Organizers hope to become a full province of the Anglican Communion, a status that would make it a peer of the Episcopal Church in the United States and the Anglican Church of Canada. It is the first attempt to create a province defined by theological orientation, not by geography.
“It’s something that has never happened before in the Anglican community,” said the Rev. Roger Ames of St. Luke’s Anglican Church in Fairlawn, who attended the event. “You will have a more orthodox group that will, in time, be recognized as an alternative to the United States Episcopal Church.”
The other local breakaway parishes are St. Barnabas Anglican Church in Bay Village, the Anglican Church of the Transfiguration in Cleveland, Church of the Holy Spirit in Akron and St. Anne in the Fields in Madison.
Martha Wright, communications officer for the Diocese of Ohio, said five of its 93 parishes in northern Ohio have broken away. She said the diocese, based at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland, will “absolutely not” break with the Episcopal church.
“We’re sorry that they chose to go that route,” Wright said. “We stay because this is who we are.”
In the meantime, we will forge ahead on our mission of reform and the return to the historic faith.
I would be inclined to heavily discount any negative comments by the Diocese of Ohio. From 2002 through 2007 the diocese lost 14 percent of its Membership and 19 percent of its ASA while Plate & Pledge increased a meager 4 percent, given inflation of 16 percent. And Ohio clearly has overstanded its Membership in 2007, possibly by as much as 2,300 (by falsely reporting the same data from 2006 for some parishes which have departed). Statmann