Faithful remnant

Updated: Father Jake has weighed in.

Updated again: Other news sources (see end of post)

And again: Tobias Haller writes of The Immaculate Deception and the Vacant See.

Episcopal News Service carries reaction to the vote by delegates to the Diocese of San Joaquin’s annual convention to leave the Episcopal Church.

“The Episcopal Church receives with sadness the news that some members of this church have made a decision to leave this church,” said Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. “We deeply regret their unwillingness or inability to live within the historical Anglican understanding of comprehensiveness. We wish them to know of our prayers for them and their journey. The Episcopal Church will continue in the Diocese of San Joaquin, albeit with new leadership.”

And

Nancy Key, a co-founder of ‘Remain Episcopal,’ said those who wished to remain in the Episcopal Church have felt marginalized and maligned.

“It feels like spiritual violence,” said Key, a parishioner at Holy Family Church in Fresno, which has chosen to remain within the Episcopal Church. “All we want to do is be in the Episcopal Church that actively ordains women and is inclusive,” she said. San Joaquin is among three dioceses that refuse to ordain or deploy women priests. The others are Fort Worth and the Peoria, Illinois-based Diocese of Quincy.

Read it all.

UPDATE:

Diocese splits – Sacramento Bee

Organizers decided on an unusual method for taking the vote. They sent delegates who favored the split to one side of the room, and opponents to the other side. … Delegates also approved constitutional amendments, including an expansion of the diocese’s 14-county boundaries to enable other parishes on the fringes to join in the split.

US Church splits over gay rights – BBC

Diocese Breaks With Episcopal Church – AP

Episcopal Diocese Votes to Secede From Church – NYT

Church votes to secede – Stockton Record

Episcopal diocese secedes in rift over gays – Los Angeles Times

Episcopal fold loses 1st diocese – in valley – San Francisco Chronicle

Marc Andrus, bishop of the Diocese of California, a 27,000-member group in the Bay Area, said it plans to help the national church rebuild in San Joaquin. “This is a small group of Episcopalians who have chosen to align themselves in a different way,” Andrus said. “It’s a choice that saddens me but it is not tragic in light of things we as a church and the world address….

See, also, this article in the Living Church prior to the vote.

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