Episcopal church may go own way
Members uneasy over liberal trends
By Russell Working Tribune staff reporter
Published March 11, 2007
The Episcopal Church of the Resurrection is celebrating, its worshipers
dancing to bongos and electric guitar music, waving purple flags and lifting
their hands to the Lord.
But an awkward silence falls when a visitor to the West Chicago church calls
out that the Holy Spirit has moved him to speak. For the sake of Episcopalians
everywhere, he says, the congregation should reconsider its plans to walk out on
the denomination.
"I beg you not to leave, because to these people, your leaving would be a
grievous loss," he calls.
If Resurrection follows through on its plans, the congregation will be the
first in the Chicago Episcopal Diocese to leave the national church over issues
that are also threatening to split the global Anglican Communion, to which
Episcopalians belong.
Because the diocese owns the church building, if Resurrection leaves it would
have to abandon its current facilities, including the altar carved by a member,
the sanctuary and an upgraded sound system. But many in the congregation say
they cannot condone the liberalism of the national church, including growing
acceptance of gay rights.
"We believe that we're not moving," said Rev. George Koch, a former software
executive who wears jeans and a clerical collar under a colorful print shirt.
"We're staying put. The Episcopal Church has gone off on a journey that
objectively has set it apart from 3,500 years of Judeo-Christian understanding
of the purpose of sexuality. And if they're right, God bless them. But we don't
think they are."
The Episcopal Church sparked the current crisis by elevating a gay bishop in
2003, putting it at odds with conservative American churches like Resurrection
and much of the rest of the Anglican Communion. But for conservatives, the
issues go beyond homosexuality to more essential theology, in a denomination
where many clergy no longer adhere to traditional doctrines such as the bodily
resurrection of Jesus.
Liberals believe the Episcopal Church should lead the world communion to a
broader message of inclusiveness and acceptance.
If Resurrection leaves the diocese, members likely will seek oversight from a
foreign bishop who holds similar views; about 440 churches in the U.S. already
receive oversight from bishops in Nigeria, Rwanda, Bolivia and Uganda. The
likely separation picked up speed with an exchange of letters between the church
and the diocese over the last three months, and the congregation plans to vote
on the matter within 60 days.
Over time, some 1,363 churches are at risk of leaving the denomination and
seeking foreign oversight, according to the Anglican Communion Network, an
organization of conservative churches. Their numbers include 128 churches like
Resurrection with immediate plans to depart. If all the parishes affiliated with
the network departed, the Episcopal Church would lose 444,000 of its 2.2 million
members.
Internationally, the dispute came to a head recently when Anglican bishops
meeting in Tanzania last month issued a Sept. 30 deadline for the U.S. church to
stop blessing same-sex couples and cease consecrating homosexual bishops.
Presiding Episcopal Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has pleaded with her
flock for patience, saying she believes the church is being asked to pause, not
retreat from its positions.
For Resurrection, this wouldn't be the first time the church's congregation
left en masse. In 1993, when the ordination of homosexual priests was gaining
traction, 400 members and a previous rector who objected to the idea left
Resurrection to start a new Anglican church.
A core of 12 Episcopalians stayed behind, believing they could engage with
the denomination despite its growing liberalism.
With their new priest, Koch (pronounced "Coke"), they rebuilt Resurrection
into a lively body of 140 believers who combine traditional theology with
colorful, emotional services. Now they plan on leaving.
Nationwide, some Episcopalians are hurling insults like "Episcopagans" and "ChristiaNazis"
at one another. But in weighing its decision, Resurrection has avoided such
contentiousness, said Canon David Skidmore.
"In a sense, this was far less tense of a situation than other dioceses have
displayed in the church," Skidmore said. "Both sides, I think have displayed
considerable goodwill toward each other."
Rev. Sam Portaro, a gay retired chaplain from the University of Chicago,
joined Koch last year in co-chairing a diocese committee studying the Windsor
Report, a document released by an Anglican task force in response to outrage
over the consecration of New Hampshire Bishop V. Gene Robinson, who is openly
gay.
Portaro believes that a new understanding of Scripture, ecclesiastical
tradition and human reason all call for a greater acceptance of homosexuality.
But he says Koch isn't a bigot. "George reads and understands certain passages
of Scripture one way, and I read and understand them differently, especially
those Scriptures that pertain to my life and the shape of my life," Portaro
said.
Resurrection was founded in the DuPage County suburb in 1954, and it moved to
its current home on Illinois Highway 59 a decade later. A year after the 1993
split, Koch was called to the pulpit by a congregation so poor it couldn't pay
him a salary for its first decade. A former top executive at Oracle software,
Koch estimates this sacrifice amounted to an in-kind contribution of $300,000 to
$500,000 to the church. He received only a small housing allowance, insurance
and a pension that he would have to forgo if Resurrection leaves.
Under Koch, Resurrection has helped fund outreach to AIDS widows and orphans
in Uganda, which is being devastated by the disease.
During a visit to the East African nation, Koch recalls Christians telling
him, "We're alive because of Jesus Christ."
We are, too, Koch responded, but the Ugandans insisted they were speaking
literally.
Their conservative sexual ethics kept them from contracting HIV while friends
of theirs did.
The diocese says that if the current congregation leaves and a new
congregation can't be built in that location, the property likely would be sold
and proceeds used for mission and ministry elsewhere.
Resurrection has invested about $1 million in its facilities, Koch said,
including "the ark"--a colorful Sunday school building decorated with pictures
of animals and a huge plastic giraffe on the rooftop.
Leaving all of it behind is not what Koch had hoped for, but he can live with
the deal.
After all, the diocese will keep the buildings. He gets the church.
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rworking@tribune.com
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