Tampa Bay's Episcopal leader says he merely assisted a network that objects to a gay bishop.
By WAVENEY ANN MOORE and SHARON TUBBS
Published December 18, 2003
“I cannot in good conscience consent to the election of an individual that I would not accept into the ordination process and whose manner of life is inconsistent with the teaching of this church and the majority of the Anglican Communion.”
-Bishop John B. Lipscomb
ST. PETERSBURG - From the start, Bishop John B. Lipscomb has been at the forefront of the fight against the ordination of the American Episcopal Church's first openly gay bishop.
How far Lipscomb will go to press his case is in some dispute.
The New York Times reported Wednesday that Lipscomb, who heads the Diocese of Southwest Florida, is one of 13 Episcopal bishops forming a rival network of dioceses and parishes that eventually could lead to a schism in the national church.
Lipscomb helped draft the statement being used as the theological charter of the new network. The diocese, whose members are divided over the ordination of Bishop V. Gene Robinson in New Hampshire, started fielding calls early Wednesday about the New York Times' article.
By Wednesday afternoon, the diocese published a statement on its Web site denying any involvement in the new group. Lipscomb also denied the New York Times' report in an interview. He said he supported the statement adopted by the network, not the network's creation.
"A bishop cannot make a decision like this for our diocese," the leader of Tampa Bay area Episcopalians said in an interview. The diocese includes 79 congregations with about 35,000 members from Brooksville to Marco Island and the Gulf of Mexico to Plant City, Arcadia and LaBelle.
"It would take an action of our convention or diocesan council at the very least to have the diocese associate as an entity with any organization like this," Lipscomb said.
Ed Sellers, rector at St. Dunstan's in Largo and a member of a group of conservative priests within the diocese, said Lipscomb is "trying to balance the fact that he knows his diocese is split on this issue."
"I think he will come to the place, I hope he will come to the place, where nothing is gained by trying to appease both sides," Sellers said. "You have to make a decision at some point."
Lipscomb has been vocal about opposing what he views as the Episcopal church's slide away from scriptural teachings.
In August, Lipscomb was one of 18 bishops who issued a statement at the denomination's general convention against the ordination of Robinson in New Hampshire.
Before and since the convention, he has written pastoral letters to parishioners about Robinson's ordination.
"I cannot in good conscience consent to the election of an individual that I would not accept into the ordination process and whose manner of life is inconsistent with the teaching of this church and the majority of the Anglican Communion," Lipscomb wrote in a June letter.
He has provided avenues for members of his diocese who want to stop sending money to the national church.
And two weeks ago, at a meeting in Orlando, Lipscomb joined a group of bishops and theologians who drafted the statement being used as the theological charter of the new network.
The statement says Scripture sanctions sex only between a man and woman who are married. The network, which was officially launched Wednesday, believes that the Episcopal church has strayed from true Christian teachings.
The Rev. Kendall Harmon, canon theologian for the Diocese of South Carolina, says the new organization is "for people in the Episcopal Church who are beleaguered and, in some cases, persecuted."
"The network will provide a community of solace and encouragement," he said. "It is a group that believes that the Episcopal Church as a whole has made a massive corporate mistake and therefore they are going to seek to be a force for creative dissent."
The group has no plans to break from the national church, he said, adding that this decision will have to be made by the international 77-million-member Anglican Communion, of which the Episcopal Church is a part.
Lipscomb said Wednesday that news reports had mistaken his support of the network's theological statement as support for the group itself. He said they have taken "consent to one to be a consent to both" and that he intends to work for change within the Episcopal Church.
"I have said consistently that I have no interest in leaving the Episcopal Church or the Anglican Communion and I have no intention of leading this diocese out of the Episcopal Church," he said.
Both Lipscomb and Bishop John Howe of the Diocese of Central Florida said they were surprised by the New York Times article and insist that the network is not yet a reality.
"I, along with 12 other bishops, signed a letter of intent that said we thought a network was needed at this time," Howe said.
The idea came after a meeting in London this fall, where church leaders talked of ways that conservative parishes could opt out of liberally-minded dioceses by choosing to be under the authority of a conservative bishop.
At the time, the group had the backing of Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury.
"It was on the basis of that that we signed this memo of intent," Howe said. "And suddenly, the cart has gone way, way, way before the horse."
He said Williams recently backed away from the idea, saying that Americans should work it out.
Harmon said Lipscomb chaired a meeting in Orlando where the new network's theological charter was drafted. He said an organizational meeting will be held in January in Plano, Texas. Only the dioceses of Pittsburgh, South Carolina and Fort Worth have formally agreed to be part of the group, Harmon said.
Lipscomb will not attend the Texas meeting.
"At this point," he said, "I do not intend to be there, and I do not think that we will have any representatives from our diocese."
James Solheim, director for the Episcopal News Service, an arm of the national church, said he was surprised when he read that dioceses headed by Howe and Lipscomb were involved.
"John Howe and Bishop Lipscomb have been very careful to avoid associations with schismatics," he said.
Solheim said he believes the network wants to allow parishes to defect from their geographical dioceses without the knowledge or consent of the presiding bishop.
Harmon of South Carolina called Solheim's statements "wildly inaccurate."
