Friday, November 03, 2006

Nov. 3, A.M. Posts

Hmmm. This batch of posts is "all Schori, all the time"...

Washington Times: Episcopalians to Consecrate Female Bishop

November 3rd, 2006 posted by kendall at 8:53 am

By Julia Duin

“The bulk of this church is healthy and vibrant,” [bishop Jefferts Schori] said Tuesday. “A small portion is concerned about issues of sexuality at this instant.”
Bishop Jefferts Schori’s consecration will elevate her to the status of the most senior woman in the 77-million-member worldwide Anglican Communion. She will represent the Episcopal Church at international gatherings, including a February meeting in Tanzania of the world’s 38 Anglican archbishops. Twenty of these archbishops have released a statement saying they will not recognize her and suggested the U.S. church appoint an alternate.
Nevertheless, Bishop Jefferts Schori, 52, has “high hopes” for the Tanzania meeting, adding that Kenyan Archbishop Benjamin Nzimbi — one of the 20 — received her in his diocese three years ago.
“I imagine we will start by greeting each other and learning about each others’ contexts,” she said. “Unless we can build some kind of human relationship, it’s very difficult to build the trust necessary for real dialogue.
“It’s very easy to characterize someone wherever on the spectrum from what one reads in print and on the Internet. One gets a fuller perspective face to face, an incarnate encounter. I hope we can build three-dimensional pictures of each other.”
However, Archbishop Nzimbi will be one of four Anglican prelates conducting a Nov. 15 meeting in Falls Church for leaders of seven U.S. dioceses refusing to recognize Bishop Jefferts Schori’s leadership. Those dioceses have also asked Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams to name an alternate.
“I think the archbishop of Canterbury is clear that is not his role,” said the presiding bishop-elect, who met with the archbishop last week in London, “and that he expects this church to resolve its own issues.”
She hopes to concentrate on winning the young back to the church, citing Bronx musician Timothy Holder’s “hip-hop Mass” and a Eucharist ceremony based on music by the pop group U2 as examples.
From 1993 to 2003, however, her Nevada diocese only grew 2.3 percent while the state’s population mushroomed by 66.2 percent. Only 2,500 people attend Sunday services in her diocese, she said, because its church planners concentrated their energies on rural parishes instead of the booming suburbs of Reno and Las Vegas.
Also, “it was a place in significant conflict when I arrived,” she said. “There were major challenges in terms of resources and geography.”
However, a Hispanic mission she oversaw during her time in the late 1990s as an associate rector at the Episcopal Church of the Good Samaritan in Corvallis, Ore., collapsed during her tenure there. Jane Stoltz, the parish secretary, attributed its failure to a rival Catholic parish willing to siphon off members who were not enthusiastic about female priests.
“We love Katharine,” said the secretary, who is one of 39 members of Good Shepherd planning to attend Saturday’s ceremony. “The truth is that she is eminently qualified. She is a gifted, brilliant, talented person. She has wonderful leadership qualities. She is absolutely the person the Episcopal Church needs at this particular time.”

Read it all here

From the Church Times: Katharine Jefferts Schori prepares for office in a visit to Lambeth

November 3rd, 2006 posted by kendall at 6:46 am

DR Katharine Jefferts Schori, who this weekend will be installed as the new Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the US (ECUSA), openly pledged her commitment to the Anglican Communion this week.

Speaking on Tuesday after a brief visit to the UK to meet the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Jefferts Schori said that she “absolutely” wanted to keep the Anglican Communion together.

“It is an enormous gift to the world and its members. People across the world are united by the same heritage and can see each other as brothers.”

Concerning issues that have divided the Communion — particularly attitudes on homosexuality and women priests — Dr Jefferts Schori said that she would take her lead from the US General Convention.

But she reiterated the statement she made on her election at the General Convention in June: “Face-to-face humans build relationships.”

Read it all.

Miami Herald: Challenges await 1st female Episcopal leader

November 3rd, 2006 posted by kendall at 6:40 am

As the first woman to serve as presiding bishop since the Episcopal Church approved women priests 30 years ago, Katharine Jefferts Schori is already facing a mutiny.

Jefferts Schori, who will be installed this weekend at the National Cathedral in Washington, starts her nine-year term during one of the most trying periods in the church’s history. Rifts over church teachings on gays threaten to divide the 2.4 million-member denomination.

About 10 Episcopal dioceses — including the diocese of Central Florida — have rejected her authority, arguing her support for same-sex blessings and the ordination of gay clergy runs counter to biblical morality. In her first sermon following her election at the church’s general convention in June, Jefferts Schori angered the church’s conservative wing by referring to “Mother Jesus.'’

And she faces more challenges abroad: Conservative bishops in the Anglican Church have pressured the archbishop of Canterbury, head of the 77 million-member Anglican Communion, to keep Jefferts Schori from attending the 2008 church-wide gathering.

But supporters say Jefferts Schori — an airplane pilot and former oceanographer — has the diplomacy skills needed to hold the church together.

‘’She’s an incredible listener and a person of very deep faith,'’ said the Rev. Ian Douglas, a professor at the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass. “She’s not one to come to a quick conclusion, but from her training as a scientist, she will take in all the data that’s presented.'’

Bishop Leo Frade of the Episcopal Diocese of Southeast Florida said he believes Jefferts Schori will be able to broker a compromise between theological conservatives and liberals.

‘’She is of a liberal position, but I believe she’s willing to listen to the center,'’ Frade said. ‘One thing we cannot allow is that people say, `Well, she’s not my primate.’ She is the primate after this Saturday, like it or not.'’

Read it all

Katharine Jefferts Schori among ‘Glamour Women of the Year’ along with Hollywood stars

November 3rd, 2006 posted by kendall at 6:40 am

HOLLYWOOD - Hollywood stars Sandra Bullock and Queen Latifah were named Women of the Year at the American edition of Glamour magazine’s annual awards on Monday.

Bullock was honored as The Undercover Activist for her quiet million-dollar donations to charities following September 11th and the Indian Ocean Tsunami in December 2004.

Accepting her red trophy at New York City’s Carnegie Hall, Bullock thanked her fellow Women of the Year–An Inconvenient Truth producer Laurie David, Rachael Scdoris, Somaly Mam, Iman, Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, Billie Jean King, Katie Couric and Angela, Rosita and Margherita Missoni.

Bullock said, “Bishop–all I can say to you is it’s about damn time. Billie Jean King, for some reason I don’t play tennis, but I try–I try really hard. Rachael–You’re my hero, you amaze me, I can’t even make it to the gym.”

The rest of the article is here

More stories here and here.

NBC’s Today Show will broadcast interview with Jefferts Schori this morning

November 3rd, 2006 posted by admin at 2:05 am

ENS announces this programming note:

NBC’s Today Show will air on Friday morning, November 3, an interview with Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori, program officials have confirmed.

Viewers should tune in to local NBC network channels by 8:30 a.m. local time, a producer said, in case the segment, slated to air at 8:44 a.m. local time, is shifted in the schedule. The program airs daily 7-10 a.m.

The interview — conducted by Today Show co-anchor Meredith Vieira — was pre-recorded on October 30 in the chapel of the General Theological Seminary in New York City.

Further information — and possibly the interview itself — will be posted online at http://www.msnbc.com and http://www.nbc.com, the producer said.

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