but to reverse the judgment of the trial court that [he] is guilty.”

Bennison, 66, described himself as “very gratified” in a teleconference call from Michigan, where he is vacationing. He plans to return to his duties as bishop Aug. 16.

“I hope I am a changed person,” he said, adding that his immediate goal was to listen to the men and women who have led the diocese since his suspension in October 2007. He said he would likely devote more attention to the spiritual affairs of the diocese than to its finances or administration.

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At 59, Grafton was consecrated as second Bishop of Fond du Lac on April 25, 1889, with the Bishops of Milwaukee, Chicago, Minnesota, Indiana and Springfield assisting ”” and marking out geographically the general boundaries of what was subsequently known as the “Biretta Belt.” As diocesan bishop for nearly a quarter of a century, Grafton encouraged and led a campaign of substantial church-building and clergy-recruitment that still shows its mark on the ecclesiastical map of northeastern Wisconsin. His private wealth funded various initiatives, including the founding of a Benedictine monastery, architectural work in parish churches and at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Fond du Lac, and charitable activities throughout the diocese. While diocesan bishop, Grafton served as superior general of the American branch of the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament from 1890 to 1912.

In 1900, Grafton’s actions caused a furor in parts of the Episcopal Church when he invited a number of non-Anglican bishops to participate in the consecration of Reginald Heber Weller as coadjutor Bishop of Fond du Lac. The bishop’s friendships with Russian Orthodox and Polish National Catholic clergy led to their accepting his invitation, but declining to participate in the actual consecration of Grafton’s own eventual successor. A photograph of the assembled clergy after the service circulated widely and earned it the disparaging title of “the Fond du Lac Circus,” still remembered as a watershed event in American Anglo-Catholic history. Although the presence (and even participation) of vested non-Episcopal clergy at ordinations is commonplace today, Grafton was decades ahead of his time in encouraging mutual recognition of the unity of the Church through its sacramental life.

Grafton’s physical strength declined in the later years of his episcopate, and he delegated some duties in his large diocese to his coadjutor. But he was well enough to travel to Russia in 1903, where he renewed and formed friendships with many Orthodox bishops and theologians. At his death on Aug. 30, 1912, Grafton was at 82 the oldest serving bishop of the Episcopal Church (though not the most senior in years of consecration).

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Charles Bennison has been reinstated as the head of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania following a church court ruling overturning his conviction on charges of covering up a sexual relationship between his brother, also a priest, and a 14-year-old girl in California more than 30 years ago.

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From here:

I am very pleased with today’s ruling overturning California’s Proposition 8. All of God’s children are equal in God’s eyes, and today Chief Judge Vaughn R. Walker affirmed once again that all Californian families share equal protection under the law.

The Episcopal Church has reached resolution on the issue of full civil rights for lesbian and gay persons and, speaking for myself as a bishop and person of faith and as a representative of the Episcopal Church, I am gladdened whenever discrimination is rejected and fundamental rights are acknowledged as equal rights.

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From here:

Bishop Diocesan J. Jon Bruno has issued the following statement on federal Judge Vaughn R. Walker’s Aug. 4 decision on Proposition 8.

“Justice is advancing thanks to today’s ruling affirming Californians’ constitutional right to marriage in faithful, same-gender relationships.
“Although the appeal process will now challenge U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision on Proposition 8, my continuing prayer will be — as the prophet Amos said — for justice ‘to roll down’ and to prevail.
“To reiterate my statement of November 5, 2008: ‘Proposition 8 is a lamentable expression of fear-based discrimination that attempts to deny the constitutional rights of some Californians on the basis of sexual orientation. It is only a matter of time before its narrow constraints are ultimately nullified by the courts and our citizens’ own increasing knowledge about the diversity of God’s creation.’ “

…victim advocates say that church law still allows offenders in ministry.

“The Episcopalians, like most denominations, have a long way to go,” said David Clohessy, executive director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “It’s alarming that the denomination hasn’t even committed to a ‘one-strike’ policy on paper.”

But Bishop Kenneth Price of Pittsburgh believes that the policies dioceses are required to enact create a de facto one-strike rule that keeps offenders out.

“Over the years this has become a much more public concern. The House of Bishops is very concerned for the protection of alleged victims … and the canons are very clear on what to do,” said Bishop Price, who is also secretary of the House of Bishops.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10214/1077004-455.stm#ixzz0vS3iD2jy

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One minute, he’s a parish priest.

But as a dozen bishops placed their hands on the shoulders of a kneeling John Smylie, he became the new head of the Episcopal Church in Wyoming.

The national church’s presiding bishop, the Rt. Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori, conducted the two-hour consecration service attended by several hundred members of the Wyoming diocese at the Casper Events Center on Saturday.

