New Jersey Diocese Turns to Consultant to Help Ease Tensions
Episcopal News Service. April 3, 1997 [97-1724]
Jerry Hames, Jerry Hames is Editor of Episcopal Life, the national newspaper of the Episcopal Church.
(ENS) Bedeviled by a financial crisis, claims of institutional racism, and complaints that their bishop has an autocratic style, Episcopalians in the Diocese of New Jersey are seeking to reconcile factions and heal divisions that threaten to fracture the diocese.
In January, a letter to all parishes from several diocesan leaders, including Bishop Joe Morris Doss, the chair of the standing committee, the treasurer and wardens of diocesan council, said that the Rev. Peter Steinke, a consultant skilled in conflict resolution, had been hired to help the diocese resolve its problems.
The diocesan standing committee called for the consultant last November as a move to "deal with the issues of conflict, dysfunction, tension, trust, anger, and lack of communication which are present in the diocese."
Steinke, a Lutheran pastor living in Connecticut, addressed the Diocesan Convention meeting in Trenton in March to describe his planned process of intervention. To date, he said, he has spoken with Doss, his staff, standing committee members, and members of the black caucus and Hispanic caucus.
Steinke's report on his findings from the interviews he is conducting across the diocese, expected in mid-May, will include his observations and suggestions for direction. The year-old diocesan wellness committee will develop a proposed plan of action during the summer.
The implementation of the action plan is scheduled for fall. "That's when the rubber will hit the road," said one priest, closely associated with the study.
Also at the convention, Doss, in an starkly candid address, pledged to work with clergy and lay leaders in a collegial style to overcome the problems of the past.
"I love my ministry. I want to be a good bishop. I want to be your bishop," Doss told the convention. He admitted that he had made mistakes and predicted he would err again.
"In my zeal to combat racism, I have sometimes failed to consult the very people most affected by it," he said. "In my enthusiasm for collegiality, I have at time forgotten to seek advice from you. I recognize other faults as well. But I learn from them, change what I can and be a better bishop because of them."
When he asked, "Will you help me?", more than three-quarters of the 800 clergy and lay delegates stood to give him prolonged applause.
Doss started his two-year tenure as bishop in the financially strapped diocese by asking for the resignations of most of the diocesan staff, leaving a truncated diocesan structure that has been criticized as unresponsive to letters and telephone calls. His handling of a crisis in the diocesan cathedral where the dean was accused of forcing male staff members to have sex with him also has been criticized.
But where some critics see an overly controlling management style, others see a visionary leader with a strong hand attempting to move the diocese out of its doldrums. Doss's liberal stances on social issues -- opposed by some conservative elements in the diocese -- have exacerbated his problems, they suggest.
"From day one, he's been under unremitting attack from certain quarters of the diocese," the Rev. E. Walton Zelley Jr., head of the diocesan council, told the Sunday Star-Ledger newspaper. "I'm not saying the bishop hasn't made mistakes," Zelley said. "He's shot himself in the foot in a few instances. but that's true of every bishop I've served under. I've never seen anybody get it in the chops like this bishop has."
As the diocese continues to face financial woes, the New Jersey convention approved a scaled-back 1997 budget which cuts its funding obligations to the national church from $585,000 to $158,760. In 1996, the diocese gave only $216,825 of the $576,000 it had committed to national giving.
Stephen Duggan, national treasurer for the Episcopal Church, predicted that this reduction will have serious consequences for national and overseas work as it contributes to an expected $1.8 million national shortfall for 1997.
The diocese's financial problems stem in part from the decision of six predominantly black and Hispanic parishes to place in escrow the funds that they normally would send to the diocese.
The Rev. Henry Atkins, the bishop's liaison to an anti-racism commission created last year, said that he was told the funds would continue to be withheld until the diocese took significant steps to eradicate institutional racism. One complaint, he said, is that black and Latino clergy rarely are called to lead white congregations.
Black clergy also complained when Doss hired a consultant to help heal racial tensions in the diocese without consulting them. At last year's convention, black clergy and 400 members of their congregations marched in in a silent show of protest.
With the potential flashpoint of the diocesan convention safely past, many in the diocese apparently seem to be taking a "wait and see" approach now that Steinke's intervention has begun.
"The diocese is a family trying to heal," the Rev. Peter Stimpson, chair of the diocesan wellness committee that is overseeing Steinke's work, told the Star-Ledger. "That is the main point."