Senior Active Bishop Plans Retirement
Episcopal News Service. July 25, 1985 [85162]
DETROIT (DPS, July 25) -- The Rt. Rev. William Jones Gordon, Jr., assistant bishop of Michigan and Huron district head, plans to retire after an active episcopate that has spanned 37 years.
Gordan's retirement was announced at spring meeting of the diocesan executive council. Diocesan Bishop Coleman McGehee, in making the announcement, spoke of Gordon's years of service to the diocese and the contribution he has made to strengthening the Church in the north. He will continue to serve until the end of the year.
In announcing the retirement, McGehee recalled a visit that Gordon had made to Virginia Theological Seminary. "We students were dazzled by the handsome young missionary Bishop of Alaska. We talked of nothing else for days."
Gordon began his service in Michigan in September, 1976, after a colorful 26 years in Alaska. His accounts of his first 6,000 miles by dog team to the Arctic Coast missions were a delight to congregations all over the Diocese. Michigan probably seemed tame to him and its distances quite insignificant; in Alaska he flew his single-engine plane about 50,000 miles a year.
Gordon has been for some time the senior active bishop in the Church. He is a mere 67 years old, but when he was consecrated Bishop of Alaska he was only 30. In fact, his consecration had to be delayed for six months after his election because he wasn't canonically old enough for the office.
He served Alaska from 1948 until 1974, when he resigned to attempt to introduce a concept he had developed in Alaska to the rest of the Church. To cope with the distances and isolation of the Alaskan diocese, Gordon had worked hard to develop local lay leadership. The success and vigor of this convinced him that the Church needed to be much more energetic about developing the gifts and ministries of the laity. He called the concept TEAM -- Teach Each A Ministry -- and, with United Thank Offering and Episcopal Church Foundation support and the blessing of the House of Bishops, traveled around the Church for two years, developing diocesan programs of lay enablement.
Here in Michigan, he has continued to live the vigorous life, consistently winning in running competitions in which his younger clergy found it hard to keep up with him. Gordon's fondness for the out-ofdoors has made him a forceful advocate of the diocesan camping program, and the plans for a new conference center, to be called Gordonwood, are close to his heart.