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TITLE:NEWSBRIEFS
June 26, 1996
Episcopal News Service
James Solheim, Director
(212) 922-5385
ens@ecunet.org

96-1507
AUSTRALIAN CHURCH CONSIDERS RADICAL NEW APPROACH TO SEXUALITY
           (ENI) A radical new approach is needed to deal with the issues of
sexuality and sexual relationships, according to recent
proposals being considered by one of Australia's biggest churches, the Uniting
Church. While emphasizing the importance of marriage, the
proposals would also give recognition to homosexual relationships and to
heterosexual relationships outside marriage. An interim report,
which the church will debate at its next national assembly, in Perth in July
1997, recommended that traditional rules and categories for
church recognition of relationships should be replaced by a new
standard--"right relationships," based on the "broad themes" of the Bible. In
its 58-page report, the church's task group on sexuality, which has spent four
years studying sexual issues, found: no legitimate reason to
reject homosexuality or homosexual relationships per se; a need to affirm and
support heterosexual couples, whether they are married or
not; a case for putting aside biblical laws, if they do not express the mercy
and love of God; Many signs that people struggling to live as
"sexual people" experience the church as "judging, rejecting and conditional
in its acceptance." The task group wants wide discussion of the
interim report, and has asked for responses by November of this year. It will
then report, with revisions and recommendations, to the
assembly next year.

WCC TO SUPPORT YOUNG PEOPLE'S CAMPAIGN FOR CHILDREN'S RIGHTS
           (ENI) A group of young people, many of whom have been victims of
forced labour, violence or prostitution, recently won
support from the World Council of Churches to establish a network linking
youth organizations. The network will bring pressure to bear on
governments and political leaders to ensure that children's rights are
protected. "Amongst ourselves, we are planning to set up a network
among children of the world, and we want the World Council of Churches to
help," Craig Kielburger, a 13-year-old activist from Canada,
told journalists at a press conference at the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva. "In
this way, when one of the [children's] organizations reaches a
deadlock, they can let the others know. It will shake up world leaders to
receive letters from children around the world telling them to live
up to the promises they made for children." Kielburger, who is the founder of
a group called Free the Children which promotes children's
rights around the world and has branches in Canada, the United States, Brazil
and Switzerland, said new branches were being set up around
the world "like wildfire." Nine young people, aged 13 to 19, from five
continents attended the press conference after a three-day
consultation organized by the WCC to promote children's rights and welfare.
Some of the nine youths have been the victims of on-going
violence, some have lived on the streets and worked as prostitutes, and some
have been forced to work.

CHINA'S BOOMING CHURCH FACES TOLERANCE AND `HINDRANCES'
           (ENI) China's Christian community is growing at "breathtaking
speed," but churches face a number of "hindrances" and
"abuses," according to an international church delegation which recently
completed an investigative visit to several provinces of the world's
most populous country. The 13-member team, which visited churches and met
Chinese academics and government officials overseeing
religious bodies, often found what one of the team described as surprising
tolerance by state officials of religious practice. However, the
team also found that there were tensions among the Christian community itself,
that there were "some general restrictions" on religious
practice, and that, in at least one province, state officials "blatantly"
interfered in church activities. The team visit to China, organized by
the World Council of Churches (WCC), examined the implementation by Beijing of
its 1994 decrees on religion. The WCC team visit
followed meetings in Beijing two years ago between WCC's general secretary
Konrad Raiser and officials of the Chinese government's
Religious Affairs Bureau (RAB). At that time, RAB officials invited the WCC to
send a team to China. In a briefing paper, the team
reported that "there remains a dearth of qualified pastoral leadership [and]
certain tensions exist between church leaders ordained before the
Cultural Revolution, who are now in their 70s or older, and a new generation
of clergy in their 20s and 30s."

WOMEN ARE 'VITAL FACTOR' IN GROWTH OF CHINESE CHURCH
           (ENI) The contribution of women has been a "vital factor" to the
growth of the Chinese church, which has increased ten-fold
since 1949, when the communist People's Republic was founded, according to a
recent study on women in the contemporary Chinese
church prepared for the Lutheran World Federation (LWF). According to the
report, which is intended as an interim contribution to the
LWF's China Study Project, women account for about 70 percent of Christians in
the country. The report quotes figures from the China
Christian Council, China's main Protestant body, showing that the number of
ordained women has increased from 75 in 1988, to 223 in
1994. By 1994, women accounted for one sixth of the total number of ordained
pastors, compared to less than a tenth in 1988. There are
465 female students and 46 full-time female teachers at 13 theological
seminaries in China, representing about half the total number of
students and teachers in these institutions. Chinese Christianity has also
taken "a positive and pro-active stance with regard to the liberation
of women," according to the study, which says that the Christianity has
promoted the "theory of gender equality." However, women in the
Chinese church "still face many limitations and difficulties." Although in
some districts, women have been "fully accepted" as pastors and
church leaders, in a number of villages "even ordained women pastors are not
permitted to perform baptisms or celebrate Holy
Communion." And in some big cities the "distribution of Holy Communion is the
responsibility only of the men, while the women are only
able to do some of the preparatory work."

