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Pope Returns to the Anglican Church


From rollins@intac.com
Date 06 May 1996 06:10:24

9/20/95
ANGLICAN COMMUNION NEWS SERVICE
Canon James M. Rosenthal, Director of Communications
Anglican Communion News Service
157 Waterloo Road, London SE1 8UT, England
Tel. 44 0171 620-1110    jim.rosenthal@ecunet.org
Fax 44 0171 620-1071

714 ACC

Pope Returns to the Anglican Church

(ENS-Episcopal News Service - James Solheim) In a letter to all
bishops of the Episcopal Church, Presiding Bishop Edmond L Browning
announced on 18 August that former bishop of Ft. Worth Clarence Pope
"has made the decision to return to the Episcopal Church."

Presiding Bishop Browning said that he had been in conversation with
Bishop Pope, who with his wife joined the Roman Catholic Church last
February, "for several months about this and I am delighted at his
decision. This Church is his home, his family, and with joy we
welcome him home."

A notice by Bishop Jack Iker, Bishop Pope's successor, said, "As the
date drew near for his re-ordination [as a Roman Catholic priest],
Bishop Pope began to have serious concerns about this, and this
eventually led to his decision to return to the Episcopal Church."
According to Bishop Iker, Bishop Pope has "withdrawn his letter of
resignation from the House of Bishops, which was to have acted upon
at our next meeting in Portland, Oregon, in late September."

In his announcement, Presiding Bishop Browning said, "The question
of his status was to have been on the agenda for the Interim House
of Bishops meeting in September and we will no longer need to
discuss it."

"I felt like it would be going back on all that I have been," Bishop
Pope said in an interview with a local newspaper. "I also felt I had
abandoned a [traditionalist] constituency that needed me. I felt
very guilty about that. It became very clear I needed to reverse
course," he said.

"I was finding myself more and more compromised in my thinking and
I simply had to come back home to where I belong," Bishop Pope said.
He told the Dallas Morning News that he "felt very keenly about the
holy orders that I had taken and I didn't feel I could undergo
another ordination."

  




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