News Brief
Episcopal News Service. July 13, 1978 [78198]
The Rt. Rev. J. Brooke Mosley, assistant Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania has accepted the position of chairman of the Policy and Action Committee of The Urban Bishops Coalition. The Coalition is an informal group of 55 American Bishops drawn together by their common concern for the plight of the cities today. Over the past eight months, the Coalition has sponsored a a series of public hearings on the urban crisis. The bishops evaluated the 70 hours of testimony at a March meeting in Chicago and voted to form the Policy and Action Committee to provide assistance to Episcopal Dioceses in developing urban policies. The committee will also disseminate public policy information and educational materials to the church and implement appropriate programs which the bishops identified. The bishops specified the new committee should include not only bishops, but lay and ordained Episcopal men and women and knowledgeable non-Episcopalians. Mosley will announce the names of the committee members in the near future.
A leading liturgical scholar and a lay ethicist have been named to the faculty of the Seabury-Western Theological Seminary here, according to Dean O.C. Edwards. The Rev. Leonel Mitchell, Th.D., has been named professor of liturgics and Dr. Timothy Sedgwick will join the staff as professor of ethics and moral theology. Dr. Mitchell comes to the Seminary from Notre Dame University while Dr. Sedgwick has recently completed doctoral studies at Vanderbilt University.
The Rt. Rev. Peter Nathaniel Nyanja is the new Diocesan Bishop of the Diocese of Lake Malawi in Central Africa. A former Archdeacon of Nkhotakota, the new bishop was consecrated here June 25 by the Archbishop of Central Africa, the Most Rev. Donald Arden. Assisting in the ceremony were the Rt. Rev. Filemon Mataka, Bishop of Lusaka (Zambia); the Rt. Rev. Joseph Mabula, Bishop of Northern Zambia, and the Rt. Rev. Josiah Mtekateka, retired bishop of Lake Malawi. The new bishop is 38 years old, married with five children. He is a former school teacher who received his theological education in Tanzania and later at St. John's Theological College in Zambia. He wvas ordained to the priesthood in 1972 and while continuing his theological education by correspondence and through special courses, he served as a priest in several parishes in the northern (Lake) diocese. He was appointed Archdeacon of Nkhotakota in 1977.
The College of Preachers in conjunction with the Communications Department of Washington Cathedral will offer a two-day workshop December 14 and 15 on video tape recording for the church. Multi Media Productions will provide the professional staff for the workshop. A variety of the newest in video equipment will be available for hands-on technical training the second day of the workshop. Included will be practical suggestions for video use in the average parish church, for example: video taping services for house bound parishioners and for nursing homes, closed circuit TV for overflow crowds, tape recording special services for cable TV, using broadcast video (pretaped) as discussion starters for church school classes, training acolytes, ushers, lay readers and others.
Services honoring the Rt. Rev. George M. Murray, Bishop of the Central Gulf Coast, on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of his consecration, were held in St. Paul's Church here, on June 18. Preacher for the service was the Rt. Rev. Gray Temple, Bishop of South Carolina, and the celebrant was the Rev. Roger C. Porter, rector of St. Paul's and president of the Diocesan Standing Committee. Contributions from individuals throughout the Diocese provided a gift to Bishop Murray of a purse of $25,000, or $1,000 for each year of his episcopate. Proclamations from the governors of Alabama and Florida and from the Mayor of Mobile were also presented.
"Telecommunications and the Church -- Part I" -- a full color one hour video cassette presentation produced by Multi Media Productions, Inc., a national video consulting firm specializing in church telecommunications, is now available announces Ms. Ciel Kabler, President of Multi Media Productions, Inc. This vital comprehensive presentation, an introduction to telecommunications for churches, is accompanied by a full package of printed materials and contains: Introduction to video tape recording, How to Get Into Video, "50 Practical Ways to Use Video Tape in the Church", Information on distribution systems including cassette, cable, satellite, videodisc, etc., Six Costly sins in Video, training with video, resources, books, periodicals and glossaries, converting existing A/V materials to video and production planning. It is available in 3/4" U-Matic, 1/2" VHS and 1/2" Beta formats. For further information, contact Multi Media Productions, P.O. Box 1041, Virginia Beach, Va. 23451 (804) 486-6118.
The Rev. Charles Wellington Taylor has been appointed Assistant Professor of Pastoral Theology at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, Dean Frederick H. Borsch announced today. Father Taylor, the rector of the Church of the Holy Comforter in Washington, D.C., will assume his new duties on August 1. Ordained in 1967, Father Taylor drew national attention while still in his first pastoral assignment in Columbus, Ohio, for his creative work in developing a youth ministry. Within a year he was appointed to the Youth Ministry Staff of the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church. His pastoral posts have included chaplaincies at Ohio State, Howard University, and St. Peter's Preparatory School, Peekskill, New York.
Dissident members of St. Christopher's Episcopal Church have voted to continue their litigation battle with Episcopal Diocese of Nevada, the Rev. Clark Tea announced here. St. Christopher's recently lost a decision in District Court over its right to break away from the denomination and still retain the parish property. Mr. Tea said his parishioners have voted to appeal the decision to Nevada's Supreme Court. "It is a moral point with me, and now we have got everything to win and nothing to lose," he said.
The Rt. Rev. Bob Gordon Jones, Bishop of Wyoming, received the honorary degree of doctor of divinity at commencement exercises of the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest here in late May. Bishop Jones is the second graduate of the seminary elected to the episcopate. The Bishop of Hawaii, the Rt. Rev. Edmond L. Browning was the preacher at the eucharist which was celebrated by the Rt. Rev. J. Milton Richardson, Bishop of Texas and chairman of the seminary board of trustees.
The Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego, a New Testament scholar and a West Coast civic leader were recepients of honorary degrees at the commencement exercises of the Church Divinity School of the Pacific here in mid-June. The Rt. Rev. Robert M. Wolterstorff, Bishop of San Diego and Dr. Silvia Tipple New Lake received doctorates in divinity at the excerises while Mary Cooper Jewett Gaiser of Spokane, Wash. , was honored with a doctorate in humane letters from the seminary.