BROOKLYN'S DIOCESAN TREASURER SACKED FOR STEALING US$1.1 MILLION
           (ENI) A "trusted employee for more than 32 years" of the Roman
Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn "diverted" $1.1 million of
church funds to her personal bank account, the church recently announced. The
Diocese of Brooklyn announced at a press conference that
Vincenza Bologna, a member of a Brooklyn parish who had been promoted to
manager of the lay pensions office in 1990, had taken sums
ranging from a few hundred dollars to $35,000. Bishop Thomas V. Daily of
Brooklyn, personally attended the press conference to assure
retired employees that their benefits were not at risk. The Brooklyn diocese
is seeking compensation from its insurers, and is asking for
restitution from Bologna.  Diocesan officials said the embezzled funds came
from office operating funds, not the invested pension reserves.
Thomas V. Doyle, a priest who was Bologna's supervisor, said that Bologna
normally went through bank statements before he saw them,
and replaced the checks in question with photocopies of a bank report stating
that checks had been accidentally destroyed. In this way Doyle
did not see that Bologna had endorsed checks to her own account.

CHURCHES IN GERMANY AND CANADA SPEAK OUT FOR HOMOSEXUALS
           (ENI) A Reformed church federation in Germany has called for an end
to discrimination against homosexuals in the church.
Homosexuals should be able to work as ordained ministers, and "lesbian and gay
couples who wish to begin a life together" should be able
to celebrate a church service of blessing, according to a recent statement
from the federation's synod in Bueckeburg. The Bund evangelisch-
reformierter Kirchen--an association of six Reformed parishes in Germany which
do not belong to any of Germany's 24 protestant regional
Landeskirchen--is linked to the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD). In
Toronto, the general secretary of the Anglican Church of
Canada, Archdeacon Jim Boyles, has written to the Federal Government
supporting proposed legislation to ban discrimination based on
sexual  orientation. "We do not believe that anyone should be discriminated
against because of gender, race, creed, color or sexual
orientation," Boyles wrote to the Federal Justice Minister, Alan Rock. "I
would like to encourage your government in its endeavor to amend
the Canadian Human Rights Act to include sexual orientation on the protected
list."

GAY RIGHTS MARK 'AMERICANIZATION OF E. EUROPE', SAYS CHURCH HEAD
           (ENI) The head of Hungary's Reformed church has condemned a recent
decision by Hungary's Parliament to give legal
recognition to homosexual partnerships. Bishop Lorant Hegedus said the vote
was the work of a "parliamentary dictatorship" consciously
promoting "Western permissiveness." "Although we are committed to the
tolerance enshrined in the Christian faith, we cannot agree with
this," Hegedus said. "The measure represents a declaration of libertinism,
against biblical truth. It is another sign of the Americanization of
attitudes and lifestyles which is gathering pace throughout Eastern Europe."
The bishop was speaking after the Hungarian Parliament
adopted a Civil Code amendment on May 21 deleting a previous stipulation that
common law marriages must be between partners of
different genders, and extending to gay couples who live together the joint
property, pension and inheritance rights held by heterosexuals.
The Hungarian Parliament approved the Civil Code amendment by 207 votes to 73,
with five abstentions. The amendment follows a
Constitutional Tribunal ruling empowering courts to restrict under-age
membership of homosexual organizations. Bishop Hegedus told ENI
that the Reformed Church's governing synod had condemned the extension of gay
rights in Hungary. "We recognize the need for tolerance
of homosexual tendencies, in line with the Christian faith, but we cannot
accept a situation in which positive legislation is used to advance
homosexual rights," he said. "In the moral vacuum left by 50 years of
totalitarian dictatorship, the Western-style permissiveness implied by
this measure carries great dangers for our post-atheist society."

