Episcopal News Service October 20, 2006
Via Media group asks bishops, standing committees to refuse consent to South Carolina bishop-elect
By Mary Frances Schjonberg
[ENS] In letters sent October 19 to bishops with jurisdiction and all the Episcopal Church's diocesan standing committees, Via Media USA (http://www.viamediausa.org) argues that the episcopacy of the bishop-elect of the Diocese of South Carolina (http://www.dioceseofsc.org) "would represent a threat to the unity of our church and to the cohesion" of the diocese.
The Very Rev. Mark J. Lawrence, 56, was elected September 16 on the first ballot out of a field of three nominees as the 14th bishop of South Carolina. He is the rector of St. Paul's Episcopal Parish in Bakersfield, California, in the Diocese of San Joaquin.
Both South Carolina and San Joaquin are part of a group of eight dioceses out of the Church's 111 that have requested a relationship with a primate of the Anglican Communion other than the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, citing 2003 and 2006 General Convention actions. The process is being called alternative primatial oversight (APO).
In response to one of three questions presented to the South Carolina candidates prior to a series of meetings with the diocese (http://www.dioceseofsc.org/mt/archives/000207.html), Lawrence said he approved of the APO requests, calling them "a temporary gasp for air" that is needed while the Communion works out a new "Anglican ecclesiology."
Via Media USA's letters argue that "Father Lawrence's episcopacy would represent a threat to the unity of our church and to the cohesion of the Diocese of South Carolina."
Full story: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_78832_ENG_HTM.htm
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