The Episcopal Diocese of Fort Worth is the latest to break with the national church over a dispute that involves Scriptural authority.
-- From "Diocese in Texas Leaves Episcopal Church" by Gretel C. Kovach, New York Times 11/16/08
The Fort Worth diocese amended its constitution to shift allegiance from the Episcopal Church [ECUSA] to the Anglican Communion, its parent body. The measure passed by a vote of 72 to 19 among the clergy and 102 to 25 among the laity, at the diocese’s 26th annual convention at St. Vincent’s Cathedral in Bedford, Tex.
The diocese was welcomed Saturday into the Province of the Southern Cone, based in Argentina, but the realignment is expected to be temporary while the diocese works to establish a conservative province of the Anglican Communion in the United States, diocese leaders said.
Bishop Jack L. Iker laid blame for the split on what he described as “a church that is increasingly unfaithful and disobedient to the word of God, a church that has caused division and dissension both at home and abroad, a church that has torn the fabric of the communion at its deepest level, a church that acts more and more like a rebellious protestant sect and less and less like an integral part of the one holy catholic and apostolic church. It is time to say enough is enough.”
Dioceses in Pittsburgh; Quincy, Ill.; and Fresno, Calif., have also voted to leave the national church.
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