NEW LAND-MINE PROTOCOL PROMPTS DISMAY AMONG NGOS
           (ENI) Ishmael Noko, general secretary of the Lutheran World
Federation (LWF), recently announced that he was "extremely
disappointed" at the failure of the United Nations review conference in Geneva
to secure a global ban on anti-personnel land-mines. More
than 80 countries took part in negotiations in Geneva which ended on May 3
with agreement on certain progressive restrictions on the use of
land-mines. But the restrictions fell far short of the global ban wanted by
the opponents of anti-personnel mines. Noko said the new protocol
on land-mines was "weak," and would encourage the production of a new
generation of technologically more sophisticated land-mines. The
LWF is one of several hundred non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and 35
governments which called for a global ban. At least 800
people, usually women, children and agricultural workers, die from land-mine
explosions each month, according to information from the
LWF and the WCC, which have cooperated in their campaigns against the weapons.
Noko said, "The LWF is distressed that this agreement
places virtually no curbs on the production, transfer and use of
anti-personnel land-mines. It fails to address the main concern of reducing
human suffering, as well as the deep social, economic and environmental
effects of land-mine pollution. We are, and will continue to be,
witnesses to the fact that tens of thousands of civilians--especially women
and children--are injured or killed each year by anti-personnel
land-mines."

ENGLISH AND GERMAN CHURCHES TRY TO OVERCOME EPISCOPAL OBSTACLE
           (ENI) Theologians from the Church of England and the Evangelical
Church in Germany (EKD) are grappling with the issue of
the role of bishops in a bid to bring the two churches closer together. In an
historic accord in 1988, known as the Meissen Statement, the
two churches acknowledged each other as churches, acknowledged each other's
sacraments and ordained ministries and encouraged
eucharistic sharing. However, the declaration did not provide for the full
interchangeability of ministers, largely because the Church of
England had retained what it described as the "historic episcopate" while the
EKD's 24 Lutheran, United and Reformed member churches
had not. Anglicans believe the "historic episcopate"--the continuity in the
ordination of bishops from the early church through the
Reformation to the present day--is central to the nature of the church. A
recent consultation between the two churches failed to reach
agreement on the issue. One Anglican participant, Bishop Colin Buchanan,
writing in the Australian newspaper, CHURCH SCENE said
"The Germans, who are not short on logic and rationality, could not hear
overall that we thought the historic episcopate was of the esse
[essence] of the church and put up a very firm response to any suggestion that
we might."

PATRIARCH ALEXEI AND POPE JOHN PAUL TO MEET IN SEPTEMBER  
           (ENI) The leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Alexei
II, and the head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope John
Paul II, will meet in Hungary in September, according to a recent report in
the CATHOLIC HERALD. The two church leaders were
scheduled to meet in July but the meeting was postponed in January this year,
the CATHOLIC HERALD said, after Russian "protests at
over-zealous Catholic evangelizing in the former Soviet Union." On May 16, the
Committee on Religious and Public Organizations of the
State Duma (the lower chamber of the Russian Parliament) rejected a proposal
by the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church
to ban the missionary work of foreigners in Russia unless they have an
invitation from Russia and work within the framework of a Russian
religious organization. Instead, the committee agreed to a compromise
requiring foreign religious organizations to register with the
government. The arrival of new missionaries has been a sensitive issue for the
Russian Orthodox Church--by far the country's biggest and
most influential church, with a long-standing traditional role in Russian
society and culture, a role it has been successfully rebuilding since
the end of communism.

CHURCH OF SCOTLAND SAYS NO TO IN VITRO FERTILIZATION FOR LESBIAN COUPLES
           (ENI) Lesbian couples should not be given access to in vitro
fertilization (IVF) and other forms of "assisted reproduction,"
according to a report recently adopted by the Church of Scotland. A report by
the church's Human Fertilization and Embryology Study
Group, whose key proposals were adopted, stated, "We do not deny the capacity
of people of homosexual orientation or single parents to
rear children with loving concern, but we believe it is important for children
to have role models of both genders." Assisted reproduction,
the report added, should only be used to overcome obstacles to pregnancy in
relationships where child-bearing is the natural outcome.
(Assisted reproduction covers IVF and artificial insemination.) The Church of
Scotland--which is a Presbyterian church--declared its
continuing belief in the sanctity of the marriage relationship by accepting
IVF where both sperm and egg are from the partners and by
opposing donor insemination or surrogate motherhood. "Where surrogacy is a
commercial arrangement, the dignity of the child is violated
through its becoming an object of barter," the report said. The assembly also
affirmed the sanctity of the embryo from conception. It
applauded the recognition in law of the embryo's special nature, while
acknowledging differences of view on the ethical acceptability of
embryo research.