“Therefore, Father, make John a bishop in your church,” Jefferts Schori prayed during the laying-on of hands. “Pour out upon him the power of your princely spirit, whom you bestowed upon your beloved son Jesus Christ, with whom he endowed the apostles, and by whom your church is built up in every place, to the glory and unceasing praise of your name.”

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These guidelines are for the clergy of the Diocese of Maryland in keeping with Resolution CO56 of the 2009 General Convention of the Episcopal Church that states that bishops “may provide generous pastoral responses to meet the needs of members of this Church,” and that we “honor the theological diversity of this Church in regard to matters of human sexuality.”

Read it carefully and read it all.

Meeting others who were sexually abused by clergy can help victims heal, says a leader of a support group for survivors.

“We hope they will try and talk with others and find they are not alone. They didn’t do anything wrong,” said Barbara Dorris, outreach director of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests.

She didn’t know whether victims of a local Episcopal bishop had contacted S.N.A.P., but said they would be just as welcome by the Chicago-based nonprofit as the more highly publicized victims of Roman Catholic priests.

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The rector of a Grosse Pointe Farms church has resigned after being removed because of allegations about an inappropriate sexual relationship with a woman who was a not a church member.

Church leaders are to call an interim rector in the coming weeks and begin the search process for a new rector.

The Rev. Bradford Whitaker resigned from Christ Church Grosse Pointe effective July 17 after a complaint was made to the church, according to the office of the Rt. Rev. Wendell N. Gibbs, Jr., bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan, which gave no further comment.

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The resignation of the Rev. Bradford Whitaker, senior pastor at Christ Church Grosse Pointe, was read to the Episcopal congregation members at a parish meeting Tuesday night.

Whitaker, a popular leader of the church for the past eight years, had been on suspension since April. The congregation was stunned by news the Michigan Episcopal diocese was investigating “a serious allegation” that was not immediately specified. Whitaker was banned from the church or from communicating with church leaders during the inquiry. It was later revealed that the diocese was looking into claims that Whitaker had an affair while serving in a previous church. Whitaker and his wife Harriet, a teacher, and three children live in a home on the church grounds on Grosse Pointe Boulevard in the Farms.

Whitaker apparently will retain his ordination status, but will not be allowed to preach in an Episcopal Church for at least three years, according to church members.

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It is true that the confirmation of Canon Trisk increased the number of clergy currently on the Committee from one to two, which matched the number of clergy who had previously served. But the reason for the “shortfall” in that category was that one of those prior clergy members had in the meantime been elevated to the episcopate:

The Committee then heard that because Bp Catherine Roskam had ended her term as The Episcopal Church’s bishop representative at the last ACC meeting in Jamaica Bp Ian Douglas’s election by Executive Committee to that position following his consecration had been entirely within its constitutional powers. It did not constitute a fresh appointment and would not extend Bp Douglas’ period of service.

So Bishop Ian Douglas, a previously elected clergy member of the Committee, was replaced by Canon Trisk from South Africa, thereby keeping the clergy number at two. Isn’t that convenient?

Not really: by accepting the charade expressed in the seven words “because Bishop Roskam had ended her term . . .” the Committee also managed to maintain its episcopal members (not counting the five bishops appointed by the Primates’ Meeting) at three. But as explained in this earlier post, and this later one, there is no provision in either the old constitution and bylaws, nor in the new articles, for an elected member’s term to end before the start of the next ACC meeting, which happens in the spring of 2012.

Who told the “Standing Committee” that Bishop Roskam had “ended her term”? No one — because it is not up to Bishop Roskam to end her term, but to the body which appointed her: ECUSA itself (acting through its Executive Council).

Read it all.

Read it and ponder it carefully.

Dear Members of Trinity Parish:

As your bishop, I am inviting you to attend a confidential meeting at which I will provide you with additional information concerning my reasons for inhibiting the exercise of the priestly office by Dean Philip C. Linder.

I am convening this meeting because in my pastoral judgment, and in my exercise of the ministry of oversight as an ordained episcopal leader in our church, it is my conclusion that sharing additional information with you is necessary. I hope to assure you of the deliberate and careful way in which decisions have been made, and the factual justification for them. The ultimate goal of the meeting is to ensure that the health and wellness of the parish are preserved.

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The Diocese of San Diego has joined several other dioceses ”” including Massachusetts, Southeast Florida and Southern Ohio ”” that have decided since General Convention 2009 to allow some form of public blessings for same-sex couples.

The decision by the Rt. Rev. James Robert Mathes, Bishop of San Diego, reflects the recommendations of the diocese’s Holiness in Relationships Task Force Report [PDF].

“My approach on this matter, and several other things, is to be in conversation with the community,” Bishop Mathes told The Living Church.

Read it all.