Bishop Stewart to Take Church Center Post
Episcopal News Service. June 30, 1983 [83125]
NEW YORK (DPS, June 30) -- The Rt. Rev. Alexander D. Stewart, Bishop of the Diocese of Western Massachusetts, has accepted the invitation of Presiding Bishop John M. Allin to become Executive for Administration at the Episcopal Church Center.
When the required canonical consents to the move are received, he will succeed the Rt. Rev. Milton L. Wood, who plans to retire at the end of the year.
As senior administrative officer, Stewart will report directly to Allin, and will monitor and coordinate all units through the administrative group at the Church Center, as well as maintain liaison with organizations and programs throughout the Church. He will also represent the Presiding Bishop at various ecumenical, civic and Episcopal Church boards and commissions.
At the recent meeting of the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church, Allin announced that the invitation had been issued and commented that Stewart's gifts as pastor and administrator" will be of great value to the Church as we look toward the transition and work to turn over to my successor a strong and vigorous program." Allin's successor will be elected at the 1985 General Convention and will take office the following January.
At the same meeting, Allin expressed his "deep gratitude for the work and presence of Bishop Wood." Allin and Wood have worked very closely over the past decade, often -- before the Allins moved into New York -- talking over plans as they commuted together between Greenwich and New York.
Stewart, 57, came to Western Massachusetts from the Diocese of Rhode Island where he had been rector of St. Mark's Episcopal Church, Riverside, for 17 years. He is a graduate of Harvard College and Union Theological Seminary. In addition, he earned a master's degree from Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration and studied at Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, Mass. In his early ministry he served St. Margaret's Church, N.Y. and as curate at Christ Church, Greenwich, Conn.
During his tenure in Western Massachusetts some dozen mission churches have achieved full parish status, the new Prayer Book has become the regular form of worship, the budget and ecumenism have flourished, and the diocese has been active in major national programs, such as Venture in Mission, The Next Step, and a pilot program for planned giving.
In addition to his leadership in Western Massachusetts, Stewart has been active in provincial and national church affairs. He is president of the Province of New England and is a trustee of the Church Pension Fund and the Episcopal Radio & TV Foundation.
Following in the footsteps of Bishop W. Appleton Lawrence, an earlier bishop of the diocese, and of his immediate predecessor, Bishop Robert M. Hatch, Stewart places a high value on missionary outreach throughout the Church. Especially has he encouraged and enabled cooperation with the Anglican Church in Africa, and last fall Western Massachusetts established formal partnership relations with the Diocese of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania and he and others from the diocese have participated in overseas exchanges of people and programs.
The Standing Committee of the diocese is beginning to outline procedures for diocesan self-study and goals, leading to a special election convention, probably late this year.
Wood, a native of Alabama and a former suffragan bishop in the Diocese of Atlanta, joined the Church Center as the chief administrative officer when Allin began his term as the Chief Pastor and Primate of the 2.9 million member Church.
After undergraduate work and theological training at the University of the South, Wood served parishes in Alabama before being called as rector of All Saints Church in Atlanta in 1952. He later served as director of the Appleton Church Home and an archdeacon and as canon to the bishop of Atlanta before being elected to the episcopate in 1967.