LUTHERAN LEADER URGES GREATER INTERNATIONAL CHURCH COOPERATION
           (ENI) The general secretary of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF),
Ishmael Noko, has made a plea for international church
organizations to continue efforts to co-ordinate their activities and avoid
duplication, given the financial pressures which many of these
organizations are facing. But in his comments, made in an interview published
in the LWF magazine LWF TODAY, Noko stressed that the
LWF would continue to have a role in the next century, as long as its member
churches "live far from each other in terms of distance,
culture and time." Noko's comments follow criticism that there is too much
duplication of work between international church organizations
which, like the LWF, are linked to specific denominations, and the World
Council of Churches, which has as members the world's main
Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox Churches. Noko said that the LWF would
increasingly become an instrument to relate to other Christian
world communions. In the next decade there would be increased attempts to
"harvest" the results of dialogue on theological and doctrinal
issues between the LWF and other Christian World Communions, Noko said, while
admitting that "the reception process has been extremely
weak on all sides."

AFTER A FIVE-WEEK WHITE HOUSE PROTEST, NUN FIGHTS ON
           (ENI) Dianna Ortiz, the US nun who began a protest vigil outside
the White House in Washington on Palm Sunday, March 31,
recently ended her vigil, but is continuing her fight to gain information
about human rights abuses in Guatemala and about alleged U.S.
government complicity in them. Ortiz announced on May 6, as she ended her
White House vigil, that she was filing a lawsuit against the
CIA, the U.S. Defense Department, the FBI, as well as the U.S. State
Department, in a continuing attempt to get information about human
rights abuses in general in Guatemala, and in particular about her own torture
and rape. Ortiz, aged 37, a member of the Roman Catholic
order of Ursuline nuns, has gained much publicity and a meeting with Hillary
Rodham Clinton for her "silent vigil for truth" outside the
White House. Ortiz said that the members of the security forces who tortured
and raped her in 1989, when she was working in Guatemala,
acknowledged as their boss a man with an American accent whom they called
"Alejandro." "I have always believed that if I could identify
Alejandro, I could also learn who my Guatemalan torturers were," Ortiz said.
Ortiz has already succeeded in forcing the US government to
release some documents about Guatemala. Hillary Clinton, who had her picture
taken with Ortiz on April 4, had promised, the nun said,
that "even classified information would be released to me."

EAM BOARD URGES KMART TO END LAWSUIT
           (ENS) The Episcopal Appalachian Ministries (EAM) board of governors
recently drafted a statement calling on Kmart to end its
lawsuit against the Greensboro, North Carolina, Pulpit Forum (a group of
African-American pastors) and to bargain in good faith with the
workers in the Greensboro distribution center. The dispute arises out of a
boycott of Kmart stores called by the Pulpit Forum and the
distribution center workers in response to Kmart's refusal to recognize the
newly organized union and to pay local workers at the same rate
paid to workers in other Kmart distribution centers. The lawsuit charges the
Pulpit Forum pastors with trespassing and causing loss of
business profits.

ANGLICAN DIOCESE OF THE ARCTIC ELECTS CHURCH'S FIRST INUK BISHOP
           (ENS) The Anglican Diocese of the Arctic recently elected the Rev.
Paul Idlout as the first Inuk bishop in the history of the
Canadian Church. Idlout, a 62-year-old priest serving in Cape Dorset,
Northwest Territories, was elected suffragan bishop after 29 ballots.
Synod delegates took two days to elect Idlout from among three candidates, all
of whom were Inuk. "We are ready to be involved," Idlout
said. "It is very important that the Inuit have chosen a bishop from among
themselves." At present, the Anglican Church of Canada has two
aboriginal bishops, Bishop Charles Arthurson, assistant bishop of
Saskatchewan, and Bishop Gordon Beardy, assistant bishop of Keewatin.

COLORADO COUNCIL OF CHURCHES OPPOSES TAX INITIATIVE
           (ENS) The Rev. Lucia Guzman, executive director for the Colorado
Council of Churches, recently made a three-stop speaking
tour against a ballot initiative that would tax nonprofits. Through the tour,
Guzman hoped to educate church members about the potential
impact of a taxation measure to be voted on in November that could make real
property owned by nonprofits taxable. If the initiative
succeeds, nonprofit organizations like the American Red Cross, Boy Scouts and
Girl Scouts, as well as the state's 2,000 churches will be
subject to taxation. One denomination estimates that the tax bill for its
statewide churches will exceed $1 million annually. "A $4,000 yearly
tax bill would hurt our efforts in this community," said the Rev. Clark
Sherman, vicar of St. Patrick's Episcopal Church in southern
Colorado's Pagosa Springs.

