KATHERINE, OUR "RAINBOW GIRL" BISHOP, AND THE SLOW, LINGERING DEATH OF A CHURCH

PRESIDING BISHOP KATHERINE J. SCHORI'
EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN THE UNITED STATES

 As a Boy Scout several decades ago in a troop sponsored by Holy Cross Church in Poplar Bluff, Missouri, I have a strong recollection of being told that Episcopalians in the United States numbered well over 3.5 million.  Fast forward to 2013, during which time the population of the country has grown by 120 million, and the number of Episcopalian communicants has dropped to approximately 1.9 million.

As the so-called "mainline" churches have tended to focus on social issues and have strayed from their mission of sharing the "good news" of the gospel of Jesus Christ, there has been an across the board drop in their membership and a corresponding rapid rise in individuals affiliating with churches which place their emphasis on fundamentalism and evangelicalism.  In no other mainline denomination has the loss of membership been so dramatic as it has in the Episcopal Church in the United States.

AN ALL TOO FREQUENT SIGN OF DECAY

                                                                                                       

                                                                                                 Beginning  in the late 50's and early 60's, Bishop James Pike became a catalyst within the church in questioning basic dogma, such as the Virgin Birth, the Trinity, Heaven and Hell.  Along with that, Pike, before his death in 1969, plunged full speed ahead into the social issues of the day, which included civil and  LGBT rights, racism, and gender discrimination. Although there had been talk of a heresy trial, the church hierarchy never proceeded in that direction, and precedent had been set for a new type of clergy that would bend the church to its will and send traditional Episcopalians down the road to affiliate with various schismatic Anglican groups, or to leave the Anglican Communion altogether.

UNDER BISHOP KATHERINE, NUMBERS OF COMMUNICANTS
CONTINUE TO PLUNGE

Each Sunday from the Book of Common Prayer, Episcopalians recite the Prayers of the People, which include an entreaty for intercession for "Katherine, our Bishop."  Bishop Katherine, in this instance, is none other than Katherine J. Schori, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States.  Bishop Schori, a graduate of Stanford University with a doctoral degree in oceanography from Oregon State and a theological degree from the Divinity School of the  Pacific, became the first woman elected primate in the Anglican Communion and assumed her present position in 2006.

BISHOP KATHERINE IN FULL "RAINBOW" REGALIA

With Bishop Katherine at he helm, controversial church policies have continued to exacerbate the decline of the church.  For example, outspoken Episcopalian conservatives such as Mark Lawrence, bishop of the Diocese of South Carolina, have attracted the ire of Bishop Katherine.  And, inconceivably, Bishop Lawrence has undergone official church prosecution, which has resulted in a schismatic diocese in South Carolina.

With unrelenting stands taken on the blessing of same-sex unions, the ordination of gay clergy, abortion rights and support of government-sanctioned birth control in the new national health care plan, Bishop Katherine is the first presiding bishop of the church to see a mass exodus of dioceses affiliating with the conservative Anglican Church of North America and with conservative dioceses in the Southern Hemisphere.  Retaliating in what would appear to be a truly unchristian-like manner, Bishop Katherine and her hierarchy of supporting clerics in the national church have unleashed several million dollars worth of law suits against departing dioceses and parishes, seeking to retain control of their property and assets. If successful in eventual adjudication of the suits, one wonders what Bishop Katherine and her remaining dioceses will do with fewer and fewer parishoners to fill up vacant and crumbling ecclesiastical properties. Also, in public pronouncements verging on heresy, the presiding bishop has ventured to question whether or not individual Christians may be saved from the consequences of their sins, perhaps reflecting the collectivist nature of her leftist politics.

A long-time Episcopalian layman and former editor of the Dallas Morning News, William Murchison, has written an insightful work on the fate of the Episcopal Church in the United States, MORTAL FOLLIES: EPISCOPALIANS AND THE CRISIS OF MAINLINE CHRISTIANITY.  For a perceptive and farsighted view of what the future might hold for Episcopalians, there is none better than Murchison's.  Certainly, at least for the meantime with Bishop Katherine and her minions in control, the long-term prospects for the Episcopal Church in the United States look none too rosy.

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