Pittsburgh bishop declines Presiding Bishop's offer of reconciliation
By Mary Frances Schjonberg, November 02, 2007
[Episcopal News Service] On the eve of the November 2-3 annual convention of
the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, Bishop Robert Duncan rejected Presiding
Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori's request that he lead the diocese away
from efforts to disaffiliate from the Episcopal Church.
The three-sentence letter, dated November 1, said in full: "Here I stand. I
can do no other. I will neither compromise the Faith once delivered to the
saints, nor will I abandon the sheep who elected me to protect them."
The first two sentences echo the conclusion of Martin Luther's speech to the
Diet of Worms in 1521, during which Luther refused to recant the stance he
took against the Roman Catholic Church. Duncan signed his letter, "Pax et
bonum in Christ Jesus our Lord, +Bob Pittsburgh."
Jefferts Schori had written to Duncan on October 31 asking him "to recede
from this direction and to lead your diocese on a new course that recognizes
the interdependent and hierarchical relationship between the national Church
and its dioceses and parishes."
The Presiding Bishop wrote that "it grieves me that any bishop of this
Church would seek to lead any of its members out of it," reminding Duncan of
her "open offer of an Episcopal Visitor if you wish to receive pastoral care
from another bishop" and expressing hope of reconciliation.
The Pittsburgh convention began meeting November 2 and gave the first of two
approvals needed to enact a series of constitutional amendments which would
essentially eliminate all references to the diocese's connection with the
Episcopal Church.
Most significantly, Resolution One -- which passed by 118 to 58 votes in the
lay order, with one abstention, and 109 to 24 in the clergy order -- would
remove required language stating that the diocese agrees to accede to the
Episcopal Church's Constitution and Canons as the constitution requires. If
that resolution passes a second reading, presumably at the 2008 diocesan
convention, it effectively would violate the requirements of the Episcopal
Church's Constitution and Canons. Article V, Section 1 says that a diocese's
constitution must include "an unqualified accession" to the constitution and
canons of the Episcopal Church.
In his address to the convention November 2, Duncan said that the first
reading of a constitutional change "announces an intention without actually
making a change" and changes nothing.
"Of course, in another sense, adoption signifies an intention, gives
warning, opens a possibility, introduces a period of preparation for
anticipated consequences," he said.
If Resolution One passes, Duncan told the convention, "our work in the year
ahead would likely include determination of the Province with which the
Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh might re-align, development of acceptable
options available to minority congregations, and negotiation, both
nationally and with plaintiffs locally, about a mediated alternative to
continuing or escalating litigation."
Jefferts Schori had asked Duncan in her letter to change his position and
"urge your diocese at its forthcoming convention not to adopt the
resolutions that you have until now supported."
Jefferts Schori told Duncan that if his course did not change, "I shall
regrettably be compelled to see that appropriate canonical steps are
promptly taken to consider whether you have abandoned the Communion of this
Church -- by actions and substantive statements, however they may be phrased
-- and whether you have committed canonical offences that warrant
disciplinary action."
In June, the Executive Council, the governing body of the Episcopal Church
between meetings of General Convention, warned that actions by Episcopal
Church dioceses that change their constitutions in an attempt to bypass the
Church's Constitution and Canons are "null and void."
Via Resolution NAC023, the Council reminded dioceses that they are required
to "accede" to the Constitution and Canons, and declaring that any diocesan
action that removes that accession from its constitution is "null and void."
That declaration, the resolution said, means that their constitutions "shall
be as they were as if such amendments had not been passed."
-- The Rev. Mary Frances Schjonberg is national correspondent for the
Episcopal News Service.
Editor's Note: Resolution One has passed at the Pittsburgh Diocesan Convention.
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