FRANCE'S ROYAL ANNIVERSARY SPARKS A NATIONAL DEBATE ON RELIGION
           (ENI) Celebrations to mark the 1,500th anniversary of the baptism
of France's first Christian king have sparked a heated debate
about the influence of the Roman Catholic Church in a country which is,
according to its constitution, a secular state. Clovis, King of the
Franks, was baptized, many people believe, in Rheims in 496 by the city's
bishop, St Remigius. But celebrations planned to mark the
1,500th anniversary--including a planned visit from Pope John Paul II in
September--have led Protestant and Muslim leaders to accuse
French President Jacques Chirac of pandering to traditionalist Roman
Catholics. Dissenting voices, including Jacques Stewart, president of
the French Protestant Federation, argue that it is illegal for taxpayers'
money to be used for the celebrations because this breaches a 1905
law which defined the separation of church and state. According to statistics
published in 1995, the Roman Catholic church has 42.35
million followers in France out of a total population of 57.9 million. The
number of Protestants is put at 850,000. Stewart also believes that
the high-profile celebrations send out the wrong signals at a time when
religious minorities, especially Muslims, face increasing
discrimination. Theologians have also joined the debate, pointing out that the
baptism of Clovis--which earned France the title of "elder
daughter of the Church"--happened neither in 496, nor at Rheims.

ACTION TAKEN ON VERMONT LAWSUIT
           (ENS) A Vermont superior court judge recently dismissed charges
that Bishop Mary Adelia Mcleod discriminated against a priest
when she fired him. "Applying discrimination law to Lacava's case would
involve excessive entanglement with religion prohibited by . . .
the First Amendment," Judge Shireen Avis Fisher wrote in her decision. "This
court cannot inquire into the firing decisions of a minister by
the proper authorities in a hierarchical church." The Rev. Richard Lacava sued
Mcleod a year ago seeking $2.2 million in damages plus
legal fees for allegedly firing him because he was a gay man and replacing him
and two assistants with women. The judge let stand charges
that Mcleod defamed the Rev. Richard Lacava and violated his privacy, writing
that "those charges will stand because they do not require
inquiry into matters of doctrine, faith or internal organization."

HOMOSEXUALITY ISSUE TO DOMINATE PRESBYTERIAN AGENDA
           (ENS) The role of gay and lesbian persons in the U.S. Presbyterian
Church, an issue that has been off the business agenda while
church members engaged in a three-year period of study and discussion, returns
to the 208th general assembly this June in Albuquerque,
New Mexico. Since 1978, general assembly policy has been that "self-affirming,
practicing homosexuals" are ineligible for ordination to the
offices of minister, elder or deacon. When the 1993 assembly called for the
three-year study and dialogue on the issue, it also reaffirmed the
prohibitive policy. However, the ban on gay ordination has never been inserted
into the church's "Book of Order" or constitution. The
"Book of Order" continues to give to congregations the responsibility to
ordain elders and deacons as they so choose and to presbyteries the
authority to ordain ministers. Some 75 congregations have declared that they
are willing to ordain gay and lesbian persons. Challenges to
such ordinations have generally been turned down by church courts on the
grounds that the "Book of Order" is permissive.

LUTHERAN `SELF-ASSESSMENT' ON HUMAN SEXUALITY
           (ELCA) The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) will have
a "self-assessment" of where it stands on certain issues
of human sexuality, the Rev Karen L. Bloomquist, ELCA director of studies,
recently announced. A message is being drafted for
consideration this fall by the ELCA church council. The council gave the ELCA
division for church in society the assignment last fall to
develop a message on those areas where there appears to be consensus in the
church regarding issues of human sexuality. "It is clear that
our purpose is not to develop a new social statement," said Bloomquist. "It is
a kind of self-assessment, trying to discern where we as a
church are and to do that in a way that can be genuinely helpful to people."

