The province’s constitution leaves property in the hands of individual parishes, limiting the potential for lawsuits down the line if parishes or dioceses decide to leave. Details such as how marriage and divorce will be handled are expected to be hammered out before the constitution is ratified in June.
Chicago Bishop Jeffrey Lee said he is disappointed by the group’s decision to leave.
“I’m saddened that some members of the Episcopal Church are choosing to affiliate with other parts of the Anglican Communion,” Lee said. “I think we’re impoverished whenever sisters and brothers are not with us at the same table for the same conversation. There’s real regret attached to that for me.”
It is truly sad that Lee cannot hear what the rest of the Anglican Communion has been saying to the ECUSA/TEC/GCC/EO-PAC for over 5 years. But he seems to have remembered his talking points from Lambeth for the Chicago paper. If folks are leaving for other Provinces and forming a new Province, does he really expect people to swallow the line about the “inclusivity” claimed-but-obviously-not-practiced in his declining entity?