wfn.org | [ENS] Diocesan Digest

["Matthew Davies" <mdavies@episcopalchurch.org>]

Thursday, April 7, 2005

Episcopal News Service: Diocesan Digest

NATION: Presiding Bishop joins Bono, Brad Pitt in TV ad set to air
Sunday
CENTRAL FLORIDA -- Prison Ministry Conference to meet in Orlando April
8-9
CHICAGO -- Hale sentenced in Lefkow murders
EUROPE (Convocation of Churches) -- U.S. Episcopalians among Anglicans
sharing in observances of Pope's death
MINNESOTA -- Hmong community ministry grows in congregation, diocese
NEWARK -- Bishop John Croneberger announces retirement plans
NEW YORK -- Diocese to hold April 23 convocation on slavery-related
reparations
NORTH CAROLINA -- Prison Ministry Conference: 'Congregations Inside
Create
Hope,'
SAN FRANCISCO (Diocese of California) -- Grace Cathedral's media
ministry
recipient of four telly bronze awards
SOUTH CAROLINA -- Diocese begins process for election of new bishop
SOUTHERN OHIO -- Bishop's election postponed until 2006
DIOCESE OF TEXAS: Assistant bishop released from duties

NATION: Presiding Bishop joins Bono, Pitt in TV ad set to air Sunday

Fighting global AIDS and poverty is the focus of a ONE Campaign
television
ad set to air Sunday, April 10, featuring entertainment and national
leaders
including the Episcopal Church's Presiding Bishop, Frank T. Griswold.
	The ONE Campaign announced April 6 that it has enlisted ABC and MTV
Networks in the fight against global AIDS and extreme poverty. The
networks
will support ONE's efforts by donating air time for the world premiere
of a
new public service announcement starring some of the biggest names in
music,
movies, politics, and religion.
	The ONE video features an all-star cast including U2's Bono, Brad
Pitt, Tom Hanks, Jamie Foxx, Cameron Diaz, Al Pacino, Penelope Cruz,
Benicio
del Toro, Alfre Woodard, Rita Wilson and George Clooney.

Full story: http://www.one.org/PressReleases.aspx?id=21

CENTRAL FLORIDA -- Prison Ministry Conference to meet in Orlando April
8-9
By Joe Thoma

Prisons are big business in Florida, with $2 billion in annual revenue
and
state Department of Corrections plans to increase capacity to more than
91,000 prisoners in 2005.
	The department also proposes to build a new 2,000-bed prison in
Suwannee County, at a cost of $82.9 million, and to increase capacity at
prisons in Columbia, Marion, Taylor, Wakulla and Union counties. The
Suwannee facility would leave only four of Florida's 67 counties without
a
state prison.
	"That's unbelievable," said the Rev. Jackie Means, the Episcopal
Church's director for prison ministries. "We're just warehousing people
by
the thousands."
	Means hopes a statewide gathering of prison ministry workers from
all five Florida Episcopal dioceses in early April will help people
serve
those "invisible" prisoners in their own back yards.

Full story: http://www.cfdiocese.org/prison/conf2005.htm.

CHICAGO -- Hale sentenced in Lefkow murders

White supremacist Matthew Hale has been sentenced to the maximum 40
years in
prison for soliciting an undercover F.B.I. informant to murder the
husband
and mother of federal judge and Episcopalian Joan Lefkow, and for
obstruction of justice. Hale was convicted last year of soliciting the
murder of Joan Lefkow,
	The sentencing came more than a month after Michael F. Lefkow,
secretary of the Diocese of Chicago's Standing Committee and member of
St.
Luke's Episcopal Church in Evanston, Illinois, was found shot to death
with
his mother-in-law. Judge Lefkow discovered the bodies in the basement
study
of the couple's home on Chicago's North Side on February 28 when she
returned home from work. According to the Cook County medical examiners
office, Lefkow, 64, and his mother-in-law, Donna Grace Humphrey, 89,
both
died from multiple gunshot wounds.
	Bart Ross, linked by DNA to the murders, may have been stalking
federal judges in Milwaukee before he shot himself to death in a van in
a
suburb of Chicago on March 9. The van contained a note saying that he
had
killed Lefkow and Humphrey because the judge ruled against him in a
civil
rights lawsuit against a Chicago hospital over treatment of cancer to
his
mouth.
	Judge Lefkow had been under the protection of the Marshals Service
last year because of death threats following her rulings against Hale in
a
2003 civil suit.
	Michael and Joan Lefkow were active members of St. Luke's, having
joined the parish in 1987. Michael Lefkow served on the vestry from 1992
to
1995 and had been active in other ministries there, including service as
an
usher and lector, a member of the summer choir and men's group, and a
member
of the Stewardship Committee. During the 1970s and 1980s the couple
attended
St. James Cathedral and St. Chrysostom, Chicago.

EUROPE (Convocation of Churches) -- U.S. Episcopalians among Anglicans
sharing in observances of Pope's death

Episcopalians across the Convocation of American Churches in Europe are
among Anglicans sharing in observances marking the death of Pope John
Paul
II. Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams will attend Friday's funeral
at
the Vatican, and Paris-based Bishop Suffragan Pierre Whalon, leader of
the
Convocation of American Churches, has been invited to represent
Presiding
Bishop Frank T. Griswold in Vatican City. Former U.S. President George
H. W.
Bush, an Episcopalian, joins his son, President George W. Bush, in the
official U. S. delegation. England's Bishop John Flack, director of the
Anglican Centre in Rome, is recording observations for further reporting
by
ENS in the near future.

MINNESOTA -- Hmong community ministry grows in congregation, diocese

Church of the Holy Apostles in St. Paul, Minnesota, has grown from a
small
congregation to a situation where the church is almost full capacity on
Sunday mornings since it welcomed a large community of Hmong refugees
into
its fold.

Full story by Joe Bjordal:
http://www.episcopalmn.org/News_033005_HolyApostles.htm

NEWARK -- Bishop John Croneberger announces retirement plans

Bishop Croneberger of Newark issued the following letter to his diocese:
	"Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
	"As I find myself completing my seventh year as the Bishop of
Newark, I continue to give thanks for the privilege of serving as your
Bishop. So it is with profound gratitude, sadness, and great reluctance
that
I take this opportunity to tell you that I have this day properly
notified
the Standing Committee of the Diocese of Newark concerning my intention
to
call for the election of the tenth Bishop of Newark...."

Full letter: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_60976_ENG_HTM.htm

NEW YORK -- Diocese to hold April 23 convocation on slavery-related
reparations

The Task Force on Reparations for the Diocese of New York is sponsoring
a
diocesan convocation on reparations at the Church of the Intercession
from
10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 23. Participants can register
on-line
at www.dioceseny.org. Cost is $12 to cover lunch. Bishop Sisk of New
York
will be the celebrant and will deliver the Bishop's Charge.
	In a bold move the Diocesan Convention of 2003 called for the
creation of a Task Force to study the issue of reparation and to provide
opportunities for the larger diocesan community to participate in
discussion
prior to presenting a proposal for moving forward to the Convention of
2005.
The Bishop appointed a Task Force to study reparations and to define its
meaning to: repairing the damage done to the people of African descent
during slavery and its aftermath; provide adequate financial
compensation
for descendants of slaves; recognize the injustice or damage done and
develop effective protocols for empowering members of the African
American
community in a modern society.

Full details:
http://www.dioceseny.org/index.cfm?Action=Events.ViewEvents&y=2005&m=4&d=23

NORTH CAROLINA -- Prison Ministry Conference: 'Congregations Inside
Create
Hope,'
by Jane Merritt and Val Hymes

"All of us have a prison of our own," said Bishop J. Gary Gloster at a
Prison Ministry Conference and Workshop in North Carolina in March. "One
of
the things we all share is our brokenness."
	The retired suffragan and now assisting bishop to the Diocese of
North Carolina addressed 65 lay and clerical prison ministers or seekers
from two dioceses -- North Carolina and East Carolina -- at Christ
Episcopal
Church in New Bern March 4 and 5.
	"There is not that much difference between those inside and those
out," he added. "We are all of one blood - part of God's kingdom. We
can't
allow Christians to build up walls of self-righteousness ... and create
a
vast separation and isolation between us and ` our sisters and brothers
in
prisons, jails and compounds ... We are all God's children."

Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_60981_ENG_HTM.htm

SAN FRANCISCO (Diocese of California) -- Grace Cathedral's media
ministry
recipient of four telly bronze awards

GraceCom, Grace Cathedral's media ministry, has been awarded four Telly
Bronze Awards for its holiday special Songs of the Season and for
LightWorks, the long-standing monthly topical interview program
broadcast
locally on KRON 4. The Telly is one of the most sought-after awards by
industry leaders, from large international firms to local production
companies and ad agencies. The Telly Awards, founded in 1978, is a
national
competition to honor excellence in local, regional and national
television
programming. GraceCom previously earned three Telly Awards in 2002 for
its
television ad Campaign, "The Episcopal Church Welcomes You." Other
recent
Telly Award recipients have included ABC News, Detroit Public
Television,
the March of Dimes, Nike, and Oprah.

Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_60437_ENG_HTM.htm

SOUTH CAROLINA -- Diocese begins process for election of new bishop

The Rev. M. Dow Sanderson, chairman of the Standing Committee of the
Diocese
of South Carolina, announced that the diocese began the process to
select a
new bishop with a scheduled retreat of the Nominating and Standing
Committees as planned on March 29-30.
	The election will be scheduled for a "date certain" to be decided by
Bishop Edward Salmon and the Standing Committee. "We wish, as in all
things,
to take the high moral ground, and will take into serious consideration,
the
House of Bishops 'request' to delay the actual election," said
Sanderson,
who refuted earlier reports that the diocese would time its election to
have
the consents coincide with General Convention.
	Bishop Salmon will be 72, the retirement age for bishops, in January
of 2006.
	In his address to the diocesan convention on March 4, Salmon said
that a Special Convention would be called for the election of a bishop
co-adjutor, with delegates elected for that purpose only by a
congregational
meeting by majority vote. Salmon said he would remain as diocesan bishop
"as
long as the Canons allow in order to provide a short overlap" to give
the
diocese an opportunity to make an orderly transition.

SOUTHERN OHIO -- Bishop's election postponed until 2006

Following the release of the "Covenant Statement" by the House of
Bishops in
mid-March, with its pledge "to withhold consent to the consecration of
any
person elected to the episcopate ... until the General Convention of
2006,"
the Diocese of Southern Ohio announced it will put plans for a bishop
election on hold until after the 2006 General Convention.
	Bishop Herbert Thompson Jr. had called for the election of the ninth
bishop of Southern Ohio in June, 2005, with consecration of a new bishop
in
November. The 17-member search committee had already chosen three
nominees
from a field of 96:

* The Very Rev. Stephen H. Bancroft, dean of the Cathedral Church of St.
Paul, Detroit, Michigan
* The Rev. Anne B. Bonnyman, rector of Trinity Episcopal Parish,
Wilmington,
Delaware
* The Rev. Stephen Hoff Wendfeldt, rector of St. Peter's Church, Del
Mar,
California

According to the Columbus Dispatch, the three candidates were "surprised
but
not discouraged" by news of the postponement.
	The Diocese of Southern Ohio represents nearly 30,000 people in 40
counties. In 2006, the diocese hosts the national Episcopal Church's
75th
General Convention, one of the largest conventions in the country, in
Columbus.

DIOCESE OF TEXAS: Assistant bishop released from duties

Houston -- The Rt. Rev. Ted Daniels has been released from duties as
assistant bishop in the Diocese of Texas, Diocesan Bishop Don Wimberly
wrote
in a letter mailed March 21 to local clergy. Wimberly wrote that the
action
occurred for "a number of reasons which I believe should remain
confidential." In accordance with normal procedures, the matter is
currently
under review in the Office of the Presiding Bishop, said Bishop Clay
Matthews, executive director of the Office of Pastoral Development.

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