THE `CHURCH FACTOR' IN RUSSIA'S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS
           (ENI) The two most prominent figures in the recent electoral race
for the Russian presidency--the incumbent Boris Yeltsin and
his main rival, Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov, who is running as the
candidate of the People's Patriotic Coalition--have eagerly
sought to associate themselves with the Russian Orthodox Church, the nation's
biggest and most influential denomination. The church has an
estimated 60 million members, and a recent poll by the Institute for
Comparative Social Research found that 88 percent of Russians have a
"positive attitude" to the church. "Every candidate today is interested in
having God on his side, and they are courting the religious
communities," said Rabbi Arthur Schneier, president of the Appeal of
Conscience Foundation in New York. Schneier is the leader of an
interfaith delegation of American religious officials who are in Moscow to
observe the elections. The Communist Party has officially
abandoned atheism and launched its own fight for the Orthodox vote.

PRESBYTERIAN ASSEMBLY OVERRULES PLAN FOR GAY ORDINATION
           (ENI) The general assembly of the Presbyterian Church in Canada
recently rejected by almost 10 to 1 a proposal to ordain Darryl
Macdonald, a homosexual man whose local presbytery had approved his plans to
become a pastor. This is the first time the church's general
assembly has overturned a local presbytery's decision on ordination. Local
congregations in the Montreal presbytery had approved--with a
vote of more than 75 percent in favor--the proposal to ordain Macdonald. A
dozen local minsters and elders who opposed Macdonald's
ordination appealed to the general assembly which met in Montreal on June 10.
They maintained that ordaining a homosexual would go
against scripture and tradition. The Montreal presbytery's moderator, Andrew
Johnston, said the acceptance of the general assembly's ruling
was anything but a foregone conclusion. "This is a decision with which the
presbytery will struggle," he said. He predicted that the decision
would begin a jurisdictional tug-of-war in the "ultra-conservative" church. He
said the church rules were contradictory, as local presbyteries
normally had absolute authority on ordination.

STRATEGIES DEVISED BY OPPONENTS TO WOMEN PRIESTS
           (ENS) A two-pronged strategy has been devised by those in the
Church of England opposed to the ordination of women to ensure
that a woman priest never ministers to them. Opponents are carrying cards
stipulating that a male priest should be called in the case of any
life-threatening emergency and they are writing into their wills the
instruction that their funerals should be conducted by a man. The cards,
to be carried in wallet or purse, are selling "very well" at the Church Union
bookshop in Westminster, a spokesman for the shop said
recently. Anne Williams, who is vice-chairwoman of the traditionalist group
Forward in Faith, and who carries a card herself, said more
people were making such arrangements, as the number of women priests appointed
to parish churches and to hospital chaplaincies increased.
"Bringing in a female chaplain to give the last rites or absolution would, for
me, be unacceptable," she said.

PEOPLE

THE RT. REV. GERALYN WOLF, Bishop of Rhode Island, recently announced that she
will undergo treatment for breast cancer. Wolf
discovered the lump--just sixth-tenths of a centimeter in diameter--in April
during a self-exam. She immediately sought medical attention but
confided her condition to only a few friends and associates. On June 5,
results of a biopsy revealed a malignant lump in her right breast. In
a letter to the clergy and parishes of the diocese dated June 14, she wrote
that she "waited until now to share this with you because I needed
to integrate the many emotions which I have experienced. I have found an inner
peace and resolve during this time of prayer and
preparation." Wolf is scheduled to undergo surgery on July 3rd, followed by a
week of hospitalization and a significant recovery period.
The prognosis for full recovery is excellent.

THE RT. REV. CAROLYN TANNER IRISH was recently consecrated Bishop Coadjutor of
the Diocese of Utah. She will become diocesan
bishop on June 29, following the retirement of Bishop George Bates.

HELEN ORWIG HINES, wife of former Presiding Bishop John Hines, died on May 17,
1996, at the age of 85. In his eulogy, Bishop John
Spong said that in the midst of Bishop Hines' "life of witness and turmoil . .
. one quiet zone of unconditional love, unconditional support
and unconditional confidence enfolded this man. That quiet zone was created,
sustained and nurtured by Helen Orwig Hines. In a very real
sense Helen Hines made this enormous Christian leader possible."

CORRECTION:  In ENS article #96-1480 ("In search for clearer identity,
Province of the Pacific votes to restructure"), there were two
errors. First, the position being eliminated is that of administrator of the
province. Second, Thaddeus Bennett has been serving as part-time
program coordinator of Province VIII, not as a "consultant."

EDITOR'S NOTE:  James Solheim, Director of the Episcopal Church's office of
news and information, is on sabbatical through early
September of this year. During this time, requests for information should be
directed to Deputy Director James Thrall (212-922-5383) or
Communications Assistant Jack Donovan (212-922-5384).