Episcopal Bishops to Sue Diocese

[HagiaSophia]

BOSTON (Reuters) - Nine U.S. Episcopal bishops plan to sue the bishop of Connecticut in religious court, a church spokesman said on Thursday, over the bishop’s support for the church’s first openly gay bishop.

Connecticut Bishop Andrew Smith has suspended one priest and threatened five others who object to his support of Rev. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire. The priests had asked to be put under the leadership of another bishop, a step the church says it cannot take.

Now Pittsburgh Bishop Robert Duncan and eight others from mostly Southern and Midwestern states say they are preparing a suit charging Smith with “conduct unbecoming of a bishop” of the Episcopal Church.
“We are all praying for a peaceful resolution to this,” said Frank Peter, a spokesman for Duncan…":

today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2005-07-28T223242Z_01_N28386308_RTRIDST_0_USREPORT-RELIGION-BISHOPS-DC.XML

 

[geezerbob]

I figure that had to happen sooner or later. Most of the Episcopaleans around here are very conservative and are appalled at what has happened in the northeast. One of the two Episcopal bishops here is a member of the nine who are suing. Although the authority of their bishops is the immediate question, is goes directly back to the naming of the openly homosexual bishop. If the rift widens, maybe we’ll get some wholesale conversions similar to what happened when they first started ordaining women.