Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, AFP, UPI, Church Times
The Episcopal diocese of Pittsburgh voted Saturday to cut its ties with the church, affiliating with a conservative Anglican province in South America.
The clergy voted 121 in favor of the split, 33 against, three abstentions and two invalid ballots.
Among the lay delegates, 119 voted in favor, 69 were opposed and there were three abstentions.
Before yesterday's vote, most of the delegates who crowded into St. Martin's Episcopal Church in Monroeville agreed the national church has lost its way over the past few decades. But they disagreed about whether the diocese should stay with the Episcopal Church and keep fighting to alter the national church's path or move to a regional church that they see as being on the correct path, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports.
The results of the vote were greeted with silence.
The vote means that the diocese led by outspoken conservative Bishop Robert Duncan will become part of the theologically conservative Buenos Aires-based Anglican Province of the Southern Cone.
Because of preliminary votes by the diocese to secede, Duncan was deposed last month from ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church after a majority vote by the House of Bishops at a meeting in Salt Lake City, Church Times reports.
But because Duncan remains a bishop in good standing with the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone, he's again allowed to administer sacraments in the diocese after yesterday's vote.
His diocese will hold a special convention Nov. 7 to reinstate Duncan as its bishop, said David Wilson, president of the committee administering the diocese, the Tribune-Review reports.
The schism will force the 20,000 Episcopalians in the Pittsburgh diocese to decide whether to stay with the Episcopal Church or follow the diocese.
Immediately after the results were announced, the Rev. Harold Lewis from Calvary Church in East Liberty announced that his church would stay with the Episcopal Church and not follow the lead of the diocese, Pittsburgh Gazette-Review reports.
"This is a very sad day. There are no winners here," he said.
At least 17 of 74 congregations in the diocese elected to remain with the U.S. church, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports.
After the vote, the Rev. James Simons, the only member of the diocese's governing Standing Committee to oppose secession, held a press conference behind a sign that said "The Episcopal Church Welcomes You."
Simons, a conservative and longtime ally of Bishop Duncan, called it "a sad day."
The Episcopal Church has recognized Simons as the initial leader of the diocese that will remain with the US church.
"All of us who remain in the Episcopal Church will look after those who are suffering because of this split. We will find someone to minister to us as bishop. We will be recognized by the national church. We will have a diocese, and it will be healthy and faithful," he said.
Both sides have claimed the name Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, but Duncan's diocese will add "of the Anglican Province of the Southern Cone" the Post-Gazette reports.
In an official statement for the breakaway diocese, its director of communications, Reverend Peter Frank, said, "We deeply value our shared heritage and years of friendship with those still within that denomination, but this diocese could not in good conscience continue down the road away from mainstream Christianity that the leadership of The Episcopal Church is so determined to follow."
The split follows decades of contention between the theologically conservative diocese and the US denomination over doctrine, biblical authority and sexual ethics. The 2.3 million-member Episcopal Church is the US branch of the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, which is based In England, but whose membership is centered in the global South.
While conservatives have a range of disagreements with the Episcopal Church, the consecration of New Hampshire Bishop Gene Robinson, a gay man in a committed relationship, set off a firestorm in the worldwide Anglican Communion. The Province of the Southern Cone in South America and churches in Africa have been campaigning to expand their reach by aligning with US conservatives.
The Episcopal Church views the Pittsburgh secession as a violation of canon law and claims full rights to all church property. Litigation is expected, the Post-Gazette reports.
Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, primate of the Episcopal Church, said most of the worldwide church "will be intensely grieved by the actions of individuals" in Pittsburgh. Unlike in the past, however, she did not mention suing the breakaway group.
Source: Episcopal diocese chooses to secede | Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Episcopal diocese votes to split | Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Episcopal diocese votes to leave church | Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Pittsburgh diocese leaves Episcopal Church | UPI
US diocese splits from Episcopal Church amid gay crisis | AFP
US Bishops depose Bishop Bob Duncan for secession | Church Times