Pittsburgh convention approves first reading of constitutional changes
Episcopal News Service. November 2, 2007 [110207-03]
Mary Frances Schjonberg
The annual convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh November 2 gave the first of two approvals needed to enact a constitutional change to remove language in the diocesan constitution stating that the diocese accedes to the Episcopal Church's Constitution and Canons as the church's constitution requires.
Deputies voted 118 to 58 with one abstention to approve Resolution One. Clergy voted 109 to 24 in favor.
An effort, labeled Resolution Two, to instead return the diocese to full "accession" to The Episcopal Church was defeated by voice vote.
"This vote does not change the diocese's current affiliation with The Episcopal Church. In fact, nothing at all changes until such a time as the next annual convention approves a second reading of the proposed amendment," Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan said in a news release.
"We have much work ahead of us, not the least of which is to walk through this time of change with grace and charity to all," he said.
Duncan and the convention apparently disregarded Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori's October 31 request for Duncan "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."
She had urged him in a 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."
The Presiding Bishop said "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 day before the start of the Pittsburgh convention Duncan declined Jefferts Schori's requests. His 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."
Resolution One is part of a series of constitutional amendments the Pittsburgh convention will consider during its November 2-3 meeting. The amendments would essentially eliminate all references to the diocese's connection with the Episcopal Church.
If the amendments pass a second reading, presumably at the 2008 diocesan convention, they 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 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 declared 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."
In his convention address 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 passed, 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."
Among the proposed changes is one to rewrite the first article of the diocese's constitution to claim the diocese as "a constituent member of the Anglican Communion," language which mirrors the first article of the Episcopal Church's Constitution.
The other diocesan-proposed changes would allow the diocese to belong to another province of the Anglican Communion, allow parishes from outside of the diocese's geographic boundaries to join it so long as they adhere to the diocesan constitution and canons and commit to "upholding and propagating the historic Faith and Order as set forth in the Book of Common Prayer," and set up a process for electing deputies to meetings of governing bodies outside of the diocese (but not to the Episcopal Church's General Convention).
Pittsburgh decision part of larger effort
When the Diocese of Quincy met in convention in October, it passed resolutions paving the way for a possible split from the Episcopal Church. Diocesan spokesman, the Rev. John Spencer, told a local newspaper that passing the resolutions "took the first steps, constitutionally, to make it possible to realign when the time is appropriate to do so."
Spencer said that Quincy leaders want to wait to see what other similarly minded dioceses decide. "We're trying to work as a unit with our sister dioceses, so it's not just one synod acting on its own," he said. "It's a timing issue."
Spencer told the Associated Press that the diocese did not "retreat" from the issue, but took actions that give the group flexibility "within our wider communion relationships -- so should there come a time when the Episcopal Church is no longer a recognized part of that communion, then the Diocese of Quincy will still maintain that relationship."
"We're still hopeful there can be some resolution in the differences of opinion between the Episcopal Church and the wider (Anglican) communion," he said. "But we are bound by our own diocese and constitution."
The Diocese of Fort Worth is the next diocese set to consider similar constitutional changes during its annual convention, meeting November 16-17. Jefferts Schori intends to send a letter to Bishop Jack Iker, who advocates these changes, before the convention notifying him that such a step would force her to take action to bring the diocese and its leadership into line with the mandates of the Episcopal Church.
In December, the Diocese of San Joaquin is scheduled to hear the second and final reading of its constitutional accession amendment, a proposed act that may prompt "more dramatic action" beforehand, the Presiding Bishop's Chancellor David Beers told the Executive Council in a private briefing October 26 during the Council's recent meeting.
At some point, assuming that all these and other constitutional changes go forward, the Presiding Bishop could ask the Title IV Review Committee to consider whether the three diocesan bishops who have proposed and supported these changes have abandoned the communion of the Episcopal Church, Beers told the Council.
If the Presiding Bishop were to present those materials, and if the committee agreed that abandonment had taken place, the bishops would have two months to recant their positions. If they failed to do so, the matter would go to the full House of Bishops.
If the House were to concur, the Presiding Bishop would depose the bishops and declare the episcopates of those dioceses vacant. Those remaining in the Episcopal Church would be gathered to organize a new diocesan convention and elect a replacement Standing Committee, if necessary.
An assisting bishop would be appointed to provide episcopal ministry until a new diocesan bishop search process could be initiated and a new bishop elected and consecrated.
A lawsuit would be filed against the departed leadership and a representative sample of departing congregations if they attempted to retain Episcopal Church property.
"These are consequences, not punishments," the Rev. Dr. Charles Robertson, canon to the Presiding Bishop, recently told Episcopal News Service, "consequences that have long been clear, and are now being reiterated by the Presiding Bishop in the letters of warning. The goal is reconciliation, but also accountability."
Beers added: "The consequences can easily be avoided. But the Episcopal Church has the obligation to discipline its leaders under circumstances like this."
In late September, Duncan was the leader of a group of 51 bishops representing several self-identified Anglican organizations that said they will spend the next 15 months developing "an Anglican union," which they anticipate will be recognized by some Anglican Communion Primates and provinces.
The Common Cause Council of Bishops, ending a four-day meeting in Pittsburgh September 28, said that union will be the one called for in September 2006 by a group of Anglican Primates who lead provinces in the global south.
Thirteen active or former diocesan Episcopal Church bishops attended the meeting, including Keith Ackerman (Quincy), James Adams (Western Kansas), Fitz Allison (formerly of South Carolina), Peter Beckwith (Springfield), David Bena (formerly of Albany), Alex Dickson (formerly of West Tennessee), Andrew Fairfield (formerly of North Dakota), John Howe (Central Florida), Jack Iker (Fort Worth), William Love (Albany), Donald Parsons (formerly of Quincy), Henry Scriven (assistant, Pittsburgh) and William Wantland (formerly of Eau Claire).
A statement of the bishops' intentions, articles of the partnership, timeline, and issues for the "lead bishops roundtable" to decide are all available here.