UGANDA: Church receives retired North Dakota bishop Andrew Fairfield
Episcopal News Service. June 29, 2007 [062907-02]
The Anglican Church of Uganda's House of Bishops has voted to receive retired North Dakota Bishop Andrew Fairfield as one of its members to assist former Episcopalian John A. M. Guernsey who was recently elected to provide "episcopal care and oversight to the 26 congregations in America that are part of the Church of Uganda."
A press release from the Church of Uganda said that Fairfield has written to Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori announcing his resignation from the Episcopal Church's House of Bishops.
"I consider Bishop Fairfield as my friend," Jefferts Schori said on hearing the announcement. "I am sorry to see him go."
According to the Church of Uganda release, Fairfield said, "Now, although I am 'retired' (from a jurisdictional and financial point of view), I seek further Christian service, especially in the process of this transition in Anglican orthodoxy."
Archbishop Henry Luke Orombi, Primate of the Church of Uganda, said: "It is an honor for us to receive into our House of Bishops such a man of God. At the 1998 Lambeth Conference, he proposed the resolution on The Authority of Scripture, which we passed. We believe he will be a great support to Bishop-elect John Guernsey and all the congregations in America that are under our care."
Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan, Moderator of the conservative Network of Anglican Communion Dioceses and Parishes (NACDP), said: "Bishop Fairfield is one of the most respected Bishops in the entire American Church, and has served the Network very well as our ordinations suffragan. I know his work has been especially valuable to congregations in our International Conference. I am delighted to know that he has found a new ecclesiastical home in the Church of Uganda, a Province which has declared a state of broken communion with The Episcopal Church's majority, but embraces full communion with all in the Anglican Communion Network. We look forward to many years of continued fruitful